An overview of Assured Skills academies
The video below features graduates of Assured Skills academies who have secured jobs with top companies participating in the Assured Skills programme. (Subtitles are available by clicking the subtitle/closed captions button on the play bar.)
Current opportunities
Potential candidates can find out how to apply for the latest opportunities on NI Direct website, the official government website for Northern Ireland citizens:
What is the Assured Skills programme?
The Assured Skills programme is a short, demand-led, pre-employment training programme, which is fully funded by the Department for the Economy (DfE), to upskill individuals and help them compete for guaranteed job vacancies in new foreign direct investment (FDI) companies and expanding local businesses.
Company eligibility to the Assured Skills programme?
New inward investors, or existing employers considering expansion, who are Invest Northern Ireland clients, may be eligible for Assured Skills.
How to apply
Please contact your Invest Northern Ireland Client Executive in the first instance. The Client Executive will be able to advise if Assured Skills is relevant to your needs and contact the Assured Skills team accordingly.
What funding is available?
Funding will be provided by DfE to support a pre-employment training programme working in conjunction with companies.
Case studies
A video case study featuring successful participants on the Assured Skills academy who got jobs with KPMG and Microsoft.
A video case study from successful participants in the Assured Skills academy programme who gained employment with FinTrU and ASOS.
The Assured Skills academy model
Under the Assured Skills academy model, where a company or a consortium of companies have an identified skills need, DfE will consider developing a short-term pre-employment training intervention to meet that need.
This typically involves a six to eight week pre-employment training programme delivered by a local college or university. The programme is designed to upskill individuals in the skills needed by industry for current job vacancies.
The academy model is flexible and versatile, and has been used to help companies recruit new staff in areas such as:
- data analytics
- business consultancy
- legal services
- financial services
- software engineering
- cyber security
- applied intelligence
- welding
How the academy model helps companies
The benefits of the academy model for companies include:
- recruitment and selection for the Academy (including psychometric assessment if required)
- a pre-employment training programme designed by the company/companies in conjunction with a local college or university
- the training programme delivered by the college/university with input from the company/companies
- the company/companies interview the trainees at the end of the programme
- the department meets pre-employment training costs
How the academy model helps candidates
If you are unemployed, under-employed, an 18 year old school leaver, a graduate or have experience and would like to change direction in your career, then the innovative academy model may be what you are looking for. The academy model will support you into employment by providing the skills that expanding companies want.
The vast majority of Academy programmes have been aimed at providing graduate level opportunities for those with Level 5 and Level 6 qualifications. Across the last two years alone, academy participants have secured jobs in diverse roles such as data analytics, financial services, software engineering, applied intelligence and cyber security,.
Your existing qualifications are important but, participating companies want to see candidates with the drive and determination to succeed and a positive attitude to take on new challenges.
The academies have around an 80 per cent success rate of participants progressing into full-time employment.
Previous participants continue to recommend Assured Skills Academies as great opportunities to develop skills and start new careers.
Current Academies are advertised online, using resources such as JobApplyNI, nidirect, nijobs, nijobfinder and social media.
Assured Skills contact details
To find out more about the programme contact the Assured Skills Team:
Privacy Notice
If you wish to find out how we use the personal information you supply for an Assured Skills academy see our privacy notice: