Apprenticeship

Skills Audit From

Mandatory for the Cyber Security Level 4 Apprenticeship



Welcome to the Cyber security Apprenticeship programme. One of the requirements of the programme is that you need to look at your current skills and identify any areas where you are aware that you may need to enhance or develop your skills or acquire new ones.



What is the audit about?


This skills audit is a mandatory part of your apprenticeship programme. It must be completed before you are formally registered on any of our programmes.


As the provider of your apprenticeship programme, we need to understand your starting point, achievements, and ambitions in terms of your skills, knowledge and behaviours in order to help you achieve your learning goals.



What does this audit cover?


The audit covers the following areas:




  • 1. It assesses your prior learning, work-related experience and learning needs. You are asked to critically assess your current ability and seek out evidence in three prescribed areas to help identify the new skills, knowledge and behaviours you need to enhance or develop during the programme.


    • We have provided you with rating charts to help you assess your abilities in these areas:



    • • Knowledge (What must I know?)

    • • Skill (What must I be able to do?)

    • • Behaviour (How must I behave?)



    The audit also asks you to:



  • 2. Identify any Recognised Prior Learning (RPL). Recent study or qualifications you have gained in the last 3 years may exempt you from attendance at webinars or workshops and even assessment requirements for individual subject areas & may mean a reduction in the attendance and funding required for your programme.


  • 3. Whether you hold GCSE certificates for English and Maths at grade C or above (some equivalent qualifications may be acceptable).


  • 4. If you have any disabilities (including learning disabilities) which may affect the support we need to offer.





How will we use this information?


Your answers will help us to help you in the following ways:



  • • To help to establish your suitability to undertake this programme of study.

  • • To help us tailor the content of your individual Programme Schedule to your specific learning needs and ambitions.

  • • To understand subject areas where you need to enhance your skills, knowledge and behaviours and to tailor teaching and support to meet your needs.

  • • To understand areas where you are already competent and may not need to attend or are able to share your competence with others.

  • • To identify any disability and learning needs which may require extra support.

  • • To understand any organisational or personal ‘pinch points’ which may impact your commitment to the apprenticeship over the course of the programme.

  • • To inform the questions we may ask you at your apprenticeship interview.

  • • To work with you to construct a valid and practical Personal Development Plan (PDP).





Apprenticeship selection interview


Apprenticeships are almost wholly government-funded and are highly sought after.



We, as the apprenticeship provider have to account to the Educational and Skills Funding Agency to ensure that the funds go to develop the careers of candidates who can demonstrate the will to succeed, and the determination to complete the programme.



Following your Skills Audit, we will arrange an apprentice selection interview. The selection interview is an important part in this process.



It will be friendly and professional, but searching, and will explore your motivation, career history and ambitions. It will ensure that we understand your starting point, in terms of your current skills, and any qualifications or previous learning which might count as Recognised Prior Learning.



We will also explore any pinch points in your organisation’s year which may impose extra demands on your time. The aim is to devise an apprenticeship learning programme which is tailored to your needs, to give you the best chance of successful completion.



You will need to show how you can organise yourself and your study, have commitment from your organisation and your line manager, and support from your immediate friends and family.



A management apprenticeship is demanding, but it will allow you to make a real impact on your organisation and give you a nationally recognised management qualification, as well as the confidence and recognition to develop your career.





What could help you complete the questionnaire?


It is very important that you do not rely solely on your own opinion.

Useful though “gut feel” is, we can all be remarkably blind to our own faults and weaknesses – or indeed to undervalue our strengths and capabilities.


You need to provide evidence that you have asked other people for feedback. Please get as much feedback as possible from as many sources as possible before completing this questionnaire. Evidence can come from many sources. Perhaps you have:



  • Asked other people about your strengths and weaknesses as a Cyber security analyst?

  • Had recent appraisals and objective setting sessions with your own line manager which gave you feedback? If you are an apprentice, you should be meeting regularly with your line manager to report progress and receive feedback.

  • Had 360 appraisals with feedback from your staff etc?

  • Asked your colleagues, staff or even family for personal feedback?

  • Completed Insights, Myers-Briggs, Belbin or other personal questionnaires as part of team building activities?

  • Had client, partner or customer feedback about your strengths and weaknesses including surveys or KPIs which give feedback on your own or team performance?

  • An existing PDP?

  • Your current job description (or the job description for roles to which you may aspire)?





Who could help you complete the questionnaire?



Your line manager plays a key role in your apprenticeship programme, so it will be crucial to get their feedback on your strengths and development areas as well as development needs related to career progression and succession planning.




You must meet with your line manager (or someone else who knows how you work) to share this questionnaire with them to get their input and review the feedback evidence you have collected with them.


Between you, rate your knowledge, skills and behaviour for the listed management activities on the following questionnaire. Justify your scores, high or low, to your manager by explaining what they are based on.


A high score still requires a justification of why you think that rating is appropriate, to avoid the suspicion of unwarranted optimism. For example, perhaps you have:




  • • Specific experience you can relate to?

  • • Had feedback from others on previous successes?

  • • Attended a course?

  • • Had feedback from others that suggests you know what you are talking about?

  • • Anonymous feedback from team members?

  • • Undertaken coaching recently or have a mentor? Their views and insights will be valuable.



Remember, we are identifying areas for development, not for you to prove how good you are - so just be honest!

Skills Audit Questionnaire
Your experience
Firstly, some general questions about your career to date and your degree of Cyber Security Analyst. Please highlight appropriately.
Why do you want to do this programme?
1 This is the person sponsoring (or maybe paying for!) your programme of study. It might be the owner or a partner in a small business, or a senior director, Head of Department or HR manager. They may be a commissioning or procurement officer, perhaps even in another organisation such as an NHS CPEN. They have authority to make serious decisions aboutthe programme should we need to do so.

Recognised Prior Learning (RPL)


Please review your education and the training you have previously attended or are currently undertaking. Your prior learning may be recognised in the amount of work which may be required of you during this qualification.


You do not need to list school qualifications - GCSEs (‘O’ Levels) or ‘A’ levels - unless they are relevant to the apprentice standard (e.g., Management Studies).


You do need to list the following with (approximate) dates:



  • College or University qualifications related to leadership/management or similar topics.

  • NVQs or apprenticeships.


And the following, if they have been undertaken within the previous 3 years:



  • Formal training undertaken in the workplace.

  • Any coaching or mentoring programme undertaken at your workplace?

  • Any security audits assessments completed in the last 3 years

  • Whether you have a PDP/ CPD in place.


Functional skills
English and Mathematics

You need to prove that you have reached a required level in English and Mathematics.

This is an essential part of the apprenticeship programme and is a pre-requisite for completion.

Do you hold any GCSE (or higher qualification) with English in the title and any GCSE with Mathematics in the title? If so, tick the box(s) below.

You need to have attained both with a minimum ‘C’ grade (grade 4).

If you do not hold any relevant qualifications, please put a cross in the box(s).

If you do not have either of these qualifications, you will be enrolled on a course in Functional Skills, Level 2, in either English or Mathematics, or both, as appropriate.

We can provide support, for example: mock exams, e-learning material, and one-to-one tutor support.

You cannot complete the programme without producing the certificates as evidence. If you cannot find your GCSE certificates, you must obtain duplicates from the original awarding body.

The Skills Audit Questionnaire

How to complete the questionnaire


Consider the statements in the first column of the tables overleaf.


Please select the radio button that most closely matches your level of experience and/or confidence:


1 being “no experience or very little confidence” and 4 being a ‘'high level of expertise’.

Note: we do NOT expect you to score highly at this stage! If you already have these skills, this is the wrong programme for you!


Select the radio button in the ‘Extra support’ column for any subject where you think you may need extra help.


Select the radio button in the RPL (Recognised Prior Learning) box where you have attended formal training or gained a qualification in that area within the last 3 years. Make sure the training and/or qualification is listed in the box on p. 5.


State the evidence you have gathered to support these ratings in the box at the end of each section.


Don’t forget you need to justify your scores – whether they are high or low.


If you selected the radio button in the ‘RPL’ column, please list the training course(s) attended or qualifications achieved, with dates if possible - if they are within the last three years.

Your knowledge

Here is a list of generic knowledge requirements expected of a competent cyber security analyst. Rate your current knowledge and provide evidence for your assessment.

Your skills and experience

Clearly, you must be able to apply your increased knowledge - it is not enough to know the theory, you must also be able to put it into practice. Here is a list of generic skills and experience requirements expected of a competent cyber security analyst. You may have little or no experience of these, of course, but that’s what the apprenticeship programme aims to rectify! Again, rate your current skills and provide evidence for your assessment.

Your professional behaviour

It is not enough to just know things and do stuff, you must also show appropriate and professional behaviour.

None of us like to think that we behave in any way less than perfect! How many of us when asked “are you able and willing to take responsibility?” would answer “no”? But you need to be realistic. Have you ever found yourself unwilling to take on something new, perhaps through a lack of confidence or an unwillingness to add to an already heavy workload?

Specific requirements for my role?

In addition to the generic management skills listed above, there may be specific requirements that apply to your role. Often, these will be the more “technical” or “professional” aspects of your job. You should consider a wide range of sources here:

  • • Check your job contract, job description and the person specification for your role (or for the role you expect to move into). Attach them to this Audit
  • • Do any organisational competencies exist for your role (or proposed role) which you may need to develop?
  • • Does the organisation publish values or behaviours? Can they be used to define parts of your job role?
  • • Do you have in-depth knowledge of organisational policies and procedures and have the skills needed to work within them?
  • • Are there any good practice guides or professional guidelines which may be useful?

We have divided this further analysis into the same three major areas as you have just rated (knowledge, skills and behaviour). The requirements for your job may ‘fit’ under more than one heading. Please list these requirements and rate them in the tables below as you have for the previous pages.

Specific knowledge / skills / behaviours relevant to my role
Specific knowledge / skills / behaviours relevant to my role
Specific knowledge / skills / behaviours relevant to my role
Support needs

If you marked the “Extra support” column in the questionnaire with an X, please outline below the nature of the support you may need.

Signatories
This skills audit is an important document, so please keep it safe.

It will form the basis for:

  • • Your initial learning agreement with your manager.
  • • An ongoing discussion about career and personal development with your line manager.
  • • Your PDP.
  • • A programme of support from Cherith Simmons Learning & Development LLP management.
  • • The objectives you set yourself for each subject throughout the programme.
Please sign this page and have your line manager sign it, as an acknowledgement that you have both contributed to the skills audit and feel it is as accurate as can reasonably be expected.
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