Background

In 2004, Atmaana applied to deliver the Coaching Entrepreneurs Programme and was rewarded by the GOWM in November 2004.

The purpose of the Coaching Entrepreneurs programme is to work with small and medium size businesses (SMEs) to pilot a radical new approach to embedding a culture of enterprise and innovation in businesses as a core part of their continuous improvement strategy.

Enterprise and innovation culture is accepted as one of the critical drivers in improving national competitiveness and productivity. Entrepreneurship is recognized as one of the key differentiators between successful companies which are profitable and survive through growth, and those that stand-still or fail. The challenge is to enable small businesses to have the vision, capacity and capability to grow by enabling them to operate more entrepreneurial and remove the barriers to change. The project will end in December 2006.

Atmaana's role

Atmaana assisted by its training arm, Boldu, is responsible for the successful delivering of the entrepreneurship programme in the West Midlands whilst its partner in the programme, Coventry University Enterprise takes the position as the administrator of the project. The project is part funded by European Social Fund monies channelled through regional bodies.

The vision for the programme is through expanding the pool of skilled coaches and mentors to unlock and harness the entrepreneurial talents within the whole workforce and to apply these capabilities in all areas of the business.

The programme utilises highly as Master Coaches to help the MDs and staff of SMEs to develop the key skill sets needed to be more entrepreneurial and successful. The Master Coach will mentor the MD who in turn will coach the staff, increasing the pool of expert resource available to help and ensuring that change is sustainable.

Deliverables

At the beginning a pool of Master Coaches, experienced owner managers in the Midlands with a track record of successful expansion of their business was established. In parallel, for a first approach, Atmaana collated the addresses and contact details of over 800 companies from the West Midlands in a database.

These companies were contacted and asked to fill in a questionnaire to evaluate general needs and skill-gaps of the entrepreneurs in the West Midlands. After evaluating these outcomes, a first selection of companies was made. According to the areas were a necessity for coaching and mentoring was found, an appropriate Master Coach was matched to help improving the performance of the company. Progress from these companies is permanently benchmarked against best practice and new companies are approached to participate in the programme.

Client benefits

At the end of the project, over 500 companies will be involved and more than 160 people, MDs and employees, partly threaten with unemployment will have directly benefit from the programme.

Companies that have already left the programme gathered invaluable benefits and experiences and found that the huge problems they were facing at the time they joined the programme were easily solved with the appropriate mentoring and advice.

As the Coaching Entrepreneurs Programme is a pilot and therefore unique in its kind, Atmaana intends to roll it out to a region / nationwide programme for the benefit of companies

To find out more about the GOWM project, or Atmaana's extensive range of services, contact Stuart Nunn