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Work ready

Work Ready short courses

Our international Work Ready qualifications

Our Work Ready short courses are designed to help people get into jobs by delivering essential workplace skills that can be studied alongside vocational qualifications.

With nearly 202 million people unemployed worldwide in 2014, getting into a job is increasingly difficult, particularly for young people. Yet almost half of surveyed employers are unable to find staff with the workplace skills they need.* This means that those seeking employment must be able to demonstrate that they’re fully prepared for the world of work.

We have worked in partnership with training providers, industry experts and other stakeholders, such as JISC, Microsoft and the BBC, to ensure that our qualifications provide relevant, work-ready skills.

* United Nations International Labour Office, Enhancing Youth Employability: The Importance of Core Work Skills

What Work Ready qualifications do we offer?

We offer a flexible portfolio of City & Guilds Work Ready qualifications across employability skills, IT, and business administration.

Our Work Ready qualifications are designed to meet the needs of all learners, regardless of their age, level of current knowledge and skills or their career ambitions.


Our extensive range of units allows the content to be tailored to suit learners’ individual needs, regardless of their age, skill level or career ambitions.

Our new Employability Skills qualifications

Our new Employability Skills qualifications are designed to help people develop the key skills, qualities and attitudes required by all employers, and are now open for registrations.

Learners will be supported in gaining a job, progressing in their chosen field, preparing for further study and developing techniques required for a successful work future.

What are the benefits?

  • Easy to understand and flexible to deliver
  • Straightforward, reliable and pain-free administration
  • Advice and expertise from dedicated City & Guilds advisors and Qualification Consultants
  • Value for money
  • Full range of support materials and online tools

Our ITQ qualifications

Our range of ITQ qualifications provide learners with the essential IT skills required for most jobs.

This includes using a computer for the first time through to learning or enhancing Microsoft Office skills, using specialist software or learning how to set up an IT system.

Our Business Administration qualifications

Our range of comprehensive Business Administration qualifications equip learners with the essential skills for the modern working environment.

Business Administration courses cover skills from understanding the principles of project management to understanding the principles of supporting change in a business environment.

Why choose our Work Ready qualifications?

From centres to governments and learners to employers, our experience as a skills provider means that we understand your specific needs and have carefully designed our international Work Ready qualifications to benefit you.

Benefits for centres

Our qualifications are globally recognised

Providing City & Guilds qualifications means centres’ course material and assessment processes meet our strict quality benchmarks.

We offer comprehensive support  

Centres offering our Work Ready qualifications can rely on our in-depth support, which covers processes, teaching and administrative tools, and direct training.  

We provide centres with course and assessment packs to help them focus on what they do best: delivering qualifications.

Learn more about what we offer centres

Assisting governments

We help governments improve national educational standards in Work Ready qualifications

We work with governments to embed our qualifications into national curricula. This helps establish uniform qualifications standards across the world.

We help governments create a skilled workforce, boosting economic growth

Embedding our qualifications into national education systems helps governments to create a highly qualified workforce that benefits people, organisations and local economies.

Learn more about what we offer governments

Benefits for employers

We help businesses by creating capable candidates

Secure the skills you need to improve business performance by hiring City & Guilds qualified work ready staff.

Our work ready candidates will fit the position

City & Guilds work ready graduates have been rigorously tested on their knowledge and have skills tailored to specific positions. As our qualifications are internationally recognised, you can also recruit our graduates from abroad, confident that they will be suitable for sector-related vacancies.

Learn more about what we offer employers

Global opportunities for learners

Our Work Ready qualifications are recognised globally   

International recognition means that former City & Guilds learners are able to apply for jobs abroad. The Europass Certificate Supplement that our work ready graduates receive provides an overview of their skillset, and can be helpful when seeking employment in other countries at a later date.    

Our Work Ready qualifications are a path to jobs  

Our Work Ready qualifications provide learners with the skills employers need, helping them progress directly into employment or into higher positions at work.  

We have worked with employers, universities and professional bodies to create a job-focused, current, innovative portfolio. As a result, our qualifications are recognised by companies, higher education institutions and governments in a wide range of countries, giving our graduates the best chance of success.  


Why are we different?

Our Work Ready qualifications stand out from the competition for several reasons:

  • Breadth and depth of qualifications
  • Quality assurance
  • Recognition
  • Support materials (including handbooks, logbooks, assessment packs and specialist advice videos) and SmartScreen (available free for international centres)
  • Experience – our qualifications are developed from 130 years of working in different international markets

Online resources

We have some great online resources to support your learning.

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smartscreen

Online teaching and learning that can help improve success rates.
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Learning Assistant

City & Guilds Learning Assistant is a market-leading e-portfolio system designed to enable your organisation to reach its full potential.

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Learn more about our Work Ready qualifications in our brochure

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Who we work with

Learn more about who we work with

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CONTACT US

Contact our office in your country to learn how City & Guilds can help you
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