Senior Leader Apprenticeship

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Become a qualified senior leader with our Senior Leader Apprenticeship, and apply your in-depth knowledge with real-world business situations.

The apprenticeship meets the demands of working in an uncertain world. Utilising our wealth of industry experience, academic knowledge and dedicated lecturers, we aim to give our candidates an edge in challenging times.
Dr Jake Monk, SLA Course Director

You will develop deeper understanding of organisational leadership and management issues, and gain understanding of the ever-changing collaborative leadership landscape in which UK organisations operate.

What the apprenticeship covers

This course is designed for those who have management or team leading responsibilities. This can also include formal governance or director responsibilities. They are responsible for providing a degree of leadership within the organisation, providing a clear sense of purpose and helping to drive the strategic direction of the organisation. For some candidates this will form a part of their career progression plans.

Candidates will also consider wider environmental influences, impacting their organisation, identifying longer-term opportunities and risks. Through inclusive leadership, they are involved with developing ethical, innovative, and supportive cultures. Ideally, candidates will be role models for other colleagues, processes, and organisational budgets.

The course director is always happy to have informal discussions with potential candidates to discuss the course. Applicants are strongly encouraged to contact him to review their suitability, Please email Dr Jake Monk: jake.monk@canterbury.ac.uk

What will I study?

The core aims of the course, which has been designed for individuals moving into a senior or strategic role within their organisation, are to provide our Master Apprentices with a comprehensive and in-depth understanding and knowledge of collaborative leadership, shared services and organisational transformation in the public, private and third sectors. The objectives of the course are to enable Master Apprentices to gain the required academic and professional knowledge, skills, experience and behaviours to lead organisational transformation through shared leadership vision, developing capabilities and engagement with collaborative (strategic) activities.

Critical reflection is encouraged on all six taught modules as part of a personal development and course portfolio. Learning gained must be reflected as part of the ‘professional discussion’, which is assessed externally as part of the end-point assessment (EPA), at the end of the course.

You will begin work on your work-based management project during your first year. You will develop your research template and research proposal alongside your other modules. Your tutors will actively help with the preparation of an oral presentation as a ‘project showcase’ to an external assessor as part of the final End Point Assessment process. The CCCU Postgraduate Diploma in Collaborative Leadership and following MBA *top-up* (subject to validation) is open to non-apprentice applicants.

Professional accreditation

We partner with the Chartered Management Institute (CMI) for the delivery and end point assessment of this apprenticeship. This has key benefits as follows:

Upon successful completion, you automatically become a Chartered Manager (CMgr), a status that sits alongside your other achievements and demonstrates a high level of management and leadership expertise. CMI is the only professional body that can award this as part of your apprenticeship and without a separate assessment.
Upon successful completion, you will automatically gain the CMI L7 Diploma in Strategic Management and Leadership; a professional, industry recognised qualification.
For the life of their apprenticeship, apprentices are members of CMI, entitling them to be part of CMI's management and leadership community, with access to events and networking, thought leadership, mentoring, mental health support, a career development centre, and Management Direct, CMI's online library with over 30,000 pieces of relevant content.
Apprentices will also remain members of CMI for 3 months beyond their study, free of charge.

Modules

Business Strategy for the Collaborative Environment

The aim of the module is to enable you to consider strategic alternatives and evaluate your suitability for a variety of collaborative leadership contexts. You will be made aware of the complex issues involved in formulating, implementing, and managing inter-organisational projects and leading transformational change.

Managing Ethics and Business Risk

The aim of this module is to enable you to develop the knowledge and skills to critically evaluate issues associated with managing ethics and business risk in an increasingly collaborative business environment. This involves demonstrating collaborative leadership in areas of corporate responsibility; to understand the complex relationships between business and society; and to appreciate the systemic risks and challenges faced by organisations interacting in a global market place.

Financial Management

This module aims to enable you to understand the range of financial issues in an organisation; how financial and business case decisions are made and how a variety of techniques can be used to evaluate the effectiveness of business planning, financial allocation and control.

How you'll learn

Learning, teaching, and assessment is heavily orientated towards work-based learning where knowledge gained in classes, and through independent study, is applied to your strategic role in the workplace. This will provide you with rich opportunities for critical reflection and evaluation to further enhance your professional practice.

The approach to learning and teaching is participative, which means that you will contribute to discussion and debate from your own experience, and you will also learn from your lecturers/tutors and your senior leader peers. A blend of face-to-face and online activities will be used to meet the modules’ learning outcomes and to provide a bridge between university and work-based learning. For example, core information may be provided via narrated PowerPoint presentations, webinars, suggested readings and learning activities, whilst learning at University will encompass classroom teaching, both independent and group work, and formative peer-feedback to align theoretical and practical knowledge.

Importantly, face-to-face contact at the start of each module facilitates active learning and enhanced engagement in work-based learning as you value and accredit the knowledge and skills which have been learnt through your work. This allows you to demonstrate knowledge, skills, and behaviour development relevant to your work. You will be challenged with alternative approaches to problem solving so that you can consider new ways of working.

To build on your senior leadership skills, problem-solving will be a consistent feature of class-based and blended learning activity. The use of workplace case studies and scenarios will test your understanding of collaborative leadership topics and elicit appropriate judgements, behaviours, and actions. This approach will also contribute to your knowledge and in-depth understanding of collaborative leadership and organisational transformation opportunities within your given sector.

Directed learning is a significant aspect of all your modules, and it is an important process which enhances and supplements your learning. You are encouraged to reflect on the face-to-face teaching and carry out structured activities to reinforce, consolidate, and revise your learning. Self-directed learning is less structured and encourages autonomy and independent learning and can be enhanced by the use of the University’s virtual learning environment (i.e. Blackboard and Collaborate Ultra) and our e-library where you will have access to online journals and books.

Along with developing a learning portfolio and your work-based project, master apprentices will normally study one 20 credit modules at a time, with 30 hours of academic directed study per module. These occasions will provide the opportunity for interprofessional learning and the building of social learning communities. Under the terms of the apprenticeship contract, students are expected to receive 20% time remission from their usual duties to devote to their studies.

The team consists of highly qualified and experienced academics. They have a range of expertise and experience gained in industry and academia, and are also research active. The team are experienced in delivering research-informed and applied teaching built on a basis of knowledge, understanding, and application. You can find out more about the current teaching on our Meet the Team webpage. Please note that members of the teaching team will change over time.

Assessment

All modules are assessed with a combination of reports and presentation assignments. These not only address the modules but also help to prepare candidates for the presentation and portfolio submission for the End Point Assessment.

Six compulsory taught modules are delivered over two years, which equates to one module per trimester.

Assessment normally involves a linked presentation and report for each taught module, which are assessed by CCCU tutors. This is accompanied with a short critical reflection on the work-based learning gained during each module as part of the senior leader’s personal development portfolio (PDP). This will be used as part of the EPA process.

For the EPA it is expected that the senior leader will be able to clearly reflect upon examples of critical learning relating to:

skills development
personal and interpersonal excellence, i.e. leading and developing collaborative leadership
developing effective behaviours.

Once you have met your degree requirements, you will present your work in the form of the End Point Assessment (EPA) to gain your Senior Leaders Master’s Apprenticeship qualification. This EPA will be undertaken by a Chartered Management Institute (CMI) qualified independent assessor who will then issue the apprenticeship award.

It is expected that senior leader apprentices will be able to critically reflect on their learning from their work-based management project and showcase, as well as the taught modules, as part of their PDP.

During the course’s induction you will learn how to create and build a 'portfolio of evidence' as part of a personal development portfolio for the EPA; this is supplemented with support during the course. There is an electronic repository for all of your academic and workplace learning.

On completion of the EPA candidates are invited to apply for the separately awarded CCCU Postgraduate Diploma. Successful candidates can then apply for the two module (one year) MBA award.