As it’s National Apprentice week, we thought we’d catch up with our Business Administration apprentice, Chloe McDaid.
Chloe started her 18-month apprenticeship with In Professional Development on Monday 22nd July 2019, working across the different departments.
Chloe spoke to us about her decision to take on an apprenticeship, her main roles and learnings so far, her objectives, her time at college, and what she’s looking forward to achieving over the next few months.
Chloe, why did you decide to do an apprenticeship?
When I finished sixth form, I wasn’t sure on what degree I wanted to study at university. I didn’t want to sit around not learning or take on a part-time job, as I really wanted to be in a dynamic working environment.
In addition to not being sure on my course, I didn’t like the idea of getting myself into the debt of going to university. I value on the job learning/experience more than classroom learning, I get a lot more from this. So, when the opportunity to take an apprenticeship with In Professional Development became available, I jumped at it!
What are your main roles at InPD?
I split my time evenly across 3 departments – Finance, Marketing and Operations.
Every Monday and Tuesday, I work with the Finance department and look at credit control, invoice creation, supplier forms and the payment of invoices. I quite enjoy this part of my job as I know I’m bringing value to the company.
Wednesday and Thursday, I work with the Marketing department, supporting them with data cleansing, processing delegate feedback and of recent, writing up delegate case studies. Again, I like this part of my week as I’m quite interested in the marketing side and seeing how all the marketing activities link together to support the sales team and build the In Professional Development brand.
I usually spend Friday working with our operations department. As well as supporting at our events, I help the team by sending out joining instructions, contacting delegates prior to their attendance, digitalising our feedback forms, creating registration lists and certificates.
What objectives are you working towards as part of your apprenticeship?
My official apprenticeship objectives are to complete my apprenticeship before my 18-month deadline, which I am on course to do. I have my learning journey card objective, which monitors my learning, improvements and the areas I need to develop in. It tracks my on-the-job skills, role knowledge and behaviours. The college review my card every 3 months.
Finally, I am working towards a target of 20% off the job learning, this means when I learn or take part something new i.e: setting up one of our courses in London or helping with the creation of case studies.
At InPD my personal objectives are as follows:
- Hit my weekly credit control target,
- Daily work on the sales ledger, helping with queries and amendments,
- Support with the development of data,
- Digitalisation of feedback forms and testimonials from delegates,
- Support operations at our learning events.
The feedback I’ve had from my one to ones had been very positive and I feel very confident that I will meet all of my objectives.
How are you finding the college aspect of your apprenticeship?
I enjoy the college aspect of my apprenticeship, it’s been great to meet with new people and share ideas and experiences about our different apprenticeships. I’ve taken away some great new ideas that I can implement back in my role. Attending college has helped me to build my confidence when communicating with others, as I must give clear, presentations to the rest of the class. I’m getting good feedback from my tutors at college so I’m happy with my progress and the support that I get with my assignments from the team at INPD.
Director, David Hall had this to say about the decision to hire our first apprentice, “As a company that sees the importance and value of investing time and money into developing their staff, hiring an apprentice was a no brainier for us!
Due to our rapid growth we had the opportunity to bring in an enthusiastic and ambitious apprentice, so we jumped at the chance to bring Chloe on board.
Young apprentices can bring a many advantages to an organisation and play an important role in any team dynamic. Chloe has brought different ideas, new skills and a fresh view on how we tackle challenges and opportunities. She has thrown herself in to the role and has proven to be a real asset to the business whilst learning new skills all the time. Great job so far, Chloe”.
In the remaining months of her apprenticeship Chloe is looking forward to developing her skills further and becoming more knowledgeable in all aspects of her job. She said she has enjoyed working with people of different experience levels as she has been able to take on additional knowledge from them and apply it to her college assignments.
Well done Chloe!
If you would like to know more about what we do visit the InPD course page or head over to our LinkedIn page.
