Ruth is a passionate advocate of skills development and apprenticeships. She has been immersed in the world of skills, learning & development, and qualifications for most of her professional career and her belief that every person should be able to access the support needed to enhance their skills and achieve their potential.

She began her career at Sainsbury’s as a trading manager and progressed to work within L&D and HR, moving on to spend 10 years working across the Work Based Learning sector working for a variety of independent training providers. She returned Sainsbury’s to head up the apprenticeship team and, as our sector has evolved, her accountability now also includes the broader skills programmes agenda along with their early careers offer.

Her role is to explore, design and develop strategic opportunities which support colleagues to grow their professional skills and qualifications, so they can deliver excellent customer service across the group, including Argos, Nectar, Sainsbury’s Bank and Habitat.

Ruth has supported with several trailblazer’s; she is vice chair of the Retail skills board and chair’s the Chartered Manager Degree Apprenticeship Trailblazer. She is a member of the Scottish Apprenticeship Advisor Board (Frameworks and Standards group) and chair’s the Apprenticeship Advisor Group in Scotland. She has is also a member of City & Guilds, Employer Industry board.