UCLan celebrates mentoring initiative

The University of Central Lancashire (UCLan) is celebrating the success of a business mentoring support programme that has helped more than 165 established and new North West businesses over the last three years.

All of the businesses received a minimum of 12 hours support from the MORE Programme team, with many receiving considerably more. Out of the businesses that had already began trading, 81% reported an improvement whilst working with the project with more results still expected. In total, the businesses and pre-starts received more than 4850 hours of support over the three years.

“My business managed to reach new customers around the world including India, Portugal, Angola, Mozambique and Brazil the result was a real increase in turnover from £6,000 to £ 90,000 last year.”

She said: “I’m grateful for all the incredible support I've received via the mentoring programme. It's been educational, enlightening and inspiring. I want to thank the organisation for giving me access to such a comprehensively empowering resource.

All of the participants were supported by experienced business mentors including North West businesswoman Naomi Timperley, who earlier this year was honoured in the Maserati100 which acknowledges those who actively support young entrepreneurs.

Peter Rawling, UCLan’s business incubation manager, commented: “The achievements of the MORE Programme are reflected in the figures and perhaps more importantly, in seeing the businesses go from strength to strength and the positive feedback we’ve received from many of the participants. “UCLan has a strong history of nurturing new business and recently retained its status as the top University in the North West for graduate start-up businesses and second nationally for the number that are still active after three years according to the latest Higher Education Business and Community Interaction Survey.”