Celebrating James Mitchell for National Apprenticeship Week
03 May 2024
It’s National Apprenticeship Week, and what better way to celebrate than shining a light on our wonderful past and present Apprentices at Sort Group.
James joined Sort Legal from Sixth form in June 2019 as a Trainee Legal Cashier within the accounts team, working towards his AAT qualifications as part of his apprenticeship. Since joining Sort Legal, he has developed considerably, with several key promotions along the way and now manages the whole accounts team, reporting to the Group Managing Director/Head of Finance.
Here is James’ Apprenticeship journey:
· AAT Level 2 2019 – qualifying in September 2022 and promoted to Legal Cashier.
· AAT Level 3 2021 – qualifying in August 2022 and promoted to Management Accountant.
· AAT Level 4 2022 – In June 2023, James was promoted to Group Finance Manager.
· January 2024 – James qualified as an Accountant.
Would you recommend an Apprenticeship to those considering it as a route into a career?
As my experience through my apprenticeship has been so positive, I would absolutely recommend an apprenticeship. It has allowed me to learn so much knowledge from statutory accounts to processing payroll while also putting this theory into practice during my day-to-day role. An Apprenticeship has structure, and this allows there to be a clear end goal and targets along the way, which are great motivators to hit.
If you could offer current Apprentices one piece of advice, what would it be?
I think the most useful piece of advice would be to pick up as much knowledge as possible while on the job, it makes it so much easier to understand the theory and to pass exams when you can directly link this to the work you complete in the office. It’s also a great idea to ask as many questions as you can to a senior member of staff who has much more knowledge and can help things make sense by explaining it in a slightly different way.
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