My former company run two or three academies per year. For each session they recruit sixteen individuals with minimal coding experience. They pay them a salary to spend twelve weeks training full time in modern software development techniques, and then take them on as software consultants.

They deliberately target under-represented groups and do not expect candidates to have any qualifications at all, or even any work experience. All they ask for is a commitment to tech and a small amount of coding experience.

From small beginnings and over a period of five years Made Tech have built a highly successful and effective training programme, which I curated and delivered for two years up to April 2022. In this talk I share some of the principles and techniques we used to make this work.

Key takeaways:

• How to recruit fledgling engineers
• How to use an academy programme to nurture new talent and maximise diversity
• How to curate and deliver effective learning content
• How to build an ongoing learning culture