Seeds of Change was the third annual CIPD Conference and Awards, organised and run by Cynergy on behalf of NHS North West recently. We welcomed over 120 CIPD and CPP students currently working within the NHS and studying for HR qualifications. The conference, chaired by Damian Hughes, Founder of Liquid Thinker, explored best practice development in key areas of Human Resources, through plenary and workshop sessions.

During the afternoon we were joined by HR Directors for our award ceremony, where we celebrated the best HR professionals from across the north west. We were also joined by keynote speaker Jim Lawless, Managing Director of Taming Tigers Group. Jim presented an inspirational session on Taming Your Inner Tiger, encouraging us to believe that we can achieve anything we want if we follow his ten tiger rules.

We finished the day on a high note with Jim Lawless and Dean Royles, Director of Workforce and Education at NHS North West, presenting the prestigious HR Student of the Year award.

Bradford Hospitals needed an internal communications campaign to encourage the continuous improvement of patient safety, keeping it a top priority for the organisation.

We have been working with Bradford’s Programme Board to plan and deliver an 11-month campaign that satisfies Trust criteria, to achieve the above objective. We created a patient safety brand, known as SAFE!, and have used this on all communications material we have produced. There are 11 topics the campaign needs to address, so we decided to focus on a different one in depth every month.

Three months into the campaign, we have had positive feedback from BH staff. We’ll continue monitoring the campaign along the way to make sure we’re having a positive impact on patient safety, and really making a difference for the people of Bradford.

In times when you face daunting and uncertain times, you often need the love and advice from a good friend.

So as more and more organisations find themselves in challenging waters – where budgets have been cut but still face the ever increasing pressures to deliver more for less, we are lending our neighbouring organisations a hand when in need.

You should know by now that we like to do things differently here at Cynergy! That’s why, we are now in week 3 of a 7 week marketing campaign appropriately named ‘ A Friend in the Community’. The campaign is made up of seven keepsake postcards, each with an illustration of a quality we believe makes a good friend. I’d love to share the all 7 traits with you now but as we are only up to week 3, I don’t want to spoil the surprise for those who are enjoying opening their beautiful personally handwritten purple envelope! I’ll promise to share all when the whole campaign has finished so watch this space…

Each card has a number of cuts around the edge of the card allowing you to slot each card together – epitomising the analogy of building our friendship. The photo shows the friendship tower we have in our office, but you can be as creative as you wish with your tower!

If you want to find out more about how we could be your good friend in a time of need, drop us an email at friends@cynergy.co.uk or alternatively pick up the phone and speak to me, Natalie. My number is 01642 713211 and just as you would expect from a good friend, I’ll always have an ear to listen! After all, a problem share is a problem halved so what have you got to lose?

The Friend in the Community team includes Natalie; Paul; Jon; Nicky; and Sally.

The class had really impressed us with their enthusiasm and willingness to get involved on the first day. We returned a few days later to see what they’d learned since our visit…

We entered the classroom to a very warm welcome, with all of the students eager to show us what they’d been working on. We were proud to see that they remembered everything we had taught them, and had even gone on to do some further work of their own!

The class showed us the poster projects they’d been working hard on since our last visit. Many had designed their own garden with ways of recycling energy, attracting wildlife and growing their own produce. A few had surveyed the number of birds in the school garden, and one group had even demonstrated where fossil fuels came from and how we should preserve them.

After hearing about what the children had learned over the past few days, we gave them one final challenge to get them thinking. They have already studied the biblical Ten Commandments, but what would be their ideal Ten Green Commandments to follow at school? This started a great deal of knowledge sharing, and also much debate on which ten should take priority – which would be best for the environment overall? Would many people switching off an unused light make more of a difference than a few people making big changes to their recycling habits?

When we asked who had already started making changes at home and at school, almost everyone put their hand up!

To finish off our project, we asked the class if they would be interested in making their own Green Team to continue the great work they’ve already started. It was great to see almost the entire class filled with enthusiasm at the idea! They signed a green pledge to do what they can, and we agreed to keep in touch to share new ideas and make sure we were both keeping our end of the promise!

We finished the day with the class holding an assembly to let the rest of the school know what they had been learning, and why it was so important. We gave every member of the class a certificate to show how proud we were of effort they had put into becoming green. We have to admit that one of the highlights of the day for us was hearing the song that the recorder group had composed in our honour:

‘Cyn-er-gy, Cyn-er-gy, they’ve helped us save energy!’

One pupil, Abbie, read out two fantastic acrostic poems that she had written about us and the environment.

What inspirational young people! We will be keeping in touch with the Evenwood Green Team to swap ideas and keep updated with what each other is up to.

We really appreciate the enthusiasm of all of the pupils we worked with. They have invited us back to see the show they’re planning for July, starring their very own Mr Plantpot to educate others on why they should care for the environment – we can’t wait to see it!

Looks like we managed to achieve our aim!

-The Green Team

So the Green Team travelled to Evenwood Primary School to talk to years 5 and 6 about what they already knew about the environment, and what else they could do to make a difference.

The children really impressed us with the knowledge they already had about the environment and how to care for it. They even have their own gardening club and are doing a great job looking after their school grounds.

We decided to focus on two big themes for the day:

1. Local produce – we did a taste test of local milk versus Devonshire milk to show that local tastes just as good – and means less harm to the environment!

2. Reducing waste – did you know that turning off a dripping tap can save up to £400 worth of water? We do!

Our class were enthusiastic when we asked them to get interactive and use recycled yoghurt pots to sow seeds to grow their own produce. There was even competition for the job of keeping the pots watered!

We then tested the pupils’ creativity as we challenged them to design a T shirt that would show others what they could do to overcome the two big problems we looked at. All of the finished T shirts looked great and showed that what we discussed had really been taken in. Judging the best T shirt was difficult, I think you’ll agree, but the proud winners were very happy with their ‘I am proud to be green’ winning badges!

The children really impressed us with their willingness to contribute, their bright ideas and the way they worked together to solve the challenges we gave them. We know we chose the right people to ask to look after our environment!

The next stage of the project is to go back to the school to see if our session has made a difference to the way the children think and the actions they take. We also have a few surprises left to really get them thinking!

We’ll let you know how it goes next week. With a bit of luck we may even be able to develop the project so that we can take it to other schools in the area, so look out for great changes in our community coming up!

Big thanks to the staff and very knowledgeable pupils at Evenwood CE Primary School

- The Green Team (Sam, Sharon, Helen, Jayne, Beccy, Fiona, Dave and Marie)

From front – back Cynergy Events team: Fiona, Natalie, Rebecca, Rachel Munton (Deputy Director, East Midlands Leadership Academy) Sam and Nicky.

We have been working closely with the Academy to establish a brand for each of the work streams such as, Emerging Leaders and Midwifery. Some of these were chosen for use at the event for delegates to create a real life mosaic which represented collaboration and working together, it proved very popular and created a buzz on arrival.

The event was both a launch of the Academy and a consultation of participants to discover exactly what they wanted from the Academy in the coming year.

A busy Leadership Marketplace added to the atmosphere and learning as it showcased how effective leadership is having an impact on improving Quality, Innovation, Productivity and Prevention.

As with the mosaics, lots of small different pieces coming together created the bigger picture with a candid keynote speech from Greg Dyke which inspired Leaders to “just do it” and interactive voting throughout the programme the event was deemed a great success.

Some of you may already know about the ‘Shout’ initiative, but for those of you who don’t, let us tell you a little bit more about it…

The ‘Shout’ initiative was launched earlier this year to bring the wider public sector, not-for profit organisations, and charities in the region together to share their plans and discuss challenges organisations are faced with in today’s climate. Many of the challenges faced by the sector are collective ones and the initiative aimed to stimulate different ways of thinking and show how thinking differently and sharing solutions can position services to improve and move forward.

The initiative included a breakfast event and a competition to take over the stage, giving one lucky organisation the opportunity to ‘Shout’ about the valuable work they are doing in their community. The prize was worth over £10k and included venue hire, all audio visual requirements, comprehensive event management support and TV presenter Wendy Gibson.

The competition winners were informed and planning immediately got underway – with just a week and half to plan the full event, we’re not shy of a challenge! The movie shows us in action, from day one of planning to the finished product on the day.

The event, held on Thursday 29th April at The Wynyard Rooms on Teesside, was a huge success – seeing 100 delegates turn out for the occasion, a great achievement for an 8am start! In the early part of the morning, we devised and facilitated a number of interactive and creative sessions with one delegate saying “Cynergy brought organisations together to ignite passion about a common agenda and “the creative activities were an excellent way to express my ideas and issues”. In the later part of the morning, competition winners, Cleveland Fire Brigade, took the stage to ‘Shout’ about their plans for their new Centre for Excellence and also took the opportunity to educate people on the other services the fire brigade can offer. Their event was appropriately named ‘Does More Than It Says on the Tin’.

Thank you to all those who turned out for the occasion, and for those who didn’t watch this space…there will be more ‘Shout’ initiatives in the future!

As part of our Earth Day activites Cynergy will be making a trip to Evenwood Primary School to get pupils engaged in environmental issues. Planning is currently underway for a fun-filled few days, involving showing the pupils how to grow their own herbs using recycled cans, encouraging greener thinking and an interactive t-shirt session where students will come up with their own eco-orientated slogans.

The activities all fit with the new National Primary Curriculum for 2011 which aims to encourage and educate students further on environmental issues to create responsible citizens who make a positive contribution to society.

Pupils will also get creative by designing their own posters and thinking of ways in which the school can save water by changing their current habits.

At the end of the 3-day initiative pupils will receive a certificate for their participation and should be much more aware of the environment and what they can do to help the planet. The learning won’t stop then though, pupils will continue their efforts through a Green Team which they will set up. Photos, letters and progress will be shared with the Green Team at Cynergy so that learning can continue beyond the 3-day project and into the future.

Click here to read more about Earth Day 2010.

10 hours, 7 paintbrushes and 400ml of paint later the giant money box for Butterwick House Children’s Hospice was finished. We stood back, admired, then lovingly packed it into the courier’s van and waved goodbye.

Butterwick had asked us to create them a giant version of a collection box in the shape of a house, which we had recently designed for them. Work started on the 4ft money box early last wednesday morning, with it finally being finished late on thursday afternoon. It was a great project to be involved with, with nearly everyone in the building not being able to resist painting their bit of it.

Watch out for the giant money box in a shopping centre near you soon. Or, visit the Butterwick website here.

View Higher Res Movie Here

I found this information on an average child’s development
‘Eight-year-olds enjoy having the opportunity to solve problems independently. They are able to concentrate on tasks for longer periods of time and begin to use their own resources prior to seeking adult help or they may seek out peers for assistance. Eight-year-olds demonstrate more highly-developed thinking skills as well as the ability to solve problems with creative strategies.’

I was amazed at how much this mirrored our team, although I hope we are a little more advanced with our achievements and outputs, we essentially match these characteristics. Our team thrives on solving problems and when they have a challenge this is mainly done in groups, we certainly think in a highly developed way or as we refer to it different thinkingly. Finally our creative ability is second to none and our designers thrive on a challenge.

So in conclusion our 8 year old team has commonality with our 8 year old future generation. Hopefully the children will be able to achieve as much good as Cynergy has.

In a joint celebration to recognise another year and our recent success at the Tees Valley Business Awards, we had a little get together in the office. It involved fizzy pop, balloons and pizza, just like all 8 year olds birthdays!