Apprenticeships in Broadband, With Craig Barber

Apprenticeships in broadband markets may be a great way to help solve the workforce shortage. The programs are a great alternative to a college education and offer excellent training for a future career. Craig Barber, founder and CEO of Hatbox, joins the podcast to discuss how he began working in the broadband industry as an apprentice, and what he’s doing now to support apprenticeships in the telecom industry.

What is Lead Tennessee Radio?

Lead Tennessee Radio features conversations with the leaders who are moving Tennessee forward. Topics include rural development, broadband, technology, legislation, policy and more. The podcast is produced by the Tennessee Broadband Association.

Intro:
The following program is brought to you by the Tennessee
Broadband Association.

Lead Tennessee Radio, conversations with the leaders moving our
state forward.

We look at the issues shaping Tennessee's future: rural
development, public policy, broadband,

healthcare, and other topics impacting our communities.

Andy Johns:
On the stage at the Tennessee Broadband Association, Kentucky
Rural Broadband Association Joint Conference here in Franklin,

Tennessee, one of the speakers asked the audience, what are your
biggest concerns about rural broadband in 2025 and

beyond? The answer, according to the informal survey that was
put up on stage, was the workforce shortage that we're looking at

when all of the funding for broadband grows.

What we'll be talking about on this episode of Lead Tennessee
Radio is about apprenticeships and how that can help potentially

expand the labor pool.

My guest on this episode is Craig Barber, founder and CEO of
Hatbox.

Craig, thanks so much for joining me.

Craig Barber:
Thanks. Good to be here.

Andy Johns:
And I'm your guest host on this episode, pinch hitting for Carrie
and Trevor Andy Johns of Pioneer Utility Resources.

So a little bit of background on Craig.

He was born, as you may have noticed, from the accent, he was
born in England.

And your hometown was one of the last in the country to go from
dial-up to broadband.

Connecting rural communities has been a passion for you, and
your career includes leadership roles at British Telecom and

Telefonica before moving to become a CIO and then CISO of a
cloud technology

company. Interestingly, and we'll get into this a little bit in
the discussion, but Craig moved from the UK to middle Tennessee

and now lives in Chapel Hill, Tennessee, which is served by the
good folks over at United.

So, Craig, tell us a little bit about that move.

We talked about it on stage, but what drew you to Tennessee?

You could have moved anywhere, but you decided to leave the UK
and move right here to middle Tennessee.

Craig Barber:
Yeah. I mean, I think it was the fact that the area was growing
very fast.

There's a lot of opportunities.

There's a lot of rural areas that are historically underserved
by good, reliable internet

and high speed internet and broadband.

But at the same time, yeah, there's a lot of growth going on.

There's a lot of new networks going in, a lot of new
infrastructure.

And really, I just think it's an exciting time for Tennessee as
a whole right now with the way the economy is going, certainly in

this state. It also is strikingly similar to where I grew up,
which I was really surprised being thousands and thousands of

miles apart.

Andy Johns:
Right. You said miles instead of kilometers, so that shows you're
settling in.

Craig Barber:
Yeah. Yeah. Although we use miles in the UK, but the rest of
Europe, not so much, but yeah.

Yeah, it's really did.

You know, Chapel Hill is a very small town.

Reminds me so much of where I grew up, and just felt right at
home there from the moment that we found our

house, and we settled down there.

Andy Johns:
Now, we will be talking about, mostly about, apprenticeships and
the idea of an apprenticeship program on this episode.

But I did want to get into just a little bit about your
background, because so many of the folks that we work with in

economic development here in Tennessee, so many of the folks at
the broadband providers, the telcos here in the rural parts of

the state, they've heard about you, and they've talked about
you, or at least the kind of person that you represent.

The fact that somebody can move from anywhere in the globe and
connect to the rural broadband networks that folks have built in

Tennessee and be able to work, to do anything.

So tell me a little bit about Hatbox and why, you know, how that
works, that you're able to do that from a small town like Chapel

Hill?

Craig Barber:
Yeah. I mean, to begin with, I founded Hatbox because of the fact
that I grew up in that small town, passionate, as you were saying

in my intro about connecting underserved communities, and, you
know, reliable internet access is kind of a necessity

nowadays. So, anything that I can do to help with that mission,
I'm all in on.

And, yeah, as I said, as with my background working at British
Telecom, BT, and Telefonica, it's the

area that I'm knowledgeable about, almost two decades in that
space.

And yeah, primarily working on cyber security.

I think there's kind of two sides to it.

So (a) there's that kind of, you know, that's my passion.

That's where I want to be.

Andy Johns:
Right.

Craig Barber:
And (b), it's kind of a case of, I think there's a need right
there to obviously secure these

networks and ensure that, you know, as their businesses grow and
they invest in infrastructure, that, you know, they are protected

against attacks and data breaches and so forth.

Because it does have a very real negative impact on business
reputation and regulatory fines and so on and so on.

But yeah.

And then of course, living in a rural area right now, yeah, the
internet connectivity makes my job far easier because, you know,

that's the world that I'm working in.

So being reliably connected is obviously a very key thing for
me.

Andy Johns:
I would go so far as to say not just easier, but possible.

Craig Barber:
Absolutely.

Andy Johns:
You could not do what you do where you do it, without that.

Craig Barber:
Yeah. And I think that feeds into the whole thing of getting good
connectivity out there into these rural areas is it's not just

about myself that, you know, I moved to a rural area and that's
available to me.

It's also about the residents and the people that were born in
these areas, giving them good, reliable internet connectivity o

pens up a world of job opportunities, you know, customer support,
working on, you know, on live chat for various companies,

answering calls for companies, you know, it just opens it up.

Project management, for example.

There's so many roles out there from a professional and a kind
of personal growth perspective that can be achieved by having

good connectivity and working in these rural areas.

Whereas historically, you know, you're a 150 miles from the
nearest city.

You've got a limited selection of employers there.

This is opening that up, and you could almost work for any
company anywhere in the country or even the world.

Andy Johns:
Sure, sure. It's pretty amazing.

And sorry to detour on your, you know, bio a little bit there
longer than usual, but I just think it's an important detail.

And what so many of the folks that are a part of Lead Tennessee
Radio are working to do, and you just kind of exemplify that.

So I wanted to bring that up.

But our main topic today is apprenticeships and apprentices.

And, you know, I'll be perfectly honest, when I hear the word
"apprentice," I think of the trades, and then I think of Star

Wars. And then that's about where my knowledge ends on
apprentices.

Tell me a little bit about when you talk about an apprentice
program, what do you mean?

And how is it different from an internship or other things that
that folks may be a little bit more familiar with here?

Craig Barber:
Sure. It's a concept that's been around in the UK since, I mean,
British Telecom for example.

They started their program in 1960.

And it is a little different to internship.

So internship typically is unpaid.

Might not have much kind of structure to it.

The difference with an apprenticeship is that typically the
individuals are being paid a full time salary or a part time

salary, and they're working from day one for your business.

And typically it's a little more structured.

So there's some kind of structured training involved as well as
spending time with a mentor or spending time out in the field or

with other engineers where you're learning.

So it's slightly different.

The concept and the idea is that you're landing a position in a
company, for example, in telecoms or in rural broadband.

You're learning from day one how to do that job.

So if you're a field engineer, you're out there, and you're
working on the networks, and you're running cables, or you're

fixing faults, and you're working on the infrastructure.

And the idea is that you learn by doing as opposed to in a
classroom setting, you know, with a degree program, for example.

It's very theory based.

And, you know, there are benefits to that, right?

So, depending on how you learn as an individual.

Myself, I did an apprenticeship, and I learned by doing, and I
learned by being hands on, making mistakes and learning from them

and picking up on the soft skills as well from day one.

You know, dealing with customers that are unhappy and so on, and
learning how to navigate that.

Andy Johns:
And I think that's such an important piece of it, because a lot
of times when you hear "apprenticeship," you know, I think of the

trades, you know, where it is, you know, it is more about the
technical skill.

But I've been interested to hear you talk about that it is a
very well-rounded look, kind of 360 degrees at the

role where you are getting into some more of those soft skills.

Craig Barber:
Correct. Yeah, yeah.

And historically it was in the trades, and it, you know, the US
is slightly behind Europe in that sense in that it is still seen

that way in a lot of cases.

But, you know, you can apply the apprenticeship model to cyber
security.

You can apply it to network engineering, even customer service
to some extent.

You can, you know, you can apply that model.

It's really about, as you say, it's kind of, it's a well-rounded
program.

You're learning the technical skills, but you're learning them
hands on in the role, typically from a mentor or somebody that's

been with the company a lot longer.

And then you're also learning the soft skills.

So back to what I was saying about the unhappy customers.

I remember on the first day of my apprenticeship, I was visiting
somebody's house to put their internet service in with my mentor,

of course, because I, you know, at that point I was very
inexperienced.

And one of the customers was unhappy.

I think she'd had two bills for two different phone lines from
the same company.

Had no luck sorting it out with customer service.

So obviously we were the first people she saw face-to-face.

Andy Johns:
So here it comes.

Craig Barber:
Yeah, here comes the, and rightly so.

And you know me at the time, 17 years old, just out of high
school.

It was a very useful learning experience to see how my mentor
dealt with that and, you know, put the customer at ease and

explain how the issue was going to be dealt with and that, you
know, we want to get this resolved right now.

We're not going to leave until we've escalated it.

And, you know, you're not going to get that on a degree program.

Whereas with an apprenticeship, you know, you're getting those
soft skills and those experiences and the business skills.

You're learning them alongside at the same time as the technical
skills.

Andy Johns:
Now, on our panel that we did today here at the Tennessee
Broadband and Kentucky Rural Broadband Association Conference,

Jackie Griffin was on there from Franklin Skills, an
apprenticeship program.

And I thought it was interesting.

She said about 20% of the apprenticeships they're doing are
fully remote.

And a lot of the other apprenticeships have at least a remote
component to it.

How do you think this opens up, particularly for rural areas
when we're looking at tech jobs in the rural, you know, in rural

areas, how does that that ability to work remotely, how has that
changed apprenticeships?

You know, as opposed to what they were when you were going
through yours with BT?

Craig Barber:
Yeah. I mean, I think it kind of works two ways, right.

So, you know, if you're a rural broadband provider and you are
struggling to find people in your local area, well, technically,

you know, you could do something where there's, you know,
somebody slightly further afield, maybe there, I don't know,

maybe they're 50 miles away.

You could maybe kind of utilize some of that talent and bring
them on board.

And they could be partially remote, like a hybrid situation, or
maybe even fully remote.

And customer service, I think is a good example of that, where,
you know, you could almost balance, you know, you want to market

your rural broadband services, having US based customer service,
for example, a good differentiator.

Well, perhaps you, you know, perhaps you first look in your
local area, look at setting up some kind of apprenticeship

program there.

Or perhaps you look slightly further afield and you do a hybrid,
or you do a remote working situation, then you can use that, you

can still market that way.

But you can kind of widen the talent pool slightly.

So, you know, that's kind of something to consider.

Of course, technology jobs and cyber security, for example.

It applies to that as well.

You know, you could look at hiring individuals that are
somewhere else in the country or in the world and so on.

Andy Johns:
Are there certain types of folks and you mentioned that, you
know, your learning style a college lecture hall was not

necessarily the space where it was going to be the most
efficient and effective way for you to learn.

Are there folks that that you think an apprenticeship program or
what types of folks in particular do you think it's an

apprenticeship is kind of perfect for them?

Are there certain kinds, you know, is it kind of just the way
certain people think, learn that kind of thing?

I was surprised to hear in our presentation, Jackie said the
average age of apprentices they have is

32, which was significantly higher.

You know, I think of folks like yourself who 17 years old, going
right into it, right out of school.

But it sounds like it's the kind of program that can really
apply to folks at all different stages of life.

But are there some folks that, you know, you think an
apprenticeship is a better fit for than others?

Or what what kind of, you know, details or characteristics do you
think make a person a perfect candidate for an apprenticeship?

Craig Barber:
Yeah. And I think, so from an age perspective to begin with,
yeah, it's all ages.

So, you know, it can be career changers.

It can be veterans.

It could be young people.

It really, kind of, you know, the training model and the idea of
it is that it helps you land a career.

For example, in technology or in rural broadband or, you know,
in some kind of stem field where you are, you know,

you're finding something that you're going to have and hopefully
stay in for a foreseeable future.

It's helping you to find a good, solid career, basically
regardless of age or previous job experience or college

experience or high school.

In terms of the thought process and the kinds of types of people
that I think it helps, I think you have to look at it from an

affordability and an economic perspective.

Because if you're like me, you grew up in a small town.

There weren't many opportunities around.

For me, it was I didn't really, I didn't learn by being in a
classroom, really.

I always learned by kind of building computers, troubleshooting,
fixing things for family members and stuff.

And (b), I didn't really want to have to travel, you know, like
an hour round trip, or a two-hour round trip, even to the nearest

kind of technical college in an area that I wanted to work in.

As I was saying, you've got other folks that can't afford to go
to college, or, you know, they're too far away.

They can't afford to go to college, or they just plain don't
want to, because that's not how they learn.

They just want to get out there and get into the workplace.

All of those things kind of point toward an apprenticeship and
point toward that as a kind of good opportunity to go and

learn and, you know, get qualified and land in a career that is
going to kind of, you know, set the motion for you and get you

into things going forward.

I was going to say problem solving as well, right?

So like for me, I'm very much a problem solver, a logical
thinker.

I think, you know, if you're in that kind of situation, taking
computers apart, or you enjoy troubleshooting, you enjoy unknowns

, you know, if you've got that way of thinking and that's how you
kind of operate, then I really think it's a win-win over, over

doing a degree.

Andy Johns:
Let's get into the nitty gritty details and maybe even a little
more than we were able to get to on stage in the session.

The apprenticeship that you did with British Telecom was three
years, I think.

Jackie, our other panelist, had said they have programs that are
one year, and then additional certifications beyond that.

Typically these are done by the company that is looking to hire,
right.

Where the system and the curriculum, or whatever, is set up by
the company that's that's looking to recruit.

Sometimes there's a partner like the group that Jackie had
Franklin Skills, but usually this is something where you were

going to get these skills on a track to work at British Telecom,
and it's done by the company, and usually it takes a couple of

years to do it.

Craig Barber:
Yeah. So yeah, the programs in the UK are typically around three
years.

And the reason for that is they're kind of seen, we're lucky in
the UK in that it's kind of seen nationally as a kind of degree

equivalent. So a vocational equivalent to a degree.

It would be great for us to get there in the US at some point in
the future.

I know it's a little more complex with different levels of
government and states being involved and stuff.

But that's the idea behind the UK program and the US is, as
Jackie was saying earlier on stage, typically they're a little

bit shorter. And there's kind of two ways to do it.

So with BT, they're obviously a huge global multinational
company.

So they have teams of individuals that are skilled in setting up
their own apprenticeship programs, and they have a lot of

structure and a lot of kind of, you know, a lot of people
working on it.

And for smaller companies, then a company like Franklin Skills
can help by setting up that training program and that

structure on behalf of the business, kind of de-risking some of
it and taking some of the effort away.

And, you know, that could be in cyber security, it could be in
network engineering, any really kind of, you know, technology

based role.

Just because it's a smaller company doesn't mean that, you know,
they need to replicate the BT model because really it's, yeah,

it's quite different in the sense that they have a lot more
people working on it full time.

Andy Johns:
You had pretty much one mentor throughout most of it.

Or did it rotate through, [and] you had a lot of different
mentors?

Craig Barber:
I had, I want to say I had three.

And the reason for that was, they were quite good in that I came
in as a trainee network engineer.

Had a mentor that was a network engineer, I think he'd worked
there for 15 years, something like that.

So really experienced, really new, not only BT, but also the
infrastructure and all that kind of stuff.

The way that they structure their apprenticeship programs is
that you come in and started out as a network engineer, and then

they always give you opportunities to pivot from that.

So I spent some time working with the radio team, which was
microwave links, fixed wireless access, all that kind of stuff.

I had a mentor that specialized in that.

Did a bunch of stuff on fiber because that was then, this was
back in the mid 2000.

So fiber was starting to come out and the, you know, be used
more on the backbone.

And it was kind of different skill sets.

And at the end of the apprenticeship, it wasn't sort of a case
of you had a choice of where to go, but you had options.

So you could voice, okay, I really liked working with the radio
team, so I'd like to, you know, climb towers, and I'd like to fix

microwave links, things like that.

And they would look to try and place you in that team.

It wasn't a given, but it was a, you know, we would try
basically.

And I think that was one of the beauties of it, was that, you
know, if you were really doing well in your apprenticeship

program and you were, the company liked you and the teams liked
you, other opportunities in the business would then

open up, and they would be there potentially.

I stuck with the network engineering, but I was lucky that that
was where I felt like my passion was, and there was an

opportunity for me there.

Andy Johns:
Worked out perfectly.

Craig Barber:
Yeah. And the, you know, there was a full time role for me at the
end of it.

I passed the apprenticeship because there are obviously, there's
a standard, and you have to meet the standard.

I met the standard.

I passed. I then, you know, I was then moved from a trainee into
a full time network engineer.

So it paid off.

Andy Johns:
Yeah. Sounds like it. It's worked out very nicely.

Last two questions here for you.

So there's the job seeker or job candidate side of things, but
there's also the employer side of things.

What are some things that you've seen – you used the word
de-risk earlier – what are some things that employers can do

differently to be more open to this?

You know, so many of the jobs out there, it's a required four
year degree, or required two year degree.

Require, you know, master's degree a plus, whatever it is.

What are some things that employers can do to be more open to
not miss out on some of the great talent that may be there,

somebody that's either looking for an apprenticeship or that's
already been through one?

Craig Barber:
Yeah. I mean, it's yeah, I mean, I think it's being more
flexible.

So you know, looking at the requirements for the roles that you
have and looking at, you know, making it a little bit

more flexible. Because there are going to be individuals in your
local area that have the right skills, they just don't have the

paperwork or the certifications or the degree.

Andy Johns:
Right.

Craig Barber:
And they're there.

And, you know, they're going to be passionate about technology.

You're going to need good people.

So there's a match there.

And I think, you know, being more flexible on the job
descriptions can help.

Obviously, setting up an apprenticeship program as well,
building a bit of a structured program using maybe somebody like

Franklin Skills or speaking to us at Hatbox about building and
growing your business.

It's a case of the talent is there, and, you know, you really
want to use

that.It is, you know, it's kind of hard to, you know, hire
somebody that has no job experience for example.

Maybe they're straight out of school like I was, so they have no
experience.

They don't have a degree.

And I can see that a lot of individuals and a lot of businesses
would see that as slightly risky.

Andy Johns:
Sure. Risk was exactly the word that I was going to – yeah.

I mean, that's risky proposition.

Craig Barber:
Yeah. And I mean –

Andy Johns:
Or it feels risky anyway.

Craig Barber:
Exactly. Yeah.

And I think the, you know, I would reflect back to what BT were
doing, and I'm sure they're still doing it now, you know, almost

20 years on from when I did my apprenticeship where the
interview was more about, you know, as I was saying earlier,

building,. I think it was give an example of when you
troubleshooted a technical problem.

As simple as that, as basic as that.

And it allows you, as a skilled interviewer to really
understand, is that person willing to learn?

Are they passionate about technology?

Do they have some of the basics?

And, you know, I look for it as a CISO, I look for not only, you
know, I don't necessarily look for somebody that knows

every single cybersecurity or regulatory framework out there.

I look for somebody that maybe, you know, they might know a
couple, but they have the willingness, they have the passion,

they have a way to learn them, and they can learn the others.

And I think that's, you know, that's the kind of basis of hiring
apprentices, really is, you know, make the interview more

general. And, you know, you're going to get value as a business
from them on day one.

There are activities in rural broadband that an extra set of
hands, they can really help you.

You know, running cables, testing circuits, for example.

Like it doesn't, if you've hired somebody that's passionate and
they understand technology, they're willing to learn, you can

explain to them how to use a fiber tester.

And, you know, I could see it within a day, they could be at the
other end of your circuit running tests on the phone to you.

And, you know, they're immediately giving value.

So I think it's kind of being willing to accept that yeah,
interviewing individuals that maybe don't have any credentials

and asking the right questions, building an apprenticeship
program.

And then, you know, having that understanding of there are tasks
and there is value from day one in having trainees on

board.

Andy Johns:
Yeah. Somebody who's gone through the hiring process with several
different candidates, it may feel less risky to see a four year

degree on there, but that doesn't doesn't necessarily mean that
that person knows how to learn, or is eager, or any of that.

It may feel less risky, but that may just be a bias in the
process.

Craig Barber:
And for some individuals, that's a perfectly acceptable route.

That's how people learn.

It shows expertise.

It shows that you've learned a lot of standards, and you've
learned good principles and things.

It's just that with an apprenticeship, I found that, as we were
saying earlier, it wasn't just about the principles.

You learned those, but you learned the business skills.

And you learned that, you know, sometimes or in fact, most of
the time, things in the real world don't exactly tie back to the

principles.

Andy Johns:
To the textbook. Yeah, yeah.

For sure. Last question I have for you as we wrap up here, what
advice do you have for somebody who is listening to this and is

thinking, you know, maybe either (a) we need to start an
apprenticeship program, or (b) maybe we need to be more open to

people who have been through I would say a less traditional
route here in the States to have done an apprenticeship or

other work there? What advice do you have for somebody who's
listening and thinking that there are some changes their company

needs to make?

Craig Barber:
Yeah, I mean, it kind of goes back to what, some of it was just
kind of similar to what I was just saying in terms of, you know,

there are, as a rural broadband provider, in Tennessee, there
are going to be individuals in your area that would benefit your

business, but that don't have any credentials.

And that is the, I think that's the number one benefit to a
business in terms of looking at apprenticeships.

One thing we didn't talk about as well is the other way around.

So injecting –

Andy Johns:
Oh yeah, I meant to get to that.

Craig Barber:
New ideas. Yeah.

New ideas, new, you know, criticizing, questioning things, I
guess is probably a probably a better word to use.

But, hiring apprentices is going to inject new ideas and new
ways of thinking and

questioning into your business.

So, you know, you may have a specific process when it comes to
making infrastructure changes, for example.

Well, an apprentice may come in and, you know, they're going to
have a completely different background to everybody who's worked

at your company in the past.

And they might go, "Well, hey, have you looked at doing it this
way?

Or how about if we change our maintenance window to this time on
a weekend because, you know, a lot of, you know, it could

be a better time to do it?

Or have we looked at using this system instead?" You know, it's
a two-way thing.

It's not a one-way thing where you're training apprentices.

It's also that your business, your employees, and the people
that are acting as mentors will learn from the

apprentices as to, you know, different ways of doing things and
things like that.

And a lot of them never have, you know, when you're working full
time, you don't, you know, it's hard to learn new things.

Andy Johns:
A true two-way street, I think, is how you phrased it in our
panel, so it makes perfect sense.

Yep. Well, Craig, thank you so much for being willing to not
only speak at the panel, but also join us on this episode of

Lead Tennessee Radio.

Craig Barber:
Thank you. It's been good.

Andy Johns:
He is Craig Barber, the founder and CEO of Hatbox here in Middle
Tennessee.

I'm your guest host, Andy Johns, and we appreciate you listening
to this episode of Lead Tennessee Radio.