Pinnacle offers national vocational qualifications to all staff

Pinnacle has this month introduced an innovative learning and development scheme offering staff an opportunity to gain NVQs (National Vocational Qualifications) relevant to their work.

Pinnacle employs over 1,500 people and is a leading provider of public service solutions, delivering housing and facilities management and grounds maintenance services to organisations throughout the UK. This scheme will initially see Pinnacle offering NVQ Level 2 qualifications in cleaning services or horticulture. Each qualification is equivalent to 5 GCSEs.

These courses will be offered on a voluntary basis to staff and will be run by Pinnacle People. This is the organisations new people-centred business stream which focuses on tackling worklessness by improving employment prospects and skills development within housing estates and communities across the UK. Most learning will take place on the job and people will be assessed to see how well they are performing against set tasks over a period of around six months.

John Swinney, Pinnacles Chief Executive, said: At Pinnacle, we know that success depends upon well trained, motivated and managed staff. We are keen to make this investment and provide our people with opportunities to gain more skills and qualifications.

Bill Franks, an Estate Service Manager, is heading the pilot of the scheme in Canning Town. He said: There is interest already in this initiative and it seems to me to be an excellent way of going forward to train the workforce.

Following the first phase of this scheme, further NVQ qualifications will be offered in housing, business administration, management, customer services, higher levels horticulture and cleaning, literacy and numeracy, and english as a second language.

This is being part-funded by the Learning & Skills Council as part of the Train to Gain initiative.