Ex-armed forces recruits to help super-fast broadband roll-out

25 May 2011

In May, BT’s Openreach division set-up a ‘fast-track’ recruitment programme to employ around 300 ex-armed services personnel to help deliver the increase in customer orders coming from the successful roll-out of super-fast, fibre broadband.

Openreach worked with the Career Transition Partnership (CTP) – a charity set up by the Ministry of Defence – and recruitment specialists, Right Management, to help place service leavers into civilian jobs.

The recruits form part of a mobile engineering workforce which will deploy super-fast broadband to homes and businesses across the UK.

The team will be based at four geographical ‘hubs’ in London, the Home Counties, The Midlands and the North West of England.

“It’s fantastic that we’ve been able to recruit so many ex-armed forces personnel” said Olivia Garfield, CEO Openreach. “These people have served their country well and so deserve the chance of full-time employment with a generous reward package. They are highly skilled, motivated and disciplined and have experience of complex engineering tasks in challenging environments.”

The ‘fast-track’ recruitment programme meant recruits went from application to work in the shortest time possible. Typically this was four to five weeks, which is considerably less than other recruitment drives.

Career boost for BT apprentices

BT runs a number of initiatives designed to help people into the workplace. Earlier this year, 30 members of the Institute of Telecommunications Professionals graduated from the BT apprenticeship scheme and then achieved an additional internationally-recognised qualification based on their skills and competencies.

They were awarded the information communication technology technician (ICTTech) professional qualification and have been elected to the Engineering Council Register.

Mark Biffin, apprenticeship portfolio development manager with the BT apprenticeship team, said: “We’re delighted that graduates of the BT apprenticeship scheme have chosen to further their career aspirations and have been awarded this professionally and internationally-recognised engineering qualification.”

A vital cog in the UK economy

The work that BT is doing to create jobs and training opportunities is having a real impact on the UK economy. A social study – The Economic Impact of BT Across the UK – demonstrated the economic contribution of BT to the national and regional economies in terms of jobs, output and Gross Value Added (GVA). GVA measures the contribution to the economy of each individual producer, industry or sector in the UK. The study, produced in partnership with DTZ, shows that BT is contributing £13bn to the UK economy – one per cent of the UK’s total GVA – and in the financial year 2009-10, directly employed 79,805 people living and working in the UK and a further 4,368 contractors.