7th February 2020 Our CEO, Mark Creighton spoke with Hr Grapevine. Apprenticeships have long been considered a fast route for young jobseekers to make it into their chosen career and it seems managers and parents have also dubbed them as the ‘best career route’. Research of 1,000 individuals released today by Avado discovered that 68% of parents said they believed apprenticeships were a good career option. In a separate survey of managers, 71% expressed their belief in the value of non-traditional qualifications such as apprenticeships. Surprisingly, just 32% of managers and 24% of parents claimed a university degree was the most valuable asset when finding a job. “Apprenticeships provide businesses with a wealth of benefits including increased productivity, improved staff retention and a more diverse and creative workforce,” said Mark Creighton, CEO of Avado. “It's great to see that parents and managers see the value of apprenticeships and that traditional education is not the only route to a successful career.” The research went on to reveal that a university degree isn’t guaranteed to be the first quality managers are looking for in a new employee. In fact, the qualities rated highest by respondents were motivation (62%) and enthusiasm (59%), while intellectual acumen was ranked fourth (44%). Of the parents who were interviewed, one in four stated that their child had considered an apprenticeship, but that advice and support from schools wasn’t sufficient enough. So much so that 51% said that their child had not been advised on apprenticeships with 28% claiming they had received no careers advice or support at all.