How we're helping address the gender tech imbalance through apprenticeships
The tech sector's gender problem is well documented. The government's Diversity in Tech report shows that Women make up less than a quarter of the UK's tech workforce, and the pipeline isn't improving fast enough. Yet across industries, women are contributing to digital and data-driven work every day.The work involves technical skills. It just isn’t always recognised or labelled as “tech”. That disparity limits career growth – many women doing technical work simply don't see themselves as credible candidates for technical roles.
Empowering women already working in tech
Women across our corporate services, operational teams, and programme management are working with data every day. What didn’t yet exist was a structured pathway to translate that experience into recognised technical careers.
This wasn’t about formal barriers. It was about confidence, visibility and how technical capability is perceived. When the work you do isn't recognised as "tech," applying for technical roles feels like a leap rather than a natural next step.
Developing women-only tech apprenticeships
Our response was to design a clearer pathway. Innovate – a women-only Level 3 Data & Business Insights apprenticeship – was created to formalise progression into data and digital roles and support long-term career growth.
The level of interest highlighted the demand: when we set aside 14 places for our first cohort, 200 colleagues attended information sessions.
Building confidence and overcoming career barriers
Importantly, Innovate did not emerge in isolation.
The programme builds directly on Empower, our women-focused leadership apprenticeship (Levels 3 and 5).
Empower showed there was appetite for structured, women-centric development programmes. Bringing women together to learn, rather than studying in isolation – has real value.
Innovate applies the same principles to a different skills gap: data and digital capability.
Delivered in partnership with Baltic Apprenticeships, our apprenticeship combines formal technical training with protected off-the-job learning time, cohort-based delivery and mapped progression pathways into Level 4, Level 5 and emerging specialisms such as AI.
Participants apply their learning directly within their roles, turning day-to-day data exposure into recognised technical capability, and gain a nationally recognised qualification as well as practical experience.
This maximises internal knowledge, experience and learning, while creating a clearer pipeline into technical roles.
"We knew there was an appetite for something like this. There's always a degree of uncertainty when you launch something new, but the response confirmed we were addressing a real need."
There was significant unmet demand, not simply for “tech roles”, but for a credible, supported pathway into them.
It also reinforced our decision to focus on internal development rather than external recruitment alone.
Our apprenticeship is supporting retention and growth and is open to women across our business. It creates a network where participants can share experiences and support each other, rather than navigating technical career progression alone.
Data-driven decision-making is becoming standard across our business units – from justice and defence to health, transport and corporate services – not confined to specialist teams.
Creating a structured pathway into tech careers for women
We're challenging assumptions about who "belongs" in data work, and creating clear pathways for people who might not have seen technical roles as accessible before.
For employers across industries, the lesson is clear: the gender imbalance in tech won't shift through hiring campaigns alone. It shifts when capable people already in the workforce can see a route forward – and are supported to take it.
We know our people already have the talent. We’re now providing the pathway.
