RedEye
Scott Young, Chief Executive Officer
Tackling skills shortages: Benefits of degree apprenticeships for SMEs
Founded in 1997, RedEye generate significant ROI for their clients by providing sophisticated marketing automation solutions, enabling them to better understand and respond to customer behaviour. They are based in Crewe and have approximately 100 employees.
RedEye identified the potential of apprenticeships at an early stage. Scott first heard about degree apprenticeships at a Manchester Digital careers event. He attended an Apprenticeships Open Evening at Manchester Metropolitan University and recruited their first apprentices onto the Digital and Technology Solutions Degree Apprenticeship in September 2016.
This was the start of a new way of recruiting talent and establishing a dynamic apprenticeship development programme. In 2023, they have 10 apprentices in learning at Manchester Met (Digital and Technology Solutions – Software Engineer, Digital Marketer and Digital User Experience), making up 10% of their workforce.
Developing an in-house talent pipeline
We were experiencing the same digital skills shortage faced by employers across the country and were initially plugging those gaps by outsourcing work overseas. However, this wasn’t a long-term solution, and we began to look at other options.
Degree apprenticeships ticked a lot of boxes for us. They enabled us to keep work in-house, to grow our own talent, and to diversify our workforce.
Implementing new ways of working is never easy – a case had to be made to our board and we started off small, with just two apprentices. However, the impact was clear from the beginning, and it has quickly become an established route within our business. We currently have 10 degree apprentices in learning with Manchester Met.
Benefits of degree apprenticeships to SMEs
As an SME, the reason we chose to work with Manchester Met is because of the partnership and collaboration with business. We are really impressed with how Manchester Met works in partnership to design the programmes and take an active interest in what employers need.
The reason we’ve continued to work with Manchester Met over the last five years is that we’ve found the programmes are really progressive, they don’t stay still. They continue to evolve and continue to match up to what the business needs.
Smaller businesses like ours don’t have the luxury of dedicated early years support or big HR departments, but that shouldn’t be a barrier. The benefits our apprentices bring far outweigh the initial legwork required to onboard apprentices, and we received a huge amount of support from the University.
Learning and growing together
A key benefit for our apprentices is being able to work in a classroom setting with other apprentices, and the key advantage there is of bringing that back into our business to enhance everything that we do.
Our apprentices receive wrap-around support, rich on-the-job experience and add value right from the beginning – all without recruitment fees.
While we hope they’ll remain with us once they graduate, and so far, they have, we also understand that these new qualifications and experiences open doors for people, and they move on. In this market, to have employees who are dedicated to the business for four years is amazing.