Travis Perkins plc, one of the largest suppliers of building materials and equipment, and a leading partner to the construction industry, has launched two new data apprenticeships, including a data fellowship and an advanced data fellowship. 

These apprenticeships have been launched to improve colleagues’ data and analytical skills and understanding, and will cover areas, such as using data for effective decision making, best practice learning, to support collaboration and the development of value-added services and activities. 

In addition to providing technical training for Python and SQL programming, the schemes will provide insight into how to understand data quality and manage projects, as well as data ethics, visual analytics, predictive modelling and data security. 

The first cohort of 40 colleagues from across the Group, ranging from commercial and finance to marketing and supply chain, has already enrolled on the programme, and there are plans to launch two further courses in the new year to focus on data literacy for leaders and ensure data skills are accessible to all.

"Data is already a key enabler for the modern construction industry and it is only going to become even more essential as we face into the opportunities around things like product provenance and sustainability alongside the ongoing need to better understand our customers.

"By upskilling colleagues, we aim to improve data literacy and analytical skills enabling our colleagues to unlock insight from our data so that they can make better informed decisions,” explained CITO for Travis Perkins, Phil Tenney.

"Rob Barbour, our Data and Insights Director, has done a fantastic job working with the team from Multiverse to shape a set of new data apprenticeships. These are a fantastic addition to our comprehensive suite of 40+ apprenticeship programmes, and from a talent management perspective, we will use this scheme to grow and develop our own pipeline of colleagues who have data skills fit for the future,”  Phil continued.

Training will be delivered by Multiverse, a quality apprenticeship programme provider that recently was rated as ‘outstanding’ by Ofsted.

Travis Perkins first became an apprenticeship employer in 2012 and is now the largest provider of apprenticeships in the construction sector. The company was accredited under the Apprenticeship Levy in 2017, and since then, 580 colleagues have graduated, and at present, the company has nearly 1,000 colleagues enrolled on these programmes across the Group.