This was in response to Nottingham University Hospitals (NUH) NHS Trust wanting to address staff shortages.

The course, which includes an executive MBA, provides current and future leaders with the knowledge, high-level leadership and management skills, and equips them with the desired behaviours they need, to become more effective. In doing so, it also delivers professional pan-industry leadership qualifications and a professional pathway to Chartered Manager status, a statement from Arden said.

The apprenticeship is designed to enhance the careers of current health and care workers, and as such, it can be completed via remote learning to ensure it fits in with the demands of their roles.

The apprenticeship offered a number of benefits for NUH, with staff who undertook the course “feeling more invested in the organisation”, the statement said. “This will have a positive effect on retention rates in the future.”

In recent years, with many roles at NUH hard to fill, staff retention had become increasingly important, the statement said.

Ensuring staff completed training feeling valued by NUH, while also leaving with an MBA qualification, was key.

The SLA is designed to accelerate NUH staff to the next stage of their career to lead departments, services, systems of care or transformation projects.

By working with Arden University, the statement said, NUH is able to target its apprenticeship activity within the services that typically struggle to recruit pre-qualified staff, while also allowing those who haven’t followed the traditional education routes to remain in work and gain a high-calibre qualification.

Through the qualification, NUH staff are able to develop their skills and careers, allowing further investment in the development of new talent. Since launching the apprenticeship for its team, NUH has reported that they not only witnessed staff that were undertaking the apprenticeships developing their skills, but also reported that the managers supporting apprentices developing their own line management and mentoring skills – allowing the apprenticeship process to, directly and indirectly, enable development.

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