City & Guilds announces the 52 training programmes that the 2024 Princess Royal Training Awards will recognise 

Now in its ninth year, The Princess Royal Training Awards continues to recognise organisations that demonstrate exceptional commitment to learning and development and is now established as a prestigious and sought-after accolade in this field. 

With skills training increasingly cited as a key to improving economic productivity challenges, creating learning programmes to develop new and existing workforce talent is now more important than ever. 

In its latest round of awards, the Princess Royal Training Awards attracted registrations of interest from over 600 employers, of whom 127 applied for the awards. This year’s 52 winning recipients included SMEs, not-for-profit organisations and large multinational employers, who showcased innovation within their training programmes on key issues such as sustainability and diversity, equity and inclusion. They will be presented with their award by HRH The Princess Royal, President of City and Guilds of London Institute, at a ceremony later this year. 

Award recipients have been selected by a newly-expanded team of Assessors including Princess Royal Training Awards alumni and top-tier experts from the world of Learning & Development. 

Addressing a challenge facing many UK organisations, Lotus Cars were recognised for their innovative learning programme to upskill staff on Green skills to improve customer experience for the luxury car maker’s range of electric vehicles. The firm’s introduction of its Lotus Academy employed a successful blended learning programme to enhance its staff’s EV product knowledge, and has resulted in significantly improved customer satisfaction and sales. 

With its introduction of an apprenticeship programme to address both limited diversity in its workforce and skills shortages in backstage roles, the National Theatre demonstrated success in diversifying its workforce and tackling an acute skills gap. Since 2011, 86% of its apprentices have completed the training, while 90% remain with the profession – challenging the sector’s traditional reluctance to take on entrants without HE qualifications. 

Sustainability consultants Fifty Shades Greener were commended for outstanding improvements to its training processes. The organisation, located in Liscannor, Ireland, enlisted external support to enhance its growth strategy, which offers employment routes for young graduates who are educated in climate change, but have limited experience delivering training. 

Kirstie Donnelly MBE, Chief Executive of City & Guilds said:  

“The Princess Royal Training Awards has become the ‘gold standard’ for training, learning and development, and continues to demonstrate how these can open up opportunities and attract new talent to industries with significant skills gaps and labour shortages.  

This year’s recipients have shown innovation and commitment to development within their own organisations, including those which have successfully tackled contemporary skills challenges which bring us closer to net zero, as well as others who have introduced unique and interesting programmes to ensure that traditional skills do not disappear.  

We are delighted to be able to recognise their accomplishments and, as we look ahead to our 10 year celebrations of the Awards are keen to continue seeing organisations prioritising investing into training to improve both their people, and organisation performance. We look forward to celebrating with this year’s recipients in the Autumn.” 

For a full list of this year’s recipients and their training programmes please see the 2024 recipients page or you can find out how to apply for The Princess Royal Training Awards 2025 here.