Beyond the Skills Gap: Why STEM Talent is Hiding in Plain Sight

5 Signs Your Workforce Needs a Train to Deploy Strategy

You need a Train to Deploy Strategy when you find yourself: Rehiring the same roles repeatedly Staring down a retirement cliff Watching time-to-hire stall delivery Falling behind on diversity and social value Working with out of sync training providers Train to Deploy, often referred to as a Hire Train Deploy or a Recruit Train Deploy model, is a workforce transformation solution where a provider designs, delivers, and deploys role-specific training up front, helping you plug skills gaps, onboard faster, and build work-ready teams from day one. This is typically done by bringing in transferable talent from adjacent sectors, reskilling deployed contractors, or hiring and training new external candidates aligned with your business goals. Most organisations don’t always realise when they’re ready for a Train to Deploy (TTD) strategy. The signs build gradually. Recruitment pressures intensify quietly. Talent pools shrink. Skills gaps start to feel permanent. And the tools that once worked – your job boards, agencies, and graduate deployment schemes – no longer deliver the talent or speed you need. If any of this feels familiar, you're not without options. A Train to Deploy strategy can help you rebuild confidence in your workforce plan, expand your reach, and reduce the hidden costs of reactive hiring. It’s one of the most effective ways to evolve your talent pipeline strategy to build scalable, work-ready teams. Here are five signs that now might be the right time to make the shift. 1. You’re Rehiring the Same Roles Repeatedly When roles start to become revolving doors, it’s often a sign that the problem isn’t just recruitment; it’s readiness. High turnover in key positions can point to poor role fit, lack of structured development, or unclear progression pathways. It burns through recruitment budgets, disrupts project continuity, and stalls long-term growth. TTD flips the traditional model on its head. Instead of waiting for the “right” person to appear, you develop the capabilities you need within the people you hire or redeploy from day one. Rullion’s match-to-train approach directly addresses the root cause by designing role-specific training and onboarding ahead of deployment, ensuring the people coming into your organisation are better equipped, aligned, and more likely to stay. You’re building the talent you need, sustainably. 2. You’re Staring Down a Retirement Cliff In critical infrastructure sectors, retirements are accelerating. In the UK energy and utilities sectors alone, 37% of the workforce will retire by 2030 – that’s around 168,400 vacancies that will need to be filled. And with them, decades of knowledge are walking out the door. Our train and deploy solution bridges that gap before it opens. We help you upskill successors, build structured handovers, and onboard people who can shadow, learn, and grow into critical roles. We make sure that expertise isn’t lost. It’s transferred, evolved, and retained. 3. You’re Watching Time-to-Hire Stall Delivery Every week you wait for a hire to land is a week your teams aren’t delivering. In project-based environments, those delays cascade into missed milestones, overstretched teams, and lost momentum. A Hire Train Deploy strategy eliminates that lag. With custom training and onboarding ahead of deployment, candidates arrive equipped with the technical and behavioural readiness to contribute from day one. That upfront investment in preparation pays dividends in retention, and not just in performance. When new hires feel supported, skilled, and set up to succeed, they’re far more likely to stay. 4. You’re Falling Behind on Your Diversity and Social Value Goals Most organisations have diversity targets and social value commitments, but traditional hiring often reaches the same narrow pools in the same ways. Rullion’s Train to Deploy solution is built around inclusion without limits. If someone shows the right mindset, behaviours, and potential, we build the skillset, regardless of their background or circumstance. We don’t tick boxes or run generic ED&I programmes. We focus on opening doors to those with potential and create genuinely inclusive talent pipelines that reflect the communities you serve. 5. Your Training Providers Feel Out of Sync As your organisation adapts to new technologies, delivery models, and regulatory changes, you need learning partners that can evolve just as fast. But many traditional training providers are slow to respond. Courses feel outdated, generic, or disconnected from the realities your teams face day-to-day. This disconnect leads to wasted investment, delayed impact, and talent that still isn’t ready for the job. If your current provision feels out of sync, Rullion’s Train to Deploy strategy gives you control. You co-design the training journey to reflect your systems, tools, and standards, and we manage delivery, acting as the conduit between you and the training providers. We help embed learning into your operating model, whether through bespoke external programmes or scaling your own internal training. Making sure your people are learning what matters and applying it from day one. Recognising the Signs Every workforce challenge is an opportunity to rethink the way things have always been done. If any of these signs sound familiar, it may be time to reassess your approach. A Train to Deploy strategy offers a more proactive path, helping you build the skills, teams, and resilience you need to grow. Shift from reactive hiring to long-term capability building. And get ahead of change before talent gaps hold you back. Helping you get work done Visit our Train to Deploy solution page to see how a Train to Deploy strategy could work for your organisation or book a discovery call with one of our consultants.

Building a Business Case for a Train to Deploy Workforce Strategy

What is a Train to Deploy Workforce Strategy? Train to Deploy is a scalable, future-focused workforce solution. It replaces legacy recruitment with a sustainable approach that combines behaviour-first hiring with bespoke, role-specific training, enabling you to deploy work-ready people aligned with your business from day one. Here’s how to position a Train to Deploy workforce strategy as the strategic answer your business needs now. Step 1: Define the Problem Clearly Before you pitch a solution, your first job is to make the cost of doing nothing impossible to ignore. Here are 5 signs your workforce needs a Train to Deploy strategy to get you started. Use hard data to show where your current hiring model is falling short and what that’s costing you. Start by asking questions your leaders will care about: Skills gaps Are the same roles being readvertised month after month? Are niche capabilities slowing or stalling project delivery? Is critical knowledge walking out the door as retirements rise? Project risk Are high vacancy rates impacting timelines and team cohesion? Do long onboarding periods stall delivery and productivity? Can your team scale quickly enough for upcoming project peaks? If time-to-hire is 45+ days and onboarding takes another 30+ days, how much delivery time are you losing? Diversity gaps Are legacy hiring filters limiting access to diverse, high-potential candidates? Are you falling short on DEI or ESG bid requirements in public sector or regulated tenders? Do you lack scalable, measurable programmes to attract, develop, and retain under-represented talent? Step 2: Quantify the Cost of Inaction Your goal is to then articulate the long-term risks of continuing with business as usual. To get stakeholder buy-in, you need to frame the commercial impact of inaction. Make sure you define both direct costs and knock-on consequences of not addressing your current approach. Recruitment costs Add up your full cost per hire: agency fees, internal resource time, readvertising, interview panels, onboarding, and early attrition. The average cost per hire in the UK is £3,000–£5,000. For 30 hires per year, that’s £90K - £150K before you account for the cost of replacing those who leave early. Then factor in: First-year attrition Contractor spend to plug gaps Time-to-productivity lag with ramp-up times resulting in value not being delivered Productivity loss and project delays Every week a role remains unfilled, you lose delivery hours. Every month a new hire is onboarding, and your project velocity drops. Delayed milestones = missed SLAs or penalty clauses Lost momentum = increased risk of burnout in stretched teams Lower team efficiency = knock-on delays in other workstreams Even a 10-day hiring delay across 5 projects can equate to hundreds of lost delivery hours or tens of thousands in opportunity cost. Missed ESG & social value metrics For public sector frameworks and many regulated sectors, bids require proof of community investment and inclusive hiring. If you’re failing to demonstrate social value or provide measurable DEI outcomes, you could be missing out on commercial opportunities. Step 3: Train to Deploy Proposition Once you’ve demonstrated the cost of inaction, you’ll need to demonstrate how a Train to Deploy workforce strategy can address the real problem. Your workforce model no longer fits today’s reality. Behaviour-first sourcing Instead of relying on CVs and past job titles, Train to Deploy starts with what really matters: mindset, adaptability, learning agility, and culture fit. How it solves the problem: Increases retention by hiring based on long-term fit; when people align with your values and environment from day one, they’re more likely to stay long term. Helps de-risk hiring by aligning people to your ways of working before they start TTD solutions remove traditional hiring barriers, opening doors to all those able to demonstrate the right behaviours and potential, regardless of their background or circumstances. We call this “inclusion without limits”: if someone has the right behaviours, we build the skillset. Bespoke, role-aligned training A Train to Deploy programme delivers tailored technical development, embedding the systems, standards, and compliance frameworks your teams use day-to-day. How it solves the problem: It simplifies procurement with one contract and one partner, with complete visibility. Shortens onboarding time as readiness is built into the training Increases long-term capability with all hires being trained to the same standards and expectations as your existing teams. Meaning less need for post-hire correction, shadowing, or retraining. New hires start work with the right frameworks, protocols, and requirements, improving compliance and operational risk. We co-design the training with you and act as a conduit between your business and training providers while managing the heavy lifting of sourcing, screening, training, deployment, and mentoring. Deploying work-ready talent After training, talent is deployed directly into your team, already aligned with your culture, systems, and technical needs. The transition is seamless because we’ve already embedded your systems, culture, and team dynamics into their preparation. We also offer mentoring and coaching during deployment to support success. The benefits: Enables faster productivity and better collaboration Builds confidence and cohesion in high-stakes environments Supports smoother team integration and day-one impact Scalable, predictable talent pipelines With TTD, rather than reacting to workforce gaps, you’re building capability in anticipation of future need. Whether for seasonal peaks, project launches, or expansion into new capabilities, you can scale talent development in line with strategic goals. The benefits: Reduces contractor reliance by developing permanent, aligned talent Smooths hiring cycles with a predictable, flexible pipeline Helps you respond faster to new project requirements or capability shifts Step 4: Anticipate Stakeholder Priorities Your case needs to work across commercial, operational, and organisational priorities. Read our quick rundown of the ROI of building talent internally. Here’s how to tailor your message to what matters most to each stakeholder: Finance Long-term cost avoidance with fewer agency fees, less attrition/higher retention, fewer cycles of rehiring, and reduced onboarding lag Reduced dependency on costly contractors with internal pipeline Long-term cost predictability and spend control through a single all-in solution “We can reduce agency costs by 30–50% and improve first-year retention by 40% with a Train to Deploy workforce strategy.” Procurement Ability to consolidate vendor management with one trusted supplier managing sourcing, training, and deployment Alignment with existing workforce, training frameworks, and compliance with industry and safety regulations Commercial flexibility to scale up or down based on needs Operations Highlight reduced time-to-productivity and onboarding lag with bespoke training embedding tools and systems into learning Readiness in safety-critical and regulated environments through training Demonstrate retaining institutional knowledge through structured training, shadowing, and handovers Highlight reduced dependency on external contractors with an aligned, trained internal pipeline CSR / DEI Leads Inclusion with real impact on career switchers, returners, veterans, and under-represented communities Measurable progress on social value targets through inclusive pathways Position TTD as truly inclusive hiring. Rullion’s model focuses on “inclusion without limits”; the door is open to all those who have the right behaviours and potential. Step 5: Building a Clear Case for Change Reframe the narrative from patching your hiring process to building capability for the future. This can help shift the conversation from “Why would we?” to “Why wouldn’t we?” Current Approach Train to Deploy Plugging gaps Building long-term capability Spending reactively Investing in readiness Chasing CVs Developing aligned, inclusive talent Onboarding after hiring Delivery work-ready teams from day one