High praise for Capita’s Higher
apprentice, Sarah-Rose Adamson
We recently spoke to Capita plc about their apprentice, Sarah-Rose
Adamson, who is part of the Executive Assistant team within head office.
Sarah-Rose is undertaking a Level 4 Higher Apprenticeship in Business Administration –
this is the equivalent to a higher education certificate, diploma or a foundation degree.
She supports four directors within the Group Sales team (including Tom Robins - Sales
Director). Sarah-Rose manages their diaries, organises their internal and external
meetings, processes their expenses and books all their travel and accommodation.
She also supports the wider Executive Assistant team in Group Sales with booking travel
and accommodation and processing expenses for their directors.
Sarah-Rose is also responsible for co-ordinating the induction process for new employees
joining Group Sales.
Tom Robins
Sales Director
Capita plc
As Sales Director, Tom has a busy diary and despite only
joining Capita plc three months ago, apprentice SarahRose has already made quite an impression.
Tom, three months in as Sales Director,
what has it been like working with an
apprentice to support you?
“As a new starter to Capita not so long
ago, I was blown away with Sarah-Rose’s
organisation of my induction – my
first few days and weeks with Capita.
Normally, when you come into a big
organisation, you get handed a phone and
it’s all rather unstructured.
However Sarah-Rose led the most
impressive, well-structured induction.
It included about 20 invites to welcome
introductions and meetings with people
that I didn’t even appreciate I needed to
know at the time.
It was very comprehensive and she has
continued to shine.”
What has impressed you most?
“Her organisational skills are outstanding.
She handles some major things for me.
When I met her, she told me that she’d
been with Capita for two years and then
in the same sentence mentioned she was
learning to drive. I was impressed that
someone so young could hold themselves
in such a professional way.
One of things I gathered early on was
just how good her awareness of the
wider organisation is. She has a fantastic
reputation within the office – if you want
something done, you go to Sarah-Rose
and you know it will get sorted. She’s
widely regarded as the number one person
who can help solve these issues.
I have noticed that she is always picked
for front of house type roles for Capita
too. For instance, she recently organised
and greeted all the senior directors
attending a lunch meeting with the CEO.
It’s testimony to Sarah’s professionalism
that she is so often chosen to be the face
of Capita in this way.”
How would
apprenticeships work
for my business?
Apprenticeships are
simple to adopt
We will guide you through
the process and discuss
prices (if any – age
dependent).
Support will always be
on hand
You, as a business, your
apprentices and their
line managers, will all be
supported throughout
the whole process by a
dedicated Capita talent
coach.
Sarah White
Line Manager
Capita plc
As Sarah-Rose’s line manager, Sarah (Executive Assistant
Team Manager for Capita plc) discusses how she supports
Sarah-Rose in her day-to-day work tasks and her
apprenticeship.
Sarah, what has it been like having an
apprentice in the team?
“It’s quite a demanding environment,
being a FTSE 100, fast-paced and salesdriven company, but Sarah-Rose has fitted
in with great ease and was so unphased by
everything.
Sarah-Rose has a ‘can-do’ attitude, she is
approaching and accommodating, eager
to learn and always has a smile on her
face. She’s very alert and organised and
managed the transition from school to
this workplace incredibly smoothly.
As the weeks and months passed, she
became noticeably more self-sufficient
and was more confident about making
decisions without the need to ask for help.
Very very quickly, people were starting
to forget, firstly, how new she still was
to Capita and the world of work, and
secondly, how young she was, aged 17 and
straight from school.
I think that’s a huge testament to her, as
she has demonstrated such maturity. She
has gained trust and respect very quickly
from very senior level directors here.”
What ideas has Sarah-Rose approached
you with?
“The new starter guide – she really has
owned this project and it comes with a
lot of coordination and responsibility.
It involves setting up a lot of different
introduction meetings at different stages
in the first few days and weeks, so a lot of
diary coordination.
Every new starter that joins, Sarah-Rose
will ensure they have everything within
the pack, make sure it is all up to date
with all the relevant information. This
new starter project is essential for making
a good impression on a new Capita
colleague and getting that individual to a
point where they are being as productive
and efficient in their role as quickly as
possible. It’s great that Sarah-Rose has not
only taken the initiative to update this,
but she really has taken ownership of it.”
What is your relationship with SarahRose’s Talent Coach like?
“I haven’t seen much of John, her Talent
Coach, mainly because we’ve had no
need to! John set up a formal meeting
at the start of the process and we went
through a thorough introduction of what
the apprenticeship programme was about
as a whole, and more about Sarah-Rose’s
apprenticeship and her learning timetable.
It was a good overview and helpful to
set expectations of how Sarah-Rose was
going to balance her day-to-day workload
as well as her apprenticeship assessments.
Sarah-Rose meets with her Talent Coach
on a regular basis to discuss her studies,
her progression and if there are any issues,
John will contact me to discuss how we
can better support her.”
What do you believe your apprentice’s
biggest achievement to date has been?
“Her adaptive nature – there’s such huge
variety in her role and she’s transitioned
so well between school into this very
corporate environment working with the
most senior directors and management of
one of the biggest FTSE 100 companies in
the country.
She’s really stepped up over the course
of her apprenticeship, since starting
with us. So many new starters we’ve had
through the door, of her age, have been
so intimidated by the situation; speaking
with directors and important clients who
are offering Capita the opportunity to bid
for their contracts, often worth millions
of pounds. Many have needed a lot of
advice and management, but SarahRose has been self-sufficient, and picked
things up at a much quicker pace than we
expected.”
What’s next for Sarah-Rose?
“I want to keep pushing and stretching
her. She has huge talent and potential to
grow. There’s still a big learning curve but
a lot of promising signs for her growth
and development and, of course, a highly
successful career in Capita.”
Registered office: 71 Victoria Street, London, SW1H 0XA.
Registered in England No. 02299747 ©2015 Capita plc. All rights reserved. Jun15
“I’m just so incredibly
grateful for this
opportunity. An
apprenticeship was
without a doubt the
right option for me
over university.
My apprenticeship at
Capita has really shown
me what type of work
is out there and what I
could do. I’m not sure
yet what is next but I’m
excited!”
Sarah-Rose Adamson
PA and Office Assistant
Apprentice for Capita plc
If you’d like to
learn more about
apprenticeships,
contact us:
01892 593081
[email protected]
Capita Talent Partnerships | 86 Fetter Lane | Barnard’s Inn | London | EC4A 1EN
www.capitatalentpartnerships.co.uk | [email protected]