The apprenticeship offer-to-start gap is one of the quietest risks in any early careers scheme. Candidates accept an offer in the spring, then have months to change their mind, take another employer’s offer, or simply lose momentum before a September start date arrives.
Most employers do not have a deliberate plan for that gap. In our recent July Member Online Meetup we found out that Molson Coors does.
Molson Coors is the world’s fourth largest brewer, producing over 14 billion pints a year across 19 breweries in 10 countries, under brands including Carling, Madrí, Aspall, Blue Moon and Staropramen.
Its early careers programme is comparatively new, launched in 2022 under Talent Development Manager Rebecca Marandola, but in that time it has employed 103 young people, grown Gen Z representation across the business from 1 per cent to 10.8 per cent, and achieved Gold ‘Excellent Employer’ status under Next Gen Makers’ Engineering Apprenticeships: Employer Accreditation.
At July’s Next Gen Makers online meet-up, Rebecca shared how the scheme’s Onboarding is built, from the moment an offer is accepted through to an apprentice’s first year in the business. Here’s a flavour of what came up.
The months before September matter as much as day one
Molson Coors recruits on an annual cycle: attraction through the winter, assessment in February and March, offers out by April or May, and a single, fixed start date on the first Monday of September. That leaves a gap of several months during which candidates may be fielding offers from other employers.
There’s nothing worse than putting your heart and soul into a whole assessment process for them to just not join us in September. — Rebecca Marandola, Talent Development Manager, Molson Coors
Molson Coors keeps that gap deliberately warm, with ongoing contact and a buddy system that pairs new starters with apprentices or graduates from the previous cohort, on the basis that new starters will often ask a peer a question they would never ask a manager.
A pre-engagement day that removes day-one anxiety
Before September, incoming apprentices are brought together for a pre-engagement day that answers the practical questions which otherwise surface as first-day nerves, alongside sessions on workplace expectations, company values and informal access to senior leaders, including an ‘ask the leaders anything’ panel over lunch.
Induction built around the whole business, not just one role
A standard Welcome Week introduces every new starter to the organisation’s systems, culture and brands. Degree apprentices and graduates go further, with an additional induction week that follows the product from raw ingredients through to retail, giving them a view of the whole business rather than just their own corner of it.
That broader view has paid off in unexpected ways, including product ideas that have made their way back to Molson Coors’ own marketing team.
Don’t underestimate the innovation, the intrapreneaurship that these young people have. They will think of things we’ve never thought of before. — Rebecca Marandola, Talent Development Manager, Molson Coors
Mentor matching that keeps apprentices in the business
Peer community and mentor matching are treated as retention tools, not by-products of onboarding. Rebecca shared an example of an apprentice whose relationship with her mentor was strong enough that she has since asked to return and work permanently in his team.
The results
Since 2022, Molson Coors has employed 103 apprentices and graduates, grown Gen Z representation across the organisation from 1 per cent to 10.8 per cent, been named a finalist for its apprenticeship programmes, and achieved Gold ‘Excellent Employer’ status.
None of it rests on one big intervention. It’s built from a sequence of deliberate, low-cost touchpoints, applied consistently, starting months before an apprentice ever walks through the door.
Want the detail behind it?
This is only a glimpse of what Rebecca covered. The full session went deeper into how Molson Coors structures its onboarding pathway, briefs managers on next-generation talent, and builds the peer networks that keep apprentices engaged long after induction ends, plus a live Q&A with our members.
Sessions like this one happen every month inside Next Gen Makers’ Engineering Apprenticeships: Best Practice Programme, alongside benchmarking, accreditation and a members’ network of employers facing the same challenges.
If you’d like to join employers like Molson Coors at future sessions, find out more about the Engineering Apprenticeships: Best Practice Programme.