As our business has developed over the past four years, so have our knowledge, experiences and commitment to working in education. Widely reported like for like funding cuts per pupil of approximately 3% in real terms over the last 13 years, has left many schools – LEA funded, MATs and Academies – struggling to...
On #IWD22 International Women’s Day, we are celebrating the culmination of some brilliant, compassionate, and stretching thinking from two of our brilliant Associates – Professor Ellie Highwood and Diksha Chakravarti, with some beautiful artwork designed by my 13 year old niece, Miss Amy Cooper. “International Women’s Day is a day to highlight the need to...
Gratitude #6 – #Belief. There have been a handful of points in 2020 where my self-belief has wobbled, and I’ve wondered if an employed role with an organisation that would put me onto a regular payroll would be less nerve wracking. Part of the #steeplearningcurve of #owning and working in my #ownbusiness is to work with the #highsandlows, and to try to flatten...
Gratitude #5 – Working from home. We started the year with #client meetings in Hull and London, but #Lockdown1 stopped this in March. Like millions of parents, I faced the challenge of balancing #work with #homeschooling four children aged 10 and under. This was extra difficult as we endured other significant home challenges. It wasn’t just a case of supporting the children’s learning,...
Gratitude #4 – The opportunity to #learn. 2020 truly pushed us out of our comfort zone, seeing us experiment in ways we may otherwise have been dubious about. The term #fastfail resonates as we tried new things, learnt from them, and improved for next time. Although not perfect, we’ve worked hard on our #virtualpresence, including website and social media activity. We’ve...
Gratitude #3 – The firm building blocks now in place by nurturing our important #clientrelationships in 2020. We’re eternally grateful for our clients. With SUMS Consulting we’ve: -Worked with the #Universities of Reading, Leicester, Hull and Westminster in #studentrecruitment, #marketing and #admissions, optimising activities, systems and structures in the #recruitmentfunnel -At one HEI, delivered an in-depth #targetoperatingmodel assignment and shaped #matrixworking -Conducted a #TOM #benchmarkingreport, and written #thoughtleadership papers -Aligned with two #communityofpracticegroups (CPG) – #Change; and #MarketingandCommunications, providing...
Our 2nd act of gratitude is for the opportunity to add #mentalhealthandwellbeingservices to our offer. Responding to the #mentalhealthcrisis, supporting others to build #resilience, we were grateful to be able to tailor our services to support #workplacehealth and the #communityatlarge. We… – Delivered #MHFAtraining, approved by Mental Health First Aid (MHFA) England, instructed by Andy Elwood, supported by Diane Gibbons. – Offered i-act (for positive mental health...
We know 2020 has been an incredibly tough year for a myriad of reasons for very many people. And it looks like this is set to continue through to early 2021. However, we want to recognise some of the things that have gone well for our business during 2020, and in particular callout some highlights,...
We teamed up with The Brand Education and Carnival Content to take part in one of a series of podcasts themed around Disrupting the Degree – exploring the impact the events of this year have had on Higher Education. Listen in by connecting to the news story on our LinkedIn page below. https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6727550381338963968/