We’re really delighted to be launching our first ambitionUK project with Orange Digital this month. It’s a 10 week corporate training opportunity for 12 unemployed 18-24 year olds. They get to spend around 20 days in the Orange Digital HQ, working with their teams, getting mentoring and learning about branding, marketing, leadership and skills.
It’s been a challenging process to get blueprint for the project into a place where we really feel it’s going to work – for Orange Digital, for the participants and for Agency East. One thing that anyone running a business of any kind knows is that it’s not enough just to have a good idea. You need to k
now how it’s going to work, who is going to benefit (ie what are the rewards) and how it’s going to change anything.
Young people are rightly and naturally suspicious of programmes cooked up by well-meaning third sector organisat
ions, and want to know – specifically – what they are going to get out of it. What might seem like exciting developmental experiences designed by adults, very often miss a trick. I know this from experience of having made this mistake a few times before. And to break young people out of a cycle of inactivity, there needs to be a significant stimulus to get their im
aginative juices flowing.
We had to think clearly about the ambitionUK programme and what it brings to the table for the two key partners Orange
Digital and the young people. In some ways it was easy with the business because there is an i
nspirational CEO with a can-do positive senior management team, who see the value of this project for the organisation.
Not only does this work help the personal and professional development of staff, making the business a better place to work but having the young people around is in itself a motivational tool and helps to reinvi
g
orate, that ‘first day at work’ feeling. The ambitionOrange Digital programme is innovative in its approach by giving the participants the chance to engage with real product development. Coached by the designers and developers in the business, they will be given a real challenge to solve for the business.
For a young person, with little professional experience and no personal contacts to get them an internship or work experience, ambitionOrange is a first stage opportunity to understand the key attributes and chara
cteristics of successful businesses and organisations. The way they learn this is wholly in context of their own profiles. So they learn about personal branding, skill
s
development, leadership and communications, including networking skills and team work. At the end of the project they will have taken part in all the workshops, created a real product wireframe for the business and been mentored by the Orange Digital team. Most importantly though, they will have a strong LinkedIn profile with professional recommendations and industry connections and will be part of an ongoing support group for the next stage of their
careers. And of course the really smart ones will be knocking on the door of the Paddington HQ and asking for more…