Lockheed Martin’s bright young sparks are bringing their engineering skills and technical expertise to the judging panel of the F1 in Schools STEM Challenge. The young engineering talent at Lockheed Martin have been selected to join the judging panel for the northern region where they will analyse, evaluate and score high school aged entries. And the winning team will then compete in the UK nationals later this month (July).
“This is a really exciting opportunity, I’m thrilled to be part of such a prestigious STEM initiative,” said Adam, one of the two judges from Lockheed Martin. “I’ve been part of our Outreach Team and led many STEM challenges and initiatives over the years – this year, so far we have reached nearly 24,000 students – this is an incredible achievement and we’ve already smashed our annual target. From a personal perspective, inspiring the next generation of STEM experts is something that I’m very committed to.”
There’s an ongoing global engineering skills shortage and this is a growing concern for many industries that rely heavily on such skills and expertise. In an increasingly digital landscape, there will undoubtedly be a shift in what we know today as “core engineering skills,” the future engineer’s role will be very much dictated by the shift in technology as we move more towards artificial intelligence, autonomous technologies, augmented/ virtual reality, 3D printing and nanotechnology (to name a few).
It’s vital that today’s young generation are inspired and enthused to consider STEM subjects as they go through school, college, university, or indeed other vocational learning routes such as Apprenticeships. Understanding how studying for STEM subjects can lead to a breadth of technical, engineering and science related jobs is vital to ensuring young people consider these as future careers. And that’s why companies like Lockheed Martin see it as their corporate social responsibility to embed STEM outreach at the centre of its strategy and invest in the development of young talent.
The company’s vast and tailored STEM Outreach Programme is focused around ensuring it has a talent pipeline ready to come through its Early Careers Programme. The programme is structured to ensure that its Graduate Engineers and Technical Apprentices can grow their skills, develop expertise and climb the ranks through the business – each individual that comes through this route will be provided with a tailored progression plan and be presented with opportunities to support their development.
Lockheed Martin is also Patron to the 5% club (a body of members working to create a shared prosperity across the UK by driving skills training opportunities), actively supporting the work of the body through various roles and activities and delivering on its commitment to employ and support young talent through the Apprenticeships route and its in-house Graduate programme.
The company has recently ranked at number 11 (a huge leap forward from the previous year at number 17) as an “Ideal Employer” in a recent talent insights survey (carried out by Universum) – Lockheed Martin has focused its efforts on fostering an inclusive environment that delivers a positive employee experience through its culture optimisation initiative.
Speaking to Neil Hebron, Director of Engineering at the Ampthill site, he talks passionately about the young talent the company has invested in for many years: “I can honestly say that I am blown away at times by the enthusiasm, passion and mindset that our early career employees bring with them."
Neil said, “I couldn’t be prouder of our Graduates, Apprentices and Placement Students. They’re great ambassadors for our company too, and many of them support a variety of STEM initiatives to help inspire the next generation of STEM experts, both through our STEM Outreach Programme and in their own time too."
"We have an exceptional Early Careers Programme that has grown over the years and many of our employees that have joined the company through this route have gone on to building successful careers at Lockheed Martin," said Neil.
