The Graduate Foundation College will create opportunities for up to 150 young, unemployed graduates and offer them a concentrated 10 week programme of e-learning, face-to-face workshops and exam preparation, followed by six months of industry experience with a financial advisory firm.
Liz Field, CEO of Financial Skills Partnership who created the programme, said: “This visionary new idea will give unemployed graduates access to rewarding careers in a sector which many young people have traditionally found difficult to enter, and open up the industry to recruitment from a wider and more diverse pool of keen and able candidates.”
Major sector employers such as Aviva, Just Retirement and Scottish Widows will help provide the training, ensuring its quality and industry relevance.
The FSP said the course would make graduates work-ready and able to contribute immediately to SMEs’ businesses.
These make up over 90% of the financial services sector and finding the time and resources to devote to training new talent can be difficult for them, making them rely on recruiting existing advisors only.
Field added: “The Graduate Foundation College will provide small and medium-sized firms in the sector a pre-selected pool of high quality candidates who can contribute from day one. These can be an immense asset helping firms grow their businesses and compete in a fast–changing market-place serving an increasingly diverse customer base.”
