Local Jobs for local people

Over the next decade £1bn of investment will drive regeneration throughout the borough of Rochdale. It’s a regeneration that will be supported by a public private partnership that aims to create more than 1,300 jobs over 15 years.

The Impact Partnership is a joint venture partnership between Mouchel Parkman, Agilisys and Rochdale council. Like other joint ventures working within the public sector, it is about transforming council services by combining private sector innovation with public sector skills. In Impact’s case, this concerns property, highways, IT, payroll and contact centre services.

Impact differs from most PPPs as it also seeks to promote local economic regeneration through job creation and in doing so to raise the expectations of the local community.

To achieve this it will create 1,305 jobs, most of which will go to local borough residents. This is an ambitious goal in its own right, but it is especially challenging considering Rochdale’s ranking as one of the most deprived boroughs in the country.

Creating new jobs locally

Impact’s ambitious job creation targets (see table, below) are central to its business plan and a lot of work has been carried out to identify where these new jobs will come from and how they will strengthen Impact’s existing workforce.

The partnership’s objective is to fill 75% of all new jobs locally in an effort to retain skilled professionals within the borough. By raising the expectations of the borough, Impact will also help to entice professional skills back into the area.

The creation of a new contact centre during the first year has provided most of the newly created jobs, and many of these have been filled by those from some of the most deprived areas of the borough. In the meantime, the biggest challenge is finding suitable professionals.

Job creation targets over 15 years (Figures represents cumulative new jobs)

Year 1 - 166
Year 5 - 539
Year 10 - 872
Year 15 - 1,305

So how does the partnership plan to achieve its ambitious job creation targets?

1. Winning new business

Impact’s focus is on winning new business locally and regionally. Job creation is dependent on business development, and winning business requires service delivery which, in turn, gives rise to job creation.

The key to achieving this target is the wider regeneration of Rochdale. New business will also have to be won regionally, outside of Rochdale, and Impact’s private partners are already creating employment by bringing private sector contracts into the borough.

Over the past year the partnership has won a number of contracts both within and outside Rochdale. If all goes to plan, in five years’ time the partnership will be one of the leading professional property, highways and business service providers in the North-west.

2. Working in partnership

The partnership recognises that it will not meet its job creation targets unless it works in a joined-up way with a number of agencies involved in delivering the borough’s various strands of economic regeneration.

Impact, for example, sits on the Rochdale Economic Partnership chaired by the Rochdale Development Agency, which was set up by the council to lead the regeneration agenda in the borough.

RDA is tasked with attracting inward investment as well as procuring service providers for projects in the borough, and both RDA and Impact are consciously exploring ways they can work together to develop opportunities.

Andy Zuntz, head of regeneration for Rochdale council, reinforces this joined-up approach saying that with the broad principles now in place all the agencies working in Rochdale need to develop a shared commitment to the joint regeneration agenda.

3. Innovative recruitment methods

The partnership relies on direct recruitment to find employees with jobs advertised in the local press, trade press, job centres, across partners, and through the Rochdale Employment Partnership. Innovative recruitment methods are necessary to ensure sufficient candidates apply to join the partnership.

To help drive job creation, Impact recently held a jobs fair to attract professionals and graduates from property, highway, ICT and business services sectors to join the growing organisation. The event, branded “Do you want to make an impact on regeneration?”, created a significant amount of interest, receiving over 220 applications; an additional 70 CVs were received before the event.

The partnership has made several senior appointments as a result of the jobs fair. The most notable addition is a special projects manager who has moved from London back to his home town of Rochdale.

Building on the success of this event, Impact plans to organise a joint recruitment drive with two other Mouchel Parkman joint ventures: 2020 Liverpool (with Liverpool council); and Unity Partnership (with Oldham council and HBS).

Mouchel Parkman is an obvious source for professional jobs in Rochdale and its plans to almost double the business by 2012 will certainly create more opportunities. For example, Impact’s new managing director, Chris Lavery, has joined from management consultancy Hornagold & Hills, a recent Mouchel Parkman acquisition.

4. Raising local expectations

Within the borough there are particular issues with low aspirations. Nearly 20% of adults living there have no educational qualifications compared to 15% across England (and in the most deprived parts of the borough the level is much higher). So how does the partnership raise their expectations and aspirations?

The first important step is making Impact more visible locally, not only as a provider of services but also as a source of professional jobs. Impact also needs to raise people’s expectations that there are opportunities out there. Promoting the partnership’s role in regeneration will demonstrate that if they join Impact, they too can make a significant contribution to the borough.

Last November the partnership brought on board a new business development director to drive job creation. Part of his task is to set up links and sustainable initiatives with local educational establishments to ensure that job opportunities provided by Impact are taken up by local residents.

To address the shortage of professionals, the partnership is going into schools and informing young people that they should prepare their academic journeys for these opportunities. The partnership is working with further education colleges to ensure they deliver courses that meet the job needs; it has work placements for students and it is in the process of setting up a sponsorship programme for undergraduates.

Conclusion

It is still early days for the partnership. The main focus so far has been on providing uninterrupted service to the council and major clients, alongside service transformation. Add to the mix significant job creation targets and there is no lack of challenges.

Yet Impact remains optimistic. According to the joint venture’s human resources manager, the job targets are very ambitious and set at a level that will stretch the organisation. If the targets were easily achieved, the partnership would not be aiming high enough.