Apprenticeship Week 2019 is taking place this week and Aberdeen Football Club’s IT Support Analyst Lee Forsyth recently sat down to discuss his journey and experience as a Graduate Apprentice at Robert Gordon University.

Lee (23) left school at 16 and immediately began to look for full time work as the thought of continuing education at college or university level at the time wasn’t a direction that he was entertaining.

“I managed to secure a 2-month temporary position as a filing clerk at Plexus Plc., a wellhead manufacturing company based in Dyce. The company was quite small at the time and the only free desk was in the IT department.”

During his time as a filing clerk Lee took a keen interest in what was going on around him in the IT department and one day he was called in to the IT Manager Ally Duncan’s office and offered the role of Trainee IT Support Technician.

“Not really having any idea what type of career field I wanted to go into, I accepted the job and gave it a shot. Seven years on I’m still enjoying every minute of it! I’m really grateful to Ally for all the guidance and advice he gave me during my time with the company, my biggest takeaway from him was to do as much continual professional development as possible. Overall, I was at Plexus for two and a half years, during which time I studied part time at North East Scotland College and gained my HNC in Computing and I also studied three Microsoft qualifications”

After his time with Plexus, Lee moved to IT service provider, Dynamic Edge. During his time there he hoped to broaden his experience within the technology sector but he soon realised that working for an IT provider wasn’t as enjoyable an experience for him as working for an in-house department was.

Then, one day, a friend jokingly sent a link to a job vacancy at Aberdeen FC for the position of IT Support Analyst. Lee wasn’t a football fan, but he quickly got in touch with the club to show his interest in the job.

“I knew I enjoyed working in IT and the opportunity to do it for such a unique organisation and in a exclusive industry was something that really intrigued me. It’s a job and a work environment that has proven to be highly enjoyable.

“When I first started at the Club the IT department consisted of just myself and IT manager, David Bowman. I’m really lucky that both David and the Club were quick to support me with my development.”

Not long after he took on the Analyst role, Lee started to study a part-time degree with the Open University in Computing, something he really enjoyed doing but striking a good work, life, study, balance was something that proved to be quite difficult. He decided to take a year out of the Open University course and instead study for a Diploma in IT and Telecoms with GP Strategies (formerly YouTrain)

“The diploma course involved completing an evidence-based portfolio on a range of different IT topics. An assessor would visit frequently to check on my progress and support me if required. The best thing about it was that it was all done during work time, I realised quickly that this style of learning suited me best and the diploma was completed within a year.”

Lee’s experience with the diploma course led to him seeking out degree opportunities that worked in a similar way and after some online research he discovered the recently launched Graduate Apprenticeship courses offered by Robert Gordon University. The degree is again fully funded by Skills Development Scotland and is worth around £30,000. There are benefits for the Club as well as for Lee, as IT Manager David Bowman is acting as a mentor to Lee during his time on the course and is learning to improve his leadership and teaching skills alongside him.

Throughout all of this Lee has always wanted the opportunity to give somebody else the same chance that he was given at Plexus all those years ago and was recently given that opportunity. With the new stadium and training facilities on the horizon, the Club needed to expand their IT team to be able to eventually cover both sites and an IT Support Apprentice role was created.

“As I had experienced a wide range of jobs and courses throughout my journey so far I was able to use that experience to sketch up an ideal path for an apprentice to complete. We hired Elliot Henry in July and currently he has completed three separate week-long courses at GP Strategies training centre in Stirling. He managed to achieve a score of 96% on one of his exams which was the highest score the exam centre had seen!”

Elliot (18) is also studying for the Diploma for IT and Telecoms Professionals which he should complete in time for the beginning of next season where he will lose the apprentice title and in future follow in Lee’s footsteps by becoming a graduate apprentice!

Elliot (18) is also studying for the Diploma for IT and Telecoms Professionals which he should complete in time for the beginning of next season where he will lose the apprentice title and in future follow in Lee’s footsteps by becoming a graduate apprentice!