Cornwall-based charity launches diverse career programme

Tech Cornwall has created a careers programme focused on encouraging people from diverse backgrounds into a technology career, regardless of their current career or employment status. The programme is supported by the Shared Prosperity Fund and is free to take part.

The not-for-profit created Tech Cornwall Career Pathways with a focus on diversity, equity and inclusion, as well as increased social mobility. It allows flexibility in the ways and times participants learn, which makes the course more accessible for particular groups of people.

The programme’s course lead, Toni Coppen, said: “The programme is designed to be completely flexible with your current commitments, whether that’s work, care obligations, health management or something else.

“The programme itself is self-directed, offering a whole range of different resources which can be accessed through our learning platform, called the Tech Learning Community, in your own time. But we also hold practical workshops and coaching sessions, both online and in the evenings to make it easy for all to attend.”

There are many barriers that stand in the way of a tech career for people from underrepresented groups. For women, flexibility can often be a barrier, with Tech Talent Charter (TTC) finding that 40% of women claimed whether or not they plan to stay in their role depended on their current care responsibilities.

The programme focuses on a candidate’s attitude towards learning rather than coding ability, with Coppen stating that some participants have “never seen a line of code” but have the transferable skills necessary to take on a tech role once technical skills have been provided.

Coppen added: “It is important to note that we do see a lot of programmes which filter people out and cherry-pick certain participants. While you do need a certain amount of talent, motivation and natural ability to take on and complete the learning, you don’t need to be the finished article. The course is here to help you get to that point.”

As well as a diversity gap in the technology sector, businesses have reported that the skills shortage is standing in the way of them completing IT projects, but hiring criteria can also be quite narrow.

Tech Cornwall hopes the programme will encourage local businesses to consider talent who may need more training, but who have shown they are willing to learn and want a career in the sector. The programme uses a mixture of online training and career-based skills instruction to ensure participants have the appropriate skills to pursue a tech career in roles such as web development, embedded systems, data science, artificial intelligence (AI) and DevOps.

Tech Cornwall issued a call to action, asking the 100+ tech businesses that make up Cornwall’s “tech cluster” to partner with the charity to potentially start hiring some of the candidates who have taken part in the programme.

The first cohort has been a 50/50 split between male and female candidates, ranging in age from 20 to more than 60 years old, as well as varied levels of experience, background and employment status.

This isn’t the first of the organisation’s attempts to increase diversity of tech hiring in the local area, having held “tech jam” events, as well as the Cornwall Festival of Tech to give potential tech talent an opportunity to meet the right people who may be able to help them achieve a tech career.