The quality of our provision is no accident

The staff and shareholders of HIT Training Ltd are incredibly proud of our organisation and delighted to be recognised as the Times Education Supplement’s FE Training Provider of 2018, and being named in the Sunday Times Top 100 Companies to Work For. 

We have always worked hard to do a great job for all of our stakeholders and to have this recognised is very heartening.

The judges recognised that we have has taken the lead on the apprenticeship agenda, being the first hospitality training provider to offer the new apprenticeship standards, 16 months ahead of the deadline, and working closely with employers to help them to understand the best way to maximise their apprenticeship programmes.

Our fast moving and adaptive staff have risen to the challenge and as a result 47% of our apprenticeship standards completions have been awarded a Distinction, with the other 53% achieving a Pass grade.

We realised that many employers would struggle with the introduction of the levy so we launched a sector-wide campaign to help to educate businesses on what the new apprenticeship levy, introduced last spring, means for them.

Our levy handbook, designed to help businesses of all sizes understand the new funding system, was central to this campaign and was downloaded by over a thousand employers.

In December we launched an enhanced apprenticeship designed specifically for the ALMR & the licensed retail trade in association with our partners CPL Training and BIIAB.

We are very proud of our excellent relationships with other specialist training providers, trade associations and awarding organisations. There is nothing to fear from working in partnership, in fact everyone wins.

HIT’s Chef Academy was judged to be exceptional during out 2017 Ofsted inspection. Like everything else we do, it is run by specialists for specialists. It’s a simple strategy but one that works.

We don’t keep our good fortune to ourselves, we share it around.

Over the last few years we have advised on various apprenticeship trailblazer groups, worked with ESFA and DfE to support their thinking, supported Ofsted stakeholder groups and regularly provided speakers at national and local events, helping the sector to identify best practice and understand how to make the most of its investment in training.

The quality of our provision is no accident.

We engage with all of our stakeholders – employers, learners, the agencies, trade associations, and our own staff – to understand what great quality of training means to them, then we get on with it.

Our four “Good” Ofsted inspections are a happy by product of this but we do not run our quality systems to meet Ofsted requirements.

Why would we be so restrictive? We strive to be the best in everything we do. It’s in the HIT DNA.

All of this leads to great learner and employer satisfaction – at 94 per cent and 93 per cent – and amazing staff relationships.

The latter was recognised this year by a place in the Sunday Times Top 100 Companies to Work For. 

The judges said:

“HIT Training has enjoyed a monumental past year, driving the apprenticeship agenda. With great staff development and amazing learner and employer satisfaction, clearly HIT is one of the leaders of the sector.”

Thanks for that TES judges, but we won’t be resting on our laurels. We have a lot of people to keep happy!

Jill Whittaker, Managing Director, HIT Training