News and Events

Work West recently celebrated the end of a successful three year delivery of the Belfast City Council ‘Go Social’ programme supporting new start social enterprises and cooperatives in Belfast, with a showcasing event. An enthusiastic audience filled the vault at the Catalyst Belfast Fintech Hub to hear about the programme achievements from Councillor Carole Howard from Belfast City Council and were inspired by three amazing speakers from Usel, Angel Eyes and Brewgooder (the world’s first clean water beer) outlining their own unique social enterprise journeys. 

We are incredibly proud of what we have delivered with a brilliant team of highly skilled and committed trainers and mentors. Four years ago the board at Work West started to invest in developing a model that would support third sector organisations to develop new solutions to long-standing challenges. Our thinc methodology combines design thinking and creative problem solving approaches and facilitates organisations to think creatively in terms of designing new products and services. With our third sector lagging behind in terms of digital transformation which is impacting upon our ability to be competitive and deliver services there is no time like the present to support organisations to shift their thinking patterns and reimagine new approaches to service delivery.

‘Thinc schools’ by Work West is a no tech, experiential programme underpinned by creative practice and theory which creates a safe space for critical self-reflection allowing for the development of transferrable life skills. The thinc schools team were delighted to have the opportunity to work with the P7 students from St. Oliver Plunkett Primary School during May 2019. 

As the P7 students are preparing for their move into secondary school, the thinc team focused on making this transition as seamless as possible. Over the course of the programme imaginations were stretched, confidence & resilience was built and inventions were created. The students worked diligently through a diverse range of exercises and activities which kept the energy and engagement levels elevated throughout. 

Highlighting the positive results from the programme, feedback from the imagineers included, ‘I learnt that working together can create something incredible’, ‘I loved that the programme helped me to work with other people and helped me to build my confidence’, and ‘I learnt that going to big school is not that scary’.