Alongside being a significant centre for innovative engineering education, the New Model Institute for Technology & Engineering (NMITE) seeks to have an impact in the region’s wider skills ecosystem, development and economy.
Our Springboard early career leadership programme is one example of this in action. Participants from local organisations join us one day a month for practical workshops focused on leadership development facilitated by experts from within NMITE and our wider network.
Springboard responds to the challenge and cost small businesses face in offering structured training and development in-house. By bringing together individuals from multiple businesses, NMITE helps to address this problem.
Topics include: managing stress and wellbeing; communication and influencing; working with others; projects and organisations; value creation; and leadership styles. True to NMITE’s learning by doing approach, sessions are interactive with participants working together, and even with actors, to simulate workplace scenarios and apply their learning.
Participants gain a range of practical approaches and tools they can use to support and work with their teams at work. They are encouraged to reflect on their use of the skills in their own workplace, and to recognise the benefits of their learning, whilst also finding opportunities to apply it.
But the programme isn’t simply about developing skills: it facilitates participants building their professional network. They meet others at a similar stage in their career from other companies, and so a supportive network is emerging, which, in turn, we hope will help the participants feel more settled and established in our region.
Following the success of Springboard 2022, we are launching a second cohort in February, priced at £2,500 for the 12-month programme. But thanks to European Social Funding, we can offer a 50% discount to Herefordshire businesses, and 100% funded places for third-sector organisations.
Find out more and apply: www.nmite.ac.uk/springboard