Newsletter July 2011

Two quite different activities took place this month regarding jobs.

The first was a training course for a team at a Welsh Local Authority charged with helping job seekers to find work. The initiative is a part of a wider brief to help individuals move away from benefits to full or part time work.
The course was designed to give the team the confidence to call and engage with local employers to identify suitable job opportunities.

The second activity was the annual Graduate Assessment Centre for graduate recruitment at England's largest County Council.
During July, candidate testing continued and the observers assigned to next month's Assessment Centre were introduced to the tasks and exercises they will be observing. They were also given advice on how to observe in an unbiased way.

In September, The Development Company will be running an open Assessor Skills Course in conjunction with A&DC  to help individuals to become competent assessors at Assessment and Development Centres. The course will be run at the Hilton Hotel Watford on September 28th & 29th.

Other assignments in July included the following:

• Two courses covering Influencing and Persuading were run as a part of a graduate development programme at one of the UK's largest engineering and manufacturing companies.
  
   
• A two day programme was designed and delivered to the regional managers responsible for voluteer fundraising at the UK's largest charity. The programme focused on how the regional managers work with each other and their senior management team to deliver the funds that support the work of the charity.
  
   
• A one day Sales Training workshop was run for a software development company specialising in web site design and development.
  
   
• In May, the managers of a number of local authority owned leisure centres undertook some management development training which they put into practice at a centre that was not the one they normally managed. The programme was titled "Fit for Business" and the centre swap was for two weeks. In July, the managers attended a facilitated meeting to share and discuss the experience and the lessons learned. The programme prepared the managers for the school summer holidays which places extra demands on the centres and their staff.
  
   
• The first of two Performance Masterclasses was delivered to the managers at the largest independent training company in Wales. The Masterclasses have been designed to reinforce a performance led culture within the organisation. The company is about to start a major government contract that it won earlier in the year.
  
   
• A two day Leadership programme was run for a group of managers at a large European engineering consultancy.
  
   
• A cohort of managers at the UK's largest charity undertook the third day of the Management Fundamentals Programme.