Rob is a senior account manager at Workwhile, an initiative to make sure low-paid Londoners can secure better-quality, higher-paying work by supporting employers to increase investment in apprenticeships.

Rob joined the Workwhile team at the beginning of the project and helped create the plans to meet the brief of supporting businesses in London to get unemployed and low-skilled Londoners onto a pathway of progression through apprenticeships.

Since then, his work has grown from SME support and helping Levy paying organisations to share levy with SMEs, to working in close partnership with local councils in London to find innovative ways to support local businesses to create opportunity through apprenticeships and training, with the values of good work and good pay for residents.

Prior to joining IPPR in September 2019, Rob worked for education charity Ambition Institute. Rob worked with schools and multi-academy trusts in East London and the east of England to develop their workforce through a range of government-funded and traded programmes to help their teachers and leaders to keep getting better to improve the prospects for their disadvantaged pupils.

Before Rob decided to put his skills to use in tackling inequality through education and skills, Rob had a career in magazine publishing, holding key marketing positions at several leading publishers working predominantly on music and entertainment magazines.