The Report

Women's Services Network In South Birmingham, UK
Introduction Promoting the Project The Network Organisational Training Needs Analysis The Network Core Group The Network e-Portal Photographs of the Network Day Download Network reports

Introduction An Equal Agender Project was contracted for delivery between January and March 2006 with the aim of establishing a network that would further the prospects of women in South Birmingham. This project was to take forward ideas which had been developed under the following objectives: to develop centres that offer support to women and girls to work with employers to counter job segregation and gender pay inequalities to develop new career pathways into non traditional careers to develop a marketing strategy to attract men into childcare The project aimed to take forward the leading principles of innovation, mainstreaming and empowerment. It undertook to ensure that work undertaken did not duplicate activities or research findings that have already taken place and been documented locally, regionally or nationally. The project focused upon women living in the most deprived areas of South Birmingham and upon establishing support networks to assist them to achieve identified career aspirations. It proposed to meet this aim by identifying community organisations working with women in the South Birmingham area; establishing a network of generic support by bringing together these organisation with a view to providing empowerment through knowledge and progression routes; to offer training needs analysis to organisations to ensure that their staff are vocationally trained in order to ensure that best practices become inherent within the organisations; to produce an e portal of network information which will offer support to network members through the expertise of other partners. It was identified that there were large numbers of women living in isolation in deprived areas of South Birmingham who did not have support structures in place to help them gain confidence in themselves and raise the self esteem needed to consider future training or employment. Individual women came into contact with a wide variety of organisations working with them on particular issues, e.g. drug abuse, social services, teenage pregnancy. However, there was no single network in place to ensure that these women could benefit by the wide variety of support that could be available to them. Top.........

Promoting the Project Bournville College, as Contract Holder, instituted an intensive promotional campaign. The Project Manager contacted and visited identified organisations and agencies working in the South Birmingham area to ascertain their interest in becoming involved in the project. It worked closely with the Allens Croft Project, a Development Agency located in Kings Heath, to market and advertise the project to the widest possible audience. Allens Croft works to provide support and training opportunities to local voluntary and community groups and the people working with them and, so, provided an excellent resource to assist in reaching the target groups and organisations. They work in South Birmingham area and have links most particularly in the wards of Kings Norton, Moseley and Kings Heath, Brandwood, Billesley and Hall Green. Focus was particularly paid to the following organisations: Cofton Health Centre Allens Croft LARK Surestart South Birmingham Mental Health Trust S.W. Birmingham Community Organisation Billesley Development Agency Warstock Centre Brandwood Centre Parents Forum Victim Support WAITS South West Birmingham Access to Employment Group S Birmingham Childcare Strategy Group S.W. Birmingham Regeneration The Project was also marketed and advertised at Women’s Events and launches which took place throughout the month of March, including a special event held at the Drum at Newtown. Top.........

The Network The Network meeting was arranged for 28^th March at the Hazelwell Hub, Vicarage Road, Kings Heath between 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. Organisations that had affirmed their interested in joining the network had confirmed their attendance. On the day, the following organisations sent senior representatives to the Network meeting: Victim Support South West Birmingham B.S.M.H.T. West Midlands Foodlinks Bournville College Allens Croft Project Children’s Centre WAITS LARC Cofton Health Clinic The WAM Project Billesley Development Agency Dosti WCC DHTMC BDA Delegates were welcomed at Reception by Kate Geoghegan from the Allens Croft Project and she encouraged them to begin the process of networking and also of identifying training needs of their own organisations. Margaret Dilloway, of Bournville College, explained the purpose, aims and objectives of the network to the delegates and also explained the background and ethos of Equal, Agender and Neighbourhood Learning in Deprived Communities. She explained the benefits of joining the network and also the purpose and responsibilities of the ten organisations who would form the nucleus of the network group. These ten steering group members would be responsible for dissemination information to their own contacts and the groups and agencies with which they work. Benefits of the network would include the sharing of good practice, access to the network e portal, empowerment through belonging to a structured network group including opportunities to access funding. Members would also be encouraged to advertise their own organisations including news and promotion of forthcoming events. Christine Mulveen, of the Allens Croft Project, explained how the meetings would be held and the strength in diversity that the delegates and their organisations could offer. Christine organised the completion of the training needs analysis and the equal opportunities documentation. The results of the training needs analysis will be fed back to the Agender Core Group and to the Birmingham College’s group for follow up. Christine spent time with each delegate discussing their organisations and how they could benefit and fit into the network and encouraging participation and enthusiasm for joining the project. Photographs of the event are included with this report. Top.........

Results of the Organisational Training Needs Analysis Of the Voluntary and Community groups working in the South Birmingham area who completed the Training Needs Analysis the following evidence was compiled: 60% have paid staff working full time 70% have paid staff working part time 60% have a Management Committee 75% use volunteers 30% have ‘other’ staff involved in their organisations Training Needs and analysis: Planning, prioritising and organising task and activities, time management, self and team ……… 44% Motivation and leadership of team and individual team members …… 55% Communication skills, questioning and active listening, building trust, empathy and mutual understanding …….39% Performance and appraisals planning, conducting and follow up for team and self.. 44% One to One counselling, handling grievances, discipline, helping and enabling others with change …… 55% Training and developing others, coaching and mentoring, assessing training needs.. 67% Delegation, identifying and agreeing tasks, measuring, follow up, management by objectives ……… 39% Effective use of IT and equipment, esp. communication, planning and reporting systems ………….. 39% Financial and commercial understanding (e.g. budgets, cash flow, etc) ….. 50% Managing relationships, inter-department, peers, upwards, obtaining approval for projects, changes, etc …. 39% Planning and running meetings, effective follow up …… 11% Business writing, e.g. letters, reports, plans …….. 50% Recruitment, interviewing and selection …. 33% Administration, reporting performance and financial monitoring, maintaining and developing reporting systems …. 22% Creating and giving effective presentations to groups ….. 39% Innovation, creativity, taking initiative, problem solving and decision making … 33% Quality awareness and managing according to quality standards.... 39% Employment and H.R. policy awareness and managing equality … 70% Customer care and customer service management ….. 72% Self development, compassion and humanity, personal growth … 70% Top.........

The Network Core Group Following the Network Meeting, the following ten organisations have confirmed that they would like to join the Network Steering Group in order to promote the aims of the project and to cascade them to their own members and partners : Victim Support South West Birmingham BSMHT West Midlands Foodlinks Dosti W.C.C. DHTMC Allans Croft Project Cofton Health Centre WAM Project LARC Bournville College The group will next meet as a Steering Group in May 2006 and will formulate its constitution and identify its aims and objectives for the next twelve months and beyond. It is possible that sub groups will be formed from this main group in order to meet these aims and to promote the ethos of the project to its widest possible audience. Top.........

The Network e-Portal This is the e-portal for the Women's Network! The Portal will grow and will contains information of location and details of the organisations involved in the network with links to their own websites. It will contain downloads of forms and documentation, e.g. evaluations and application forms, research reports and other documents of interest, e.g. white papers, gender documentation, publications. It will contain all research documentation published by Equal Agender and a database of relevant research which will have live links for easy access. A bulletin news board will be included for members to publish details of forthcoming events and updates. Minutes of Steering Group Meetings and dates of interest will be published as will calls for project proposals from funding bodies. This e portal will be a live and ever changing site and members will be encouraged to drop in on a regular basis both to report and to identify any issues which may be of interest to their organisation. Please bookmark this page. Top.........