Greene King pledges to recruit 2,000 apprentices in 2014: Greene King has pledged to recruit over 2,000 apprentices in 2014 to follow a “new and improved career path, which now includes advanced management qualifications that provide a clear route from team member roles right through to managing a business, and enhanced kitchen skills qualifications”. Supported by its existing apprenticeship schemes, in the 12 months to April 2013, Greene King reported boosts to both motivation and productivity across all participating venues with overall retail key performance indicators improving: Team turnover fell 8%, employee engagement rose 4% and labour productivity improved over 2%. John Smith, group HR director for Greene King, said: “We made the decision to recruit 2,000 new apprentices this year following the success of our existing apprenticeship scheme, which has been running since 2011. As our business grows, we are proud to offer the apprentices that join Greene King the opportunity move straight onto a career path to allow them to fulfil their true potential.” Launched in 2011, the apprenticeship scheme has so far been undertaken by over 3,500 employees, working across the group’s pub, bar, restaurant and hotel outlets. Greene King has enjoyed positive results following the programmes initial introduction and has ambitions over the next couple of years to increase the number of kitchen apprentices across its businesses as well as the continued quality of the training and programmes provided. To strengthen and build on this success, Greene King will offer employees who undertake the scheme from March 2014, a BII Licensed Hospitality Advanced Apprenticeship at level 3 and a Level 4 Diploma in Hospitality Management, following the successful pilot of the level 5 Diploma in Management, where three managers celebrated their achievement. Greene King plans to extend its apprenticeship programme further to allow new team members to join the scheme at the start of their employment. Apprentices will be able to build their own personalised and tailored programme to suit their needs and career aspirations to further encourage independent study and create a challenging and stimulating learning experience. Jeremy Scorer, managing partner for Charnwood Training Group, who played a key role in developing Greene King’s apprenticeship scheme said: “I am delighted with this announcement and the introduction of the new programmes; it is proof of the value of working in partnership to deliver incredible results. When we developed this programme it was important to take Greene King’s well-established career pathway into account and it is so encouraging to see so many sites have taken up the programmes we offer to up-skill their teams and improve their business. The results are a testament to the valuable work we are doing to support the hospitality industry and help secure its future.”