Creative Companies Need Administrators Too

Yes, we’re specialists for creative, digital and marketing apprenticeships but creative & cultural businesses also need great administrators.  We also provide Business Administrator Apprentices.

One such company is Black Country Touring. They have used the apprenticeship programme to help grow their business.  Black Country Touring have taken on a full-time member of staff as a Administrator and Communications Coordinator who had just completed their digital marketing apprenticeship with Creative Alliance: a next step up for this former apprentice due to the knowledge, skills and experiences she had already achieved. The company have now recruited their own Business Administration Apprentice.

The Business Administration Apprentice was very keen to work for Black Touring Company; she volunteered at the company and when she left school she entered an apprenticeship. I spoke to Deb Justice, the company manager for Black Country Touring (BCT), about the introduction of an apprentice.

Initially BCT wanted an apprentice for a few reasons, firstly to help develop the business and lessen work load on the rest of the business. Secondly, and the main reason, was they had a young passionate woman from the black country who wanted to get into the creative and cultural industries. As a company dedicated to supporting local communities that meant developing young people who are passionate about working in the sector.

I asked how Deb had found working with her apprentice over the first few months. Deb explained that “at first it was more work for us: helping develop the apprentice, getting her to understand the company and the job she was requested to do took some time. But eventually, having a young person’s viewpoint on the company and challenging the productions we put on has proved invaluable. One example was a young person’s festival that we approached in a new way to make it more appealing to young people following …our experience has been really positive”

On speaking with Deb she was really happy with her apprentice and the development of her current employee too. As a company they are not only able to develop a young person into their business with an apprenticeship position but also grow their business with a fully fledged position in their company. Using apprenticeships and apprentice training from Creative Alliance is supporting a local creative & cultural deliver its mission and grow its business.

Black Country Touring are a theatre and arts based touring company that work with a range of people and communities to provide professional theatre, community cinema and dance productions in the black country and nationwide. They also a production company who like to work with local communities to produce site specific work in unusual places. They do productions on stage, schools and even in camper trailers. They want to create art that is professional, thought provoking and accessible to local people.

This blog post is part of a series looking at how employers are making apprenticeships work for them. We spoke last week to IMP media – Read Here – who have had lots of apprentices and their experiences of that situation.