Through an important corporate partnership, ABS has helped managers at Acorns Children’s Hospice develop their leadership skills and capabilities. By offering the charity’s managers places on its Leadership Development Programme, ABS has contributed to Acorns’ own strategic plan and organisational objectives.
ABS helped 30 staff at Acorns to develop better leadership skills within the workplace, and help them to better shape their own departments. Acorns is currently working through a survival strategy to see it through the recession and protect its vital care and support services for the future, services that currently help 600 life limited children and their families living in the region. Their ‘Fragile Lives Appeal’ allows everyone in the community to put their thinking caps on to find ways to help the charity.
The training courses were organised and led by the Executive Education department of ABS as part of its own strategy to engage with local communities. Under the guidance of Professor Robin Martin, the participants looked at ways to improve work motivation and factors linked to effective leadership. They also learnt about leadership styles and when to employ them as well as leadership development techniques. The culmination of the course was for the managers to apply what they had learnt to their work situation.
‘The results were an inspiration and showed how useful this course was to each member of the group. Acorns is going through a tough time and it was our pleasure to offer the training needed to improve workplace motivation and leadership. Allowing Acorns to develop effective leadership and enhance its mission has been a really positive experience to everyone involved,’ said Robin.
‘The participants were dedicated and have been really keen to learn new skills and to apply them to their workplace in order to enhance their service delivery.’
Karen Taylor, Head of Learning and Development at Acorns said: ‘We were thrilled to receive the leadership training. It has really helped our team to gain valuable insights into workplace motivation and leadership, and to better lead their own teams to achieve the overall vision at Acorns.’
Words by Ruth Green
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