Strategic Priority

The People Culture Skills (PCS) Framework, continues to drive the purpose and action of this Strategic Priority. Strides have been made across employability and skills development, organisational development, Equaity Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) , and careers advice and guidance for the sector. The Essex Sport & Physical Activity Skills Advisory Panel has become a critical friend to the PCS Framework and over the past 12 months has seen new members join across the skills landscape.

Working alongside CIMSPA, Active Essex have built upon current data sets to ensure insight talks to the skills and education landscape, which better articulates the need to the Local Skills Improvement Plan. In turn this has enabled the team to develop a better understanding of the breadth of the sector and where to target support, helping to influence change through their Capacity Building programmes.

Over the past 12 months Active Essex have continued to build resilience and stability across the sector through bespoke capacity building support. The programme of support, includes the Find Your Active Development Fund which has provided aid in learning across Leadership, Business Planning, Learning & Development, Employee Motivations and Compliance & Governance.

The Community Sport network across Essex is represented through the National Governing Bodies (NGB) Forum, Playing Pitch Strategy Meetings and the Find Your Active Networks. The NGB Forum has seen focuses on Cost of Living, Facilities, EDI and Safeguarding and as the team move into the next delivery year there will be some targeted work across these areas. The Find Your Active Small Grants programme has supported hundreds of clubs and groups across the sector to develop their offer, reach new audiences and build capacity.

Active Essex have made great strides in developing relationships across Education, Employment and Skills which has resulted in clearer career pathways to opportunities across the sector. Through these relationships they have supported curriculum reviews, attended career events and raised the profile of the sector.

2023 saw Active Essex continue to grow the diversity of its' workforce, strengthening their offer for young people who face additional barriers to gaining employment through traditional routes.

By building upon the Coach Core apprenticeship programme and developing our young leaders programme, Leaders in Training this has helped to ensure more young people from disadvantaged backgrounds have the opportunities to join and work within and across the sector.

Active Essex have continued to meet the Child Protection in Sport Unit’s standards and have developed a strong safeguarding ethos amongst the team. They have developed relationships with the LADO and Safeguarding Children Board and built trust with the network of Locally Trusted Organisations. There are honest and supportive conversations taking place, growing a culture of trust, humility, self-reflection, learning and sharing with shared accountability to support the individual, organisational, systemic and cultural shifts needed.

As an employer, Active Essex have actively ensured their workforce reflects the communities they serve, and in doing so, have recognised that this makes them better able to understand residents needs and priorities. Not only did they produce a staff survey, a People Plan was developed as part of their Code for Sports Governance. They recognise that this needs to be a live document, continually updated by internal Stretch Groups, accessing their internal learning culture, and reflecting on feedback received from the team.

Building upon this, a Diversity, Inclusion Action Plan has since been completed with clear outcomes and steps for the year ahead. A Quality Assurance Task & Finish Group, has reviewed and implemented new processes, and will continue to do so in 2024.