Prime Academy is one of the internal programs that PrimeIT makes available to its employees. Fully supported by the consultant, the academy started its activity in 2009 and has already carried out over 3700 hours of free training.

With a technological market in constant evolution, it is fundamental for PrimeIT to accompany all the dynamism of the sector, being this one of the strategies to keep the talent of its teams updated. Using highly qualified trainers and external entities, which ensure the best in Portugal, they provide top-level training in Technical (oriented towards hard skills and which provide participants with theory and practice in the most diverse technologies), Behavioural (oriented towards soft skills and which aim to help develop skills such as work organisation, increased productivity and teamwork, for example) and Linguistic areas (oriented towards developing linguistic knowledge in a given language).

Luís Pires, member of the Human Resources Department and directly responsible for Prime Academy, states that “it is a pride for me to be able to take an active part in a programme that is so important in the career of our employees” and stresses that “it is of great importance to promote the personal and professional development of our Primers, so that they can continue to progress continuously”. Asked about the organisation of these actions, he explains that “in order for the training to meet the wishes of the participants, it is divided into several levels, so that the training is suitable for those who have an initial, intermediate or more advanced level on the subject”. In this way, all employees of the IT consultant have the opportunity to participate, regardless of their knowledge in the area, thus having a margin of progression.

The academy already has more than 350 participations, of which some more assiduous Primers stand out. João joined PrimeIT in July 2019 and in less than a year has already participated in 5 courses: Python, Team Leadership and Management, Neuro-Linguistic Programming, German and Outsystems. When asked which were the most important areas of Prime Academy’s training courses, he answers that “the technical areas, for my specific function and in a future perspective, are the most important and where I obtained knowledge that could be very useful (…) However, the Soft Skills training courses surprised me a lot positively!” In his testimony he also says that “the added value is reflected in the level of technical knowledge (…) I speak for example of the concepts that were learned at Outsystems, which allow us to understand what can be done with the tool. ”

Patrícia, who has participated in 7 training initiatives, explains that it is a great advantage “the fact that we have free access to a relatively large variety of training initiatives” and that “the technical (training initiatives) are as important as the soft skills, since both give us very useful tools for our professional and also personal daily life” however, “the ones that perhaps surprised me the most were Emotional Intelligence, Leadership and Team Management & Conflict Management because I am part of a Project Management team and the knowledge acquired here has helped me in my daily work”. Ricardo, who has given preference to training in behavioural and management areas, says that this choice is very relevant “in the context of career progression (Team Leading, Project Managing, etc.)”, also emphasizing that participating in these activities has an advantage associated with knowing colleagues and sharing experiences.

Due to the current pandemic situation, and in order to maintain the commitment of this development pillar, but above all, the safety and health of its employees, PrimeIT is moving towards training 100% online and in live streaming mode, as of this week and which will continue in the coming months.