Addressing the digital skills gap

Across the UK, more than 339,000 young people are unemployed, the lowest unemployment levels we have seen amongst this age group since 1992. Despite the numbers, many employers need help finding people with the necessary skills for entry-level jobs. 

‍Generation UK is an independent nonprofit founded to help bridge this gap at speed and scale. With Generation, we are helping to train and place people in tech jobs they wouldn't otherwise have access to — providing businesses like us with a pipeline of tech talent they wouldn't typically have. This move will help us to close the diversity and digital skills gaps in the tech sector.

Cloud technology to data boot camps

During our partnership, we have helped to run free employment-driven boot camps to enable young people to develop the technical and behavioural skills needed to land their dream roles. We have also co-hosted two Leeds Digital Festival events with Generation, highlighting the importance of diversity in tech and supporting our local communities.

In 2022, Generation Leeds placed over 100 people into various tech roles, enabling them to triple their income, making a significant impact on their lives and those around them. This positive outcome was only possible with our collaboration.

Removing barriers to employment

One of the most important aims of our partnership is to help remove barriers that unemployed people from disadvantaged backgrounds face entering the tech sector. 

As a company with a strong diverse and inclusive culture — we value building teams that reflect our society. Having greater diversity also improves problem-solving and is proven to increase productivity and happiness. 

We recently hired two Generation bootcamp graduates and are committed to recruiting more people in 2023. Jamie, a junior developer at Aire Logic, initially joined Generation's AWS Re/Start Program last year. After struggling to secure a career in tech since school. 

Jamie saw Generation's program as an opportunity to change this and could foresee cloud technology as the future. He found creating architecture in the cloud fascinating, learnt to run apps in the cloud and completed an AWS Cloud practitioner certification. Jamie feels the program was "life-changing". 

Raymond, a junior data engineer with Airelogic, joined Generation UK’s data engineering cohort in 2022. His interest in data and programming started at the University of Leeds, where he learned basic programming principles, data modelling and cleaning. 

Generation’s program offered Raymond an insight into technology, and he found it a fascinating opportunity to contribute to the advancement of technology. 

Raymond is a crucial member of our internal project team, building data dashboards to make it easy for our teams to make data-driven business decisions, and he’s also developing course content for new employees.

We look forward to continuing our transformative partnership with Generation UK and recruiting more people who have the power to transform our thinking and ways of working with their unique skills and perspectives. 

Find out about Generation UK’s life-changing digital, data and technology programs.

"We love Aire Logic's commitment to diversity and willingness to hire people from different backgrounds and experiences. The company's focus on supporting their local community, employees, and innovation around healthtech work (particularly during Covid) is outstanding."

Jess Sewter, Partnership Director, Generation Leeds