A NEW online platform will match new talent with placements and apprenticeships in Dorset’s thriving digital and creative sector.

The Talent Exchange has been launched by Silicon South, the not-for-profit organisation that champions the industry locally.

Silicon South director Anthony Story said: “Over the past year or so the big bit of feedback we’ve been getting, particularly from some of the larger businesses, is how hard it is to recruit people.”

He said some businesses were also unsure about striking up relationships with the town’s universities to get a “pipeline” of talent.

“Some companies manage to do it brilliantly and get really good results. Others just aren’t really quite sure where to go and they kind of give up before they start. So we thought there’s an opportunity to try and align those two things,” he said.

Silicon South programme manager Megan Bagnall said: “This all started by talking to companies and finding out what they want – and also talking to the universities and finding out how we can better work with them to make sure that it links up with their students.”

She said the idea was to be able to send students to a site that listed all the opportunities in apprenticeships, placements and internships.

“I think one of the key things they’ve found was that if they had students who were interested in creative and digital and tech, they didn’t necessarily have somewhere they could send them,” she said. 

Companies which are part of Silicon South’s network can indicate on the Talent Exchange that they are offering placements, apprenticeships or internetships, while students can browse and filter opportunities.

Mr Story said: “It’s a bit like a job site, only specifically focusing on these early entryways into the industry.”

The next step for the project will be to promote better understanding of the creative and digital sectors – and to attract a more diverse range of talent.

“Across the BCP area and Dorset more broadly, there are a lot of people who don’t really know much about the digital and creative,” he said.

“Lots of people play video games, watch screens, they’re on screens, they’re doing social media all the time, they’re Tik-Toking, they’re storytelling all those kinds of things. But what most people don’t realise is that there are careers in all of those things.

“They’ll go to the cinema, they’ll watch the film and go away and do something else and they don’t realise that they can be involved in that. There are so many careers available within that.”

The Talent Exchange can be found at siliconsouth.org.uk/talent-exchange