Addressing tomorrow’s training needs

As Jonathan Baillie discovered from CEO John Thatcher during a visit to the training centre’s extensive Gloucestershire facilities, since a 2003 management buyout the range of training on offer has expanded as never before.

Originally established in 1969 by the Department of Health and Social Security, and with its central offices housed in an elegant late Victorian mansion within rolling Gloucestershire countryside, Eastwood Park subsequently became part of the NHS, and later, at around the time the first NHS Trusts began appearing (in 1991), was transferred to within the Avon and Gloucester College of Health. In 1997 the centre was purchased by Fujitsu Services’ (FJS) Training Division in what John Thatcher admits was “a rather strange marriage” where its focus, for a short time at least, shifted almost exclusively to IT service/management training and conferencing. “We really were on the periphery of what FJS was doing,” he admitted, “so it was no major surprise when the Fujitsu division decided to sell us in 2003.” Convinced of the centre’s significant future development potential, John Thatcher put together an MBO with partners finance director Pauline Oliver and facilities and procurement director Lin Willis, and with the business now 100% privately-owned, the team can now, as John Thatcher put it, “really call all the shots”. The centre’s ever-growing range of training courses, he went on to explain, are predominantly delivered by freelance trainers, all, he says, “experts in their field”. Last year 48 of the 219 courses (the quota excludes NVQs) were delivered on site within Eastwood Park’s comprehensively equipped facilities, a fascinating mix of old and new, with a “typical” on-site course comprising up to 12 students. Students pay for their tuition via a mixture of Learning and Skills Council funding, Strategic Health Authority and employer contributions, grants, and from their own pockets.

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