Member Testimonial – Tyson

Why joining the Fylde Coast Responsible Business Network is good for:

• Your Business
• Your People
• Our Community

“I used to think I was reasonably well connected in business. But the Fylde Coast Responsible Business Network opened my eyes, and mind, to many more opportunities.

I met with Michelle Walker, Project Manager for the network, 12 months ago at a networking event at a presentation about Upskilling Blackpool.

From that event, Michelle quickly put me in touch with schools that we had been trying to engage with for a while.

Being a Blackpool company we want to help the community. Blackpool is our home, it is precious to us, and it’s important for us to reinvest.

We deliver a lot of social value across Blackpool and through Michelle we were able to get in touch with the right people.

Inspiring the Future

For me, it’s not about attending school careers fairs. We have done a lot of that in the past. To be perfectly honest that’s not what works for us.

We want to do something different and more bespoke with schools – particularly with creating programmes and activities which are going to inspire people about the construction industry. That’s where the network has been so helpful for us.

Through Michelle we were able to engage with South Shore Academy and have been introduced to Lancashire Careers Hub.

We are putting an innovative programme together, linking art and construction, through eight sessions with South Shore Academy which will involve students coming to our sites

Working with schools in careers and construction to upskill the area is really important to us. It’s a big part of what makes us tick and we do a lot more in the community than we are contractually obliged to because we are passionate about the people and the place.

Our apprenticeships are heavily oversubscribed. We do lots with Blackpool and Fylde College with T-Level students, we take three or four on work placements during the year, and we hope to be able to create a new role for one.

Connecting you to the right people

The Fylde Coast Responsible Business Network is also great at connecting you with people in other companies and organisations who share the same values. By making those connections and by working together we can achieve a lot for the area. Michelle has helped me make contact with those people. She is a joy to work with. Her advice and contacts are invaluable.

As a team we recently suffered the sudden and tragic loss of a colleague. Michelle was incredibly supportive. She quickly introduced us to The Empowerment Charity who helped us with mental health advice and support which is so important for all workforces, but especially construction where mental health is often still treated as a taboo subject and clearly a lot of people in the industry are really suffering.

Through the network we will now be working with The Empowerment Charity to support us for the months and years ahead which will help not just this generation of workers in construction but the next generation too.

For all these reasons, and many more, I would highly recommend any business in the Blackpool area joining the Fylde Coast Responsible Business Network.”

Philip Helm
Business Development Director
Tyson
www.tysonconstruction.co.uk