CASE STUDY
Support Programme: LEAD
Company Assisted: Jubilee Tower Credit Union
Support Activity: Leadership Development
In 2009, Margaret Massey of Jubilee Tower Credit Union heard about the Northwest Regional Development Agency's LEAD programme. The organisation was facing a number of changes and LEAD appeared to offer an effective way of developing new leadership and management skills that would help the team to cope with them. Consequently, Margaret enrolled on Enterprise4All's first cohort and soon found that her organisation and her own personal confidence were deriving significant benefits.
Jubilee Tower Credit Union is a Blackburn based social enterprise that has been helping local people since its formation in 1996. It offers savings facilities and low cost loans to its members and, through links to other organisations, it also helps them with budgeting or financial difficulties.
Initially, its growth was slow and for several years it operated one evening a week, using a community centre as its collection centre. However, word gradually spread of the benefits it was bringing to people (who might otherwise have had to turn to doorstep lenders for credit) and in the following years it established a permanent base with a shop front in the town centre.
By 2004, it was operating four days a week and beginning a period of substantial and sustained growth. By 2009, it was working out of 23 different sites across Blackburn, Darwen and the surrounding area and lending out between £250,000 and £350,000 per annum.
With many plans for further growth and diversification, the company’s management team recognised that planning and coping with this expansion would be a challenge in itself and so it took the opportunity to participate in the Northwest Regional Development Agency’s highly acclaimed LEAD programme.
Support Provided:
After attending a preview event hosted by Enteprise4All at Blackburn College’s new University Centre, Jubilee’s development officer Margaret Massey took the decision to join the first LEAD cohort.
After an induction day, during which she got to know other members of the group, Margaret attended an overnight residential event held at Lancaster House Hotel.
Working with facilitators and other delegates, she shared her experiences and discussed a range of issues from confidence building to business planning and recruitment.
As trust developed between the participating business owners and managers, they were able to learn from one another and suggest solutions to challenges that many of them shared.
“I joined LEAD at a time when we were planning and implementing many new changes,” says Margaret. “We were planning a move to new premises, recruiting new staff and developing new service level agreements with local authorities, children’s centres, landlords and many other clients.
“It was a very rewarding experience; by sharing ideas with other delegates, I gained valuable feedback and found new confidence in my own abilities as a business manager.”
Results:
“LEAD has been of enormous benefit to me,” explains Margaret. “I’m really pleased with what it’s done for me and for the organisation as a whole.
“I had been looking to negotiate a new lease for our premises before I joined the programme. In the past, I might have simply accepted the deal on the table but only two days after completing the residential, I had built up the confidence to renegotiate for a longer lease and a bigger discount. In the end, I secured a subsidy worth nearly £34,000.
“Through coaching, masterclasses and various other events, LEAD has kick-started many changes within our organisation. We’re working very closely with carers, schools, local councils and other clients and we’ve introduced new ways of dealing with recruitment, marketing and our continued expansion.”