Workplace Challenges
Study: It pays to hire an apprenticeAsk employers why they don’t hire apprentices and they’ll often blame the cost of training. But a new study suggests apprentices more than earn their keep — they actually generate profits. And that finding could lead to new opportunities for youth. LINDA WHITE |
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 [ 2006-11-01 ] |
“Those in the labour movement concerned about apprenticeship and shortages of skilled workers are encouraged by the results of the study,” says Allan Bruce, chair of the Canadian Apprenticeship Forum- Forum canadien sur l’apprentissage (CAF-FCA), Return on Training Investment Project Committee and representative of the International Union of Operating Engineers.
“The benefits of hiring an apprentice have often been discussed, but only anecdotal evidence has been available up until this time,” he says. “Not only do these findings provide us with actual data that substantiates what we suspected all along, they also establish the business case for hiring apprentices.”
The CAF-FCA released its Apprenticeship Training Investment for Employers study in June. It follows a 2004 study that identified cost as one of the perceived barriers to accessing and completing apprenticeship training in Canada.
“We did some research to see what had already been done and found that previous studies focused only on cost, not benefits and what an employer gains by having an apprentice help a journeyperson,” says executive director Allison Rougeau. “We wanted to look at the whole picture.”
The picture, it turns out, is much prettier than many might have painted. Over the life of an apprenticeship, an employer receives a positive net benefit of $1.38 for every $1 invested in an apprenticeship, the most recent study determined.
The CAF-FCA contacted 11,550 employers from across the country. The only prerequisite: they had to have taken on an apprentice within the previous two years. Only one in five qualified. “That told us that only one in five who could be training do,” Rougeau says.
More than 430 employers representing 15 trades participated in the study, providing information about wages, charge-out rates, training costs and qualitative measures of the benefits of apprenticeship training. The Conference Board of Canada helped analyse the data.
The CAF-FCA is planning to develop a tool that employers can use to calculate their own return on apprenticeship training investment. This fall, it will also examine the return on investment of apprenticeship training for apprentices who attend college-sponsored, union-run and private-training institutions.
The study comes at a time when much of the current workforce in the skilled trades is approaching retirement age and there is increased demand for skilled tradespeople in many sectors and regions of the country. The CAF-FCA hopes the results will encourage more employers to hire apprentices.
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