Celebrating talent and diversity with the Asian Apprenticeship Awards

Just over a week ago, I had the privilege of being in the room with over 500 talented apprentices, their employers and learning providers at the Asian Apprenticeship Awards. It was a hugely memorable night and there is still a warm glow in our office as we read the many emails and social media messages from winners excited about the opportunities that winning a national award brings.

However, our aim in setting up the Asian Apprenticeship Awards was so much more than creating a feel good factor. This is the third year that our team have run the awards. We set up the event on the back of government research and targets to get more British Asians to consider the apprenticeship opportunities. The cause is important as British Asians are significantly underrepresented partly due to misunderstanding and a certain stigma around this subject.  The aim of the awards is to recognise and celebrate the best and as I have come to appreciate, the best people to promote apprenticeships is apprentices themselves. This is why we need to bring out the best of the best, and a competition in the form of awards is a great way to do just that.

Too many British Asian young people are making an automatic decision to go to university without fully considering the alternatives, and then finding their options limited upon graduation. Just as there is an under representation of British Asians considering apprenticeships, by contrast there is an over-representation going to University. We also need to dispel the myth that apprenticeships are only for the less academic it is more about gaining the right experience while developing the skills to thrive in a modern workplace. Many of our winners this year are of graduate calibre, either taking the apprentice route to their degree, or becoming an apprentice after graduation. We hope the winners will share their journey and story and encourage others.

Now we are in year three we have awarded apprentices from all around the country and from many sectors. Our winners are change makers and role models, their talent is world class. They all have a story of determination and hard work, many have overcome family concerns in their chosen career path, and all are conscious of the influence they have in encouraging other young people to consider the apprenticeship route. It was a pleasure to meet them, and many of their proud parents, and I say again, congratulations to them.

Many of our winners named particularly supportive colleagues and managers in their entries. The commitment of the employers who were in the room is to be commended, it is their support that enables their apprentices to thrive. We often hear that employers are the backbone of our country and there is no doubt about that.  It is these businesses that we need to step up further as these great businesses will make great apprentices, who in turn make great businesses.

So many organisations have been highly supportive of the Awards and the vision we are aiming to achieve. In their centenary year, we were delighted to have the RAF as our headline sponsor. Each category has its own sponsor, many of whom have worked with us tirelessly in tandem with us. My, thanks to APM, ICQ, NOCN, AELP, Pathway Group, Severn Trent, Dudley College, Birmingham Met College, BAME Apprenticeship Alliance and the East and West Midlands Ambassador Network who continue to support the awards through challenging times for many in our sector.

 

Finally, my personal thanks to all involved for another successful event. We plan to be back next year and look forward to your support again but in the meantime, the full list of the 2018 winners is on our website and the full photos from the evening are also available as below:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/socialframes/albums/72157704103474624

https://asianapprenticeshipawards.co.uk/2018/12/01/asian-apprentices-year-celebrate-glittering-ceremony/

CHARLIE Mullins will tell you that apprenticeships are the way forward.....

CHARLIE Mullins will tell you that apprenticeships are the way forward for everybody- businesses and for employees. In addition, that building a successful business is not as complex as many might claim and believe!

And he is a man worth listening to because after leaving school with no qualifications Charlie became Britain’s first millionaire plumber with a business now employing more than 300 people and turning over tens of millions and with no signs of slowing down at all.

Charlie openly supports Apprenticeships at any given opportunity, it is the apprenticeship that started Charlie off in his business, and this is the reason for my visit to his head office near Lambeth Road, to meet with him to discuss Apprenticeships but also entrepreneurship and business.

So, what does a man who certainly ‘walks the talk’ think makes for success in business?

“The way I run my business isn’t rocket science, its common sense,” said Charlie, who after leaving school at 15 – he believes his mistake was not to leave a year earlier – went on to do a plumbing apprenticeship.

Now comes the rub: “The only problem is that common sense isn’t that common.”

Charlie was the typical ‘man with a van’ and when he started in business that is what he had – second hand of course - along with a bag of tools.
Being young in the age of moon flights, Concord and the early pioneering of medical advances such as heart transplants, Charlie had his feet very much on the ground and from just nine years of age he wanted to be a plumber.


“I set out to change the image of the plumbing industry and get rid of the stigma of plumbers always turning up late in rusty old vans, no uniforms and with the arses hanging out their trousers, bad workmanship and ripping off the customer,” he said.

For Charlie plumbing is a trade that should run as a profession with high standards and it is an ethos that he expects from his employees.
His smart blue liveried vans and staff in uniforms have a corporate look.

His firm is regarded as the plumbers of choice for the stars, the rich and famous ranging from former Prime Minister David Cameron to stars of stage and screen and many more.

Apprentice training is part of raising the status and standing of plumbers. He is unhappy that anyone can call themselves a plumber and would also like greater regulation of plumbing including licensing.

In some respects, Charlie Mullins is a man of contradictions and is completely proud of this.
Born and raised on a London council estate, he is proud of his success and not ashamed to wear his money with a love of cars including a £300,000 Bentley. He has a number of homes and admits to spending a lot of money on holidays.

With a keen interest in politics, Charlie believes Margaret Thatcher helped to make it possible for people like him to ‘better’ themselves and set up businesses.

He has advised Government, including former Prime Minister David Cameron and the former Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne.
However, he is much less enthusiastic about Prime Minister Theresa May and believes Brexit will prove to be a bad mistake.

He is a great believer in young people and a champion of apprenticeships. Charlie is a Patron of the Prince’s Trust and has setup ‘The Pimlico Apprenticeship School’ that he has put to Government and believes would help to dramatically cut youth unemployment.


Charlie is also a sponsor and fund raiser for The Rhys Daniels Trust that provides a home from home environment at Children’s Hospitals.
“I’ve been fortunate enough to be in a position to be able to put something back into society by helping others,” added Charlie Mullins.

But whilst being a strong advocate and champion of young people, Charlie has a huge regard for age and experience.

He makes no secret of the fact that he is keen to employ older people and someone over 100 and another in his 90’s have been on his books.
“Employ older people because their experience is priceless,” he added.

Experience and learning, at times from mistakes, is at the core of Charlie’s business success. He admits that borrowing from a bank was a huge error that almost resulted in the business going bust.
Perhaps it is because common sense is usually a product of age and experience and learning from the ‘school of hard knocks’ that it is not that common.

Charlie Mullins is in his early 60’s and put me to shame with his is very youthful look but what impressed me most was his energy levels shown in his enthusiasm and ambitions which include growing the business to an annual turnover of more than £100 million and having it recognised as the UK’s leading plumbing and service company.

I must say that in meeting with him, I found him truly inspiring, as he is the best kind of inspirer – doing it by example.

Please also review his take on my meeting with him on their website with the link below:
https://www.pimlicoplumbers.com/blog/apprentice-to-executive-filming-for-a-new-youtube-series-with-pathway-group

He is an avid user of twitter - connect with him on:
https://twitter.com/pimlicoplumbers

Thank you to all the team at Pimlico and Charlie for taking time out to support our promotion of Apprenticeships through “Apprentice to Executive” video series and the Asian Apprenticeship Awards.

Proud moment with The Asian Apprenticeship Awards

THE very best in apprentices from the British Asian community have taken a bow at a very special awards presentation. The first ever Asian Apprenticeship Awards took place on the 10th November 2016. These awards aim is to celebrate and showcase the best of British Asian Apprentices and the people that employ and train them.

Background and context

Apprenticeships provide value for individuals, businesses, and the economy. Over the last 5 years, more than two million apprenticeship courses have been delivered; the government is now aiming for another three million recruits by the year 2020.

For those who are involved within this particular field, the ultimate goal is that the prospect of higher education, no longer outweighs the opportunity to embark upon an apprenticeship. And with the expansion of Higher, and Degree Apprenticeships available, this seems more likely than ever before.

The opportunities for apprenticeships are rapidly increasing every year. With an immense rise in specialised and highly skilled apprenticeship courses being offered. The government has also put employers in the driving seat – groups of employers, large and small are working together to design apprenticeships so that they respond to the needs of their industries. Current apprenticeship frameworks are being replaced by standards. The aim is to increase the quality of apprenticeships- introducing more rigorous testing at the end of the apprenticeship to ensure that the apprentice is fully competent and grading to challenge and stretch.

There is also the additional change to apprenticeship funding with again the employers being in the driving seat with funding shifting towards them and for employers taking a central role of their own budgets. The first of these changes is planned to take place in May 2017 with these additional changes there is no doubt that apprenticeships will shift into main stream language and culture.

There is a universal commitment in the UK of being able to extend opportunities for everyone, regardless of their race, gender, or religion. In this respect, a number of government targets have been placed to improve the labour market chances for all. These include increasing the quantity of apprenticeships taken on by young people deriving from BME backgrounds by 20%, and then increasing BME employment by another 20%, by the year 2020.



British Asian community is under represented

Most of us recognise that for the success of businesses and therefore the economy and the country as a whole we have to be able to draw upon a skilled and motivated workforce.
It is also clear that our apprentices are vital to providing those skills. But it is also clear that there are not enough of them and especially not enough of them from the British Asian communities.
So the challenge for us is how to help address this issue.

The Asian Apprenticeship Awards are all about doing something practical to make a positive difference and we will continue to do so by highlighting, recognising and celebrating apprenticeship success both with individuals, employers and learning providers that support them.



As the Founder and Chair of the Asian Apprenticeship Awards I stated that “Apprentices are vital to our future but the British Asian community is under represented and “The best way to raise awareness and to encourage others is to show what can be achieved and we have been delighted by the response from apprentices, employers and sponsors.” “Without the support of our apprentices, the people who employ them, our sponsors, judges and ambassadors this event would not have been possible.”


It is envisaged that the Asian Apprenticeship Awards which had representation from across the country and industries will become an annual event.