Young MCA Apprentices and School Leavers | Learning and Development Event Feature

Words by Naeem Ahmed, Digital Apprentice, Technology Consulting at EY.

Last Thursday, members of the Young MCA’s committee organised a virtual workshop on Learning and Development. The session was hosted by Izzy Fewster Jones and Abdul Hassan, both Vice Chairs of school leavers.

The initial discussion, led by Ceri Hughes a director from KPMG, prompted us to explore the growing importance of being proactive in our individual development. In a virtual working world, away from face to face contact and in person experiences it is vital we actively seek out development opportunities to fill in the gaps. Utilising an interactive poll we discussed the ‘why’ and it became clear we all understood the importance of  continuous L&D but were maybe unsure on the ‘how’.

A key takeaway from this section of the workshop for me was the 70/20/10 model and how we can take steps to successfully implement this approach. The idea that learning goes beyond technical skills / qualifications and away from our comfort zones was thought provoking and reinforced the emphasis on seeking new opportunities. Ceri quoted “Learning should be a constant in our careers” and this particularly resonated with myself and the attendees.

Following on from this we heard from Harriet Willsher, Degree Apprentice from IBM, and Tasmin Wall, Digital Apprentice from Atkins. They provided some insights to their career experiences so far and some steps they’ve been taking for time management, stepping out of their comfort zones and overall personal leadership. It was great to hear from young professionals in similar phases of their careers and helped to contextualise some of the steps we can be taking to enhance our approach to L&D.

We concluded by collecting tools and services we personally find effective and shared them with the group. I have listed a few below, although it is always useful to search your organisations intranet and internal documentation for learning partners and firm-wide learning platform licenses.

https://www.udemy.com/ – broads range of learning topics in several sectors / competencies

https://www.freecodecamp.org/ – Coding & programming

https://www.w3schools.com/ – same as above

Overall, my biggest takeaway from the workshop was the realisation of the importance of being continuously aware and active in my own development. It is easy for this to be pushed aside when starting your career and it is difficult to keep on track. However, if we take ownership of our L&D journey and continue to be proactive, we can ensure we continue to grow and thrive throughout our evolving careers

“Change is not a threat, it’s an opportunity. Survival is not the goal, transformative success is.” — Seth Godin