Meet Dawn, from our customer service apprenticeship scheme

In the last of our blog posts this week covering National Apprenticeship Week we thought it would be a nice touch to introduce you to Dawn who works for Powered Now!

Dawn joined us in 2018 and came with years of experience having previously worked for BMW and a busy telesales agency. However Dawn wanted a new challenge and joined us on our Customer Service apprenticeship scheme.

Having completed her apprenticeship in 2020, a task made harder thanks to the national lockdown, Dawn is a great example of how mature apprenticeships can really benefit everyone.

What attracted you to taking on an apprenticeship?

I had previously worked for a number of companies, in different roles, but short of the qualifications I had when I left school I didn’t have much to show for my years of experience. I saw Powered Now was advertising for this position and thought why not!

Lots of people think of apprenticeships as something only young people do, what are your thoughts on that?

Oh, its totally wrong, an apprenticeship is a great way to learn new skills regardless of your age. Getting the qualification at the end is really just a bonus, its the journey.

What was the best thing about doing the customer service apprenticeship?

For me it was taking a lot of what I already knew from my previous jobs and realising that I was actually pretty good at it! You can get a huge amount of confidence when you apply your real world experience, something I think favours mature apprentices over the younger ones!

What was the hardest thing?

Fitting it all in, there is a lot of work to do as part of the course and some of it really pushed me to work hard. This is especially challenging when you have a family, a full time job and a social life. However it was absolutely worth it.

So, what’s next?

One of the things I really appreciated was how the people I work with supported me, we have some new apprentices so I want to help them get to where I am.

Dawn completed a Customer Service Apprenticeship with HTP on the Isle of Wight. She now works in the sales team in Powered Now and a specialist with payment options including credit cards for tradesmen.