Applying for an Apprenticeship - why, when, how

Our mission is to help you find the ideal apprenticeship and our recruitment process is designed to understand you, your motivations, your capabilities and try to match you to a suitable opportunity.

Why do an Engineering Apprenticeship?
The best people to answer this question are those who have done an apprenticeship or are doing one. Here is what Saadiq, Lydia, Alice and Jacques have to say....

School of College Leavers
Now is the time to apply if you are interested in starting an apprenticeship after your current school or college course. There are lots of employers who time their vacancy to start in September, once the latest cohort of people complete their current studies. 

Already finished school of college?
You can start an apprenticeship at any age and we have vacancies available pretty much all year round so there is often opportunities available with immediate starts. Our recruitment runs all year round and attracts candidates with a wide variety of skills and backgrounds; submitting an application form is the first step in finding an apprenticeship for you, more about this below.

It’s a competitive process
Like with any job application and recruitment process, there is no guarantee of success. This means you must submit a full and engaging application form plus do your research into any businesses you are put forward to. We always advise you to have multiple options when planning how you take your education and career forward in order to not have all your eggs in one basket.

ETT Talent Pool
We accept applications both in relation to a specific vacancy and also from candidates who are interested in being considered for multiple opportunities. If you know you want a career in engineering and want to follow the apprenticeship route, it is worth applying and entering our Talent Pool so we can match you with any vacancies that are open or vacancies that are added in the future.

Our Talent Pool is a group of candidates who have completed their application form, successfully completed their online assessment and have completed their interview with one of our Training Officers. To enter the Talent Pool, all you have to do is submit a general application or, if applying for a specific vacancy, tick the box on the application form to say you are happy for us to consider you for different opportunities.

Recruitment and Shortlisting
We follow an in-depth recruitment and selection process to ensure we only put forward candidates who are suitable for each vacancy. There are four stages to the process;

1. Application: You have to complete our application form which draws out the key information we need to assess if you are suitable and motivated to do an engineering apprenticeship.
2. Vocational Aptitude Assessment: This is an online assessment of your abilities in terms of key skills such as mechanical reasoning, understanding electrical principles, spatial awareness, principles of measurement, literacy, numeracy and general information technology. The results assist our team in assessing the level and type of apprenticeship you are suitable for.
3. Telephone Interview: If your application form is suitable and you successfully complete the assessment you will be invited to a telephone interview with one of our Training Officers, all of who are engineers themselves. Within the interview our team will ask you questions to understand your motivation to work in engineering, your drive to complete an apprenticeship, your interests, skills and capabilities. The Training Officer will also talk to you about your location, your willingness to travel (or not, that is fine too) and your willingness to relocate if required should you not be located close to any of our vacancies. Lastly they talk to you about the vacancies, both in terms of current availability and what you would want to be considered for in the future.
4. Shortlisting: Those who have successfully completed the first three steps will be shortlisted for any vacancies suited to them. We meet on a weekly basis to discuss the shortlisting of candidates, both in terms of those who only want to be considered for a specific vacancy and those from the Talent Pool. This is an ongoing process, so if you are shortlisted and unsuccessful for one vacancy, then you will be put forward for others that we feel you are suited to.

Employer Interviews and Selection  
In order for our partner employers to get the right person for their business, the final stage of the process is completed by each employer. We provide the employer with a shortlist of candidates who we feel are suitable for the vacancy. They then decide which candidates they would like to interview for the role. Each employer has a different process and we will speak with each candidate to assist you at every stage. Ultimately the decision of who the employer takes on is theirs. 

Appointment
Once the employer knows who they want to employ, they will send the candidate and official offer of employment. This follows their normal process to employ someone and we too will complete the necessary paperwork required of us as the Training Provide. Once all that is in place we agree an apprenticeship start date and crack on with your training. 

Apply 
So, if you think an Engineering apprenticeship is right for you then don’t hesitate, get you application form completed and begin the process of being considered for a vacancy. You can submit a general application to be considered for all our current and future vacancies or see our current open vacancies by clicking here >