Making tracks for the future

With so many employers looking to recruit from a diminishing pool of engineers and those with technical qualifications, the approach of Network Rail has been to grow its own. Its advanced apprenticeship scheme, designed to help recruits develop the skills they need for a long-term future with Network Rail, represents a fiveyear, £30-million investment by the company and is designed to train up a new generation of skilled technicians to help maintain and upgrade Britain's railway for the future.

Network Rail owns and operates Britain's rail infrastructure, which covers a vast network of rail, signals, electrified lines and telecommunications. Taking over from the much-maligned Railtrack in 2002, it works to ensure 20,000 miles of track, 20,000 points, 30,000 signals and 10,000 miles of electrified lines are reliable and effective - the network on which 2.75 million people travel every day.

Now in its third year, the advanced apprenticeship scheme will take on 240 aspiring engineers. For the first time, in 2007, Network Rail will also be training telecoms specialists, alongside the existing disciplines of track, signalling or electrification and plant.

In the first year of their course, the apprentices will be trained at the Royal Navy's historic base HMS Sultan in Gosport in Hampshire and accommodated nearby at HMS Collingwood. HMS Sultan is Europe's largest engineering training centre while HMS Collingwood boasts bespoke facilities, including refurbished accommodation, a swimming pool and football, tennis and squash amenities. The apprentices will be taught by Network Rail and Flagship Training Ltd, and will earn as they learn, being paid £9,000 in their first year rising to £13,000 by year three.

The initial course of study will give the apprentices a solid background in engineering, leading to attainment of NVQs at levels 2 and 3 and a Btec National Award technical certificate. Network Rail staff, delivering a range of railspecific training, will teach the second and third years of the course. This will help to fulfil Network Rail's strategy of standardising its employees' set of competencies and standards.

Jessie Smith, a signalling apprentice, is currently checking signals across East Anglia. "Sometimes there can be a fault and on one occasion I had to spend up to 12 hours fixing it," she says. "But that's the nature of the job. A lot can happen and from one day to the next, it can be very different. I know that if I keep the signals in good working order - and part of that involves giving the electrical circuit a good clean - then I'm helping to keep the network running smoothly."

Richard Berry, an electrification and plant apprentice, adds: "What I'm doing is essential for the smooth running of the railway, especially in winter. Whatever time of year, the great thing is that I'm outdoors, I'm working with a team of experienced people, I'm learning, I'm doing something really satisfying and I've got a real future in front of me."

Dan Anderson, a track apprentice, has set his sights on being a technical officer for one of the inspection teams. "So far I've worked with a number of different teams, including ultrasonics," he says.

Network Rail's advanced apprenticeship scheme is one of a number of innovative recruitment schemes it has established to attract and retain skilled employees. In fact, the company recently won a Talent Management Award at a ceremony organised by Human Resources magazine, Personnel Today, beating off stiff competition, including Carphone Warehouse and Deloittes.

According to head of marketing Mark Shaoul, Westwood, the training and development centre Network Rail opened just over a year ago right next to the University of Warwick, is "the heartbeat of the organisation. It offers courses varying from nine-month leadership and management programmes to day courses and caters for people on the frontline to senior management. I recently completed a course there myself."

Peter Bennett, HR director at Network Rail, explains the thinking behind Westwood. "Network Rail issues can be complex and technical, and the company wanted to avoid a situation where there was rapid turnover of employees with huge corporate memory, leaving us with no option but to use expensive, time-consuming recruitment processes," he says.

"Our challenge was to better manage Network Rail's talent and succession planning; and to ensure a talent pool for the future. We worked with the University of Warwick and the Centre for High Performance Development to devise a process to identify, select, assess, develop and manage talent across the company.

"We then established a world-class leadership centre to run development centres, training and education programmes, strategy planning and functional events. University-accredited leadership programmes included assignments on real business issues that were relevant to Network Rail, and this enabled us to build a substantial talent pool, ready to take the next step up."

Bennett credits Westwood with the fact that, last year, 60 per cent of key business-critical vacancies were filled from within Network Rail, halving the need and cost of external recruitment. Mark Shaoul is also keen to ensure the company's recruitment policy involves them speaking to a new audience.

"Instead of being one of a number of companies that rocks up at a graduate careers fair as everyone is desperately looking for a job, we looking to enter into the public consciousness and start the dialogue much earlier," he says. "I've just signed off a couple of case studies which will be included in a business studies course as part of the 14-19 curriculum and we're using the internet in more innovative ways.

"Our graduate recruitment campaign is now solely online, including the application process and we're looking to establish an ongoing dialogue with potential applicants using the web - a kind of online buddying scheme or mentoring service."

For Shaoul, it's about attracting the right type of people rather than people with the right qualifications. "While some organisations will dismiss any applicant who hasn't got a 2:1, we' re happy to consider engineers with 2:2s, for example," he says. "But it's really about attitude and commitment. We feel this is a job worth doing and that recruits need to share in our values."

For more information on the Advanced Apprenticeship Scheme, see www.everyday brilliance.co.uk; www.networkrail.co.uk.