Finding diverse, skilled technical talent is difficult. Having a consistent pipeline of good skilled talent year round is difficult, especially for more junior positions. Industry is shifting to new training models that turn traditional models upside down and that work better for companies, recruiters, and learners. Pre-apprenticeships are a great way for companies and training providers to work together to provide real opportunities to learners and develop a strong, skilled, talent pipeline.
Qwasar has run pre-apprenticeship programs to provide a pipeline of skilled software talent to various companies, while maintaining affordable programs and attracting learners from a huge variety of backgrounds. This method has been highly successful for companies and for learners, and there should be more of them in industry.
What is a Pre-apprenticeship?
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Pre-Apprenticeship
The Department of Labor defines a Pre-apprenticeship as, “A program or set of services designed to prepare individuals to enter and succeed in a Registered Apprenticeship program.”
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Apprenticeship An apprenticeship is defined as, “An industry-driven, high-quality career pathway where employers can develop and prepare their future workforce, and individuals can obtain paid work experience, classroom instruction, and a nationally-recognized, portable credential.” |
Internship An internship is defined as, “the position of a student or trainee who works in an organization, sometimes without pay, in order to gain work experience or satisfy requirements for a qualification.” |
In our pre-apprenticeship programs, students complete technical training according to Silicon Valley standards and gain significant software development experience to add to their technical portfolio - we’d like to think all pre-apprenticeships or software training programs do this too, but the reality is, very few do. After training, employers evaluate then hire them as interns, apprentices, or even employees to contribute to their company. The career on-ramp this provides as well as mentorship from software engineers in industry enables more learners to get hired. The curriculum acts as a preparation for job tasks and expectations, as well as the apprenticeship or internship itself (which is very much the new ‘entry-level software job’ these days), meaning employers get high quality talent for open software positions.
By working with a training provider that uses skills-based learning, competency-based education methods, and active hands-on learning, you can be assured that the candidates you hire are of the highest quality and actually have the experience and capabilities you’re looking for in your candidates. (A word of warning - be very careful who you pick as a training provider: programs that rely on knowledge transfer and don’t actually prepare learners for on-the-job skills required to succeed won’t produce win-win situations.)
Pre-apprenticeship Programs Create a Consistent Pipeline of Technical Talent
Highly skilled and qualified talent is becoming increasingly difficult for companies to find. The recruiting process takes time and financial resources that should be put to good use. The use of pre-apprenticeship programs can be a great way for engineering managers, HR leaders, and recruiters to create a consistent pipeline of talent with the technical skills you’re looking for, and to plan their hiring strategically. Such programs reduce the risk of spending time and resources down the road to find and hire new candidates to fill positions. Pre-apprenticeship programs that are true collaborations can time pre-apprenticeship cohorts such that there are students graduating constantly throughout the year. At Qwasar, having several dates throughout the calendar year means we’re flexible enough to accommodate a variety of schedules for both learners and companies. This creates a stream of candidates that flow through the pipeline each month or quarter. For a recruiter, this is the ideal situation to fill positions on a regular basis.
For companies, this provides a source of talent with technical skills that match what your company is looking for. Do you need more engineers with Rust experience? Are you looking for someone that is skilled in C++ and low-level programming experience? Do you prefer candidates with React experience? Work with us to design a program that develops the specific talent that you need. Our programs can be customized to fit front-end skills, specific back-end skills, most common languages, and even some not-so-common languages.
Software Pre-apprenticeship Programs Can Be a Great Source of Diversity
Pre-apprenticeship programs (that are well done) enable learners from all backgrounds to participate and gain experience in the tech industry. These programs ensure candidates of all genders, races, economic backgrounds, or professional backgrounds can thrive in an environment of growth and hands-on learning. It opens doors to people who otherwise had barriers to entry into tech, whether geographical or socio-economic.
One of the most important aspects of our programs is affordability. Our total program cost is $2,400 with payments made monthly to make the opportunity affordable. This price point enables more learners to get into tech that may not have previously had the chance, and combined with the flexible and remote nature of our program options means we truly have skilled, diverse candidates - which we think is awesome. Flexibility, such as offering Saturday programs, is especially important for lower income populations who can’t afford not to work. Our programs are offered on a full-time and part-time basis to accommodate learners with varying schedules and commitments.
We have one of the highest rates of diversity in our programs compared to other training options, largely due to the affordable, flexible, and part-time nature of our programs. You get highly trained, competent, diverse talent - arguably a gold-mine for companies interested in increasing their workforce diversity, but doing so requires working with a good training provider and creating pre-apprenticeship programs as well as on-ramp jobs and opportunities.
Easily Hire Pre-apprentices
Working with a training provider for a software pre-apprenticeship program means the process of hiring students is direct and seamless. At Qwasar, students can be hired before the full program is even completed since programs are based around skills and competency, and it’s up to the hiring manager to decide if the appropriate level has been attained before program completion.
The ultimate goal for students in a pre-apprenticeship program is career success - both short-term and long-term. With our pre-apprenticeship programs, by providing project-based learning methods and combining competency-based education with active learning, students develop both the hard and soft skills necessary to succeed in industry - and to qualify for your open software positions. They spend time focusing on truly learning each concept, on building a strong foundational understanding of how computers work, and in developing key capabilities in software engineering, full stack development, data engineering, AI, or cloud engineering. This ensures they are capable of explaining what they know, performing on the job, collaborating with other engineers, and passing technical interviews.
Obtaining talent from our programs is an easy and professional process. If you don’t hire all of the candidates from the program, Qwasar helps to place them elsewhere at other opportunities in our network. You can also follow the progress of pre-apprentices you didn’t accept upon graduation for future roles at your company that might work out in a couple of years.
Software Pre-apprenticeship Programs Are a Win-win For Employers and Students
A pre-apprenticeship program works to the advantage of all parties involved, which is rare in most forms of educational training. Typically the entities are separate in the sense that students gain an education and then seek employment on their own. This can lead to underemployment, employment gaps, unequal job access, missed opportunities, and even missed talent by recruiters simply because learner resumes aren’t up to standards (when the candidates themselves are).
In a pre-apprenticeship partnership, students win, recruiters win, employers win, and tech training providers win. Companies are set up for long-term success by hiring high-caliber talent that will perform well and be a great investment. Recruiters win by spending less time sourcing talent and focusing more directly on program graduates, with confidence of their abilities and placement. Students network and build relationships with those employed in industry and are mentored by seasoned engineers. Tech training providers are able to make a difference in providing education to train the next generation of engineers for the digital world while also helping graduates to gain employment. They can continue to educate students with the student’s career success at the forefront of program innovation.
How Pre-apprenticeship Partnerships Work at Qwasar
The unique thing about this type of partnership is that there is no cost to the employer. This is a huge benefit, when taking into consideration the time, effort, and financial resources that employers use to recruit a candidate for even a single position. The process works by developing a co-branded program to promote to learners. We then recruit learners for the program and train them using our 21-st century educational methods and advanced curricula. Then, we spend time preparing pre-apprentices to apply and undergo interviews in our unique Technical Interview Preparation Program. We carefully dedicate time to each learner to ensure they are prepared for employment.
As a company, you provide engineers or engineering managers to do “virtually visit campus” to present to students and expose them to a deeper level of understanding about your organization as well as share more technical and software-related aspects of products, projects, or engineering teams. This is beneficial for students and they really enjoy better understanding technology and what it’s like to be an engineer or developer at your company. There is also the opportunity to send engineers to do peer code reviews, reviewing code for specific projects in our curriculum submitted by pre-apprentices. This is a great way to connect with talent and see how they are progressing in their learning. There are so many ways to get involved with our students during a pre-apprenticeship program to positively impact the learning journey.
You Don’t Need to Have an Apprenticeship Program to Run a Pre-apprenticeship Program
If your organization does not currently offer an apprenticeship program, you can still run a pre-apprenticeship program. It is still an organic opportunity to source and find great candidates and future talent for your company. This could be run as a pre-internship program if your company has internship opportunities of any kind. Even if your company only has a few job openings, this is a way to fill these positions and garner interest from top level tech talent that is diverse. Pre-apprenticeship programs are a whole training option before entry level talent starts at your company. This also assures your efforts are being invested in the right avenues.
If You Have an Apprenticeship Program You Should be Running a Pre-apprenticeship Program
If your company already has apprenticeship programs, you should be seizing the opportunity to run a pre-apprenticeship program. This is the best way to capitalize on talent and fill positions with the apprenticeship program. Partnering with Qwasar is a way to offer a technical level of training way over the level most can afford. It opens doors for more diverse and talented candidates that may not otherwise consider your organization. You could be missing out on talent that your apprenticeship can greatly benefit from. The most important thing to remember about Qwasar programs is that we scale. For an organization, finding consistent talent takes time and effort, this can be solved with a pre-apprenticeship program to feed talent right into your pipeline.
Conclusion
A pre-apprenticeship program is something you want to consider at your company if you are interested in sourcing high quality talent without the hassle of pipeline problems. Partnering with Qwasar to develop a customized pre-apprenticeship can be a simple way to grow your organization in a diverse and systematic way. Our candidates graduate with advanced technical skills and a mindset of motivation and success. They want to prove how well they are capable of succeeding and show that from day one. If this interests you, take the next steps and reach out to us for more information.
