Business & Enterprise

On Tuesday 15th November, six Year 10 students attended the launch of the 'Make it in Great Britain' campaign to promote the British manufacturing industry and to encourage and inspire young people to consider a career in the manufacturing industry. The campaign was launched by the Secretary of State, Vince Cable, and the Minister for Business and Enterprise, Mark Prisk, at the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills offices in Whitehall.

The six students had the opportunity to listen to leaders in the manufacturing industry from businesses like Brompton Bicycles and Microsoft speak about the importance of the manufacturing industry to the UK and of the opportunities available to young people. A highlight of the event was students having the chance to put some of their manufacturing skills to use by constructing their own miniature robot. An important part of the event was presence of young apprentices from the Ford Motor Company who spoke about their experiences of training in the manufacturing. Students were lucky enough to get the opportunity to ask the apprentices questions and find out more about the training and education options available from organisations like Ford. The day was a great success and inspired the students to think seriously about pursuing their interests in manufacturing.

Representatives from BP (a British global energy company) visited Paddington Academy to teach us about how they buy and sell Oil. 106 students in total gathered in groups of four. Each student was given the role of Accountant, Trader, Market Analyst or Chairperson. The main object for each team was to earn the most money buying and selling oil at the right time, operating just as a company like BP. It was good to learn about each individual role and the duties they have on a daily basis. For instance, the Market Analyst reads the newspapers and watches the stock prices rise and fall to determine when is the best time to buy or sell in order to make a profit. The Trader is the one who actually negotiates the deal and works out how much stock to buy or sell. I decided I would be good at this job in the real world as to do this you have to be good at mathematics and quick at solving problems. Working on this task with BP taught me how to negotiate with people and how to use my initiative, how to think on my feet and most importantly leadership.

Westminster Education Business Partnership has joined up with Coca Cola to offer an opportunity for 100 schools across London to take part in an exciting business challenge using students’ enterprise skills. The aim of the project is to help young learners develop skills like problem-solving, financial capability and creativity – skills that we embed throughout their Business and Enterprise curriculum at Paddington Academy. To secure their place at Wembley students have had to work in a company structure on an exciting ‘Apprentice-style’ Business challenge. Six students from Year 10 (Troy, Bokul, Kayleigh, Charlotte, Mona and Musab) have secured Paddington Academy one of the 12 places in the final at Wembley Stadium. During the final teams will be facilitated by Coca-Cola business representatives in a further challenge. We’re wishing the Year 10 Dream Team the best of luck!

On 18th January, Mr Littler’s Year 10 Applied Business GCSE group went on a visit to the Oliver Wyman offices on Baker Street for a day of talks and business activities. Oliver Wyman is a management consultancy firm  which specialises in operations and risk management, organisational strategy and leadership development. It has offices in 40 cities in 16 different countries. The day started with a talk from a Senior Partner at the firm about his role in the business , how he ended up working in such a highly sought after job and some of the challenges he had faced working on projects with some of the world’s biggest companies.

The students then had the opportunity to interview other members of staff in more depth including a PA, the office manager, a researcher and a  recently graduated consultant to get an idea of the different skills and job roles that are required to keep the business running smoothly.

In the afternoon, the students had an opportunity to really show off their business knowledge and skills and put some of the Oliver Wyman Consultants to the test. Each group was given a case study about a business in need of help and had to put what they had learned into action. Using their business knowledge, each group developed their own set of proposals to pull the failing business out of trouble. The professionals were suitably impressed by the pitches that our budding young consultants made in the board room and after a tense deliberation, the judges declared that Conor Fitzpatrick, Daniel Proctor, Mohammed Rab and Bokul Miah had delivered the best solution to the businesses problems. Paddington Academy’s Team Business left the Oliver Wyman consultants fearing for their jobs. Watch this space!

Paddington Academy celebrated Global Entrepreneur week with a series of workshops and presentations to inspire and motivate our students.
Wednesday 18th November saw five female Entrepreneurs working with Year 10 and 12 female Business Studies students. The Entrepreneurs were able to share their skills and expertise with our students and help them identify their own strengths and abilities. One of the entrepreneurs commented on the session saying it was a “pleasure to attend,” and that she “really enjoyed the session and wanted it to go on for longer as the girls were so responsive and interested.”
 
On Thursday 19th November, a group of Year 11 students held a Social Enterprise Cinema. They had organised the film screening, ticket sales, promotion of the event and made popcorn to sell to their audience. Approximately 30 students stayed after school to watch the action comedy film ‘Rush Hour 3’. A profit of £40 was made and donated to the Lexi Cinema in Kensal Rise. The Lexi is also a social enterprise cinema and it donates 100% of its profits to The Sustainability Institute in South Africa who use it in their work to improve the lives of local disadvantaged children.
Dion Humolli and Jaafar Al-Hakem said “Through Global Entrepreneur Week we’ve had a taste of what it is like to run your own business. We’ve been able to use some of the knowledge learnt in our GCSE Business lessons and also developed some new skills. It was lots of fun! ”

On the Friday, fifty Year 10 Social Enterprise students took part in a trading game delivered by the Brokerage Charity. Students were split into teams and competed against each other to see who could make the most money through trading.  Students learnt about the importance of teamwork, time management, listening and numeracy.   The winning team made a phenomenal $89,500, having started with $20,000 – the Brokerage commented that this was a record score, compared to other London schools and Academies.