New training opportunities at COMS
Due to the increase in business and winning new contracts has meant we have been able to invest in our team and develop a career pathway for young people wishing to pursue a career in engineering.
At the beginning of 2020 we developed a graduate programme and employed Jack Phillips, 26, from Penrith. Jack studied Mechanical Engineering at Kingston University, before joining COMS before the pandemic hit. As part of the graduate program Jack has been rotated across several of COMS sub-teams to gain an understanding of the different stages of system engineering and to get an insight into how the company operates, to provide a complete asset management service. Upon completing the graduate scheme, Jack will work towards gaining incorporated engineer status, and further his career as system engineer at COMS.
It was always the intention for COMS to start a careers programme for young people, including both graduate and apprentice schemes. However, we waited until we could offer a comprehensive package; allowing a young person to gain the skills and experience required to develop into a fully qualified engineer.
The opportunity came when we were awarded a multi-year system engineering contract at LLWR. This led us to develop the graduate route first as we could offer a clear career path as a System Engineer, whilst providing experience working with other teams in Operations, Maintenance, Pre-Operations and Commissioning.
To complement our graduate programme, we are also developing an apprenticeship programme and our first apprentice will start their induction at Gen2 in early September. Jay Taylor, 16 from Whitehaven, will be undertaking a level 2 and 3 Diploma as an Engineering Technician, with an option of undertaking a HNC at a later date. His first year will be full-time at Gen2 predominantly doing course work. His second year will be based in one of the COMS teams gaining experience in Pre-Operations, Commissioning, System Engineering and Operations Support and doing a day release to Gen2.
COMS co-founders Cliff Woodman & Dave Garratt are both time-served engineers and value apprenticeships highly, especially the traditional school leaver through to competent time-served tradesman/technician route.
Cliff comments,
“It is definitely the right course of action for any responsible company to develop young adults into the engineers of the future and we are proud to add the apprentice programme to our existing Graduate Engineer programme.”
We are passionate about helping young people develop their vocation and are looking forward to supporting these two young people on their career journey and look forward to developing their graduate and apprenticeship programmes further in the future.