UIC

8th Annual UIMPROVE Conference, May 2014

The 8th Annual UIMPROVE Conference was held on 12-13 May 2014 in Sheffield. The conference is a great opportunity for UIMPROVE practitioners at all levels to get together and share their experiences. The conference is the highlight of the UIC calendar and below you will find videos of all the speakers and photos from the event.

Steve Jennings, Chief Executive, Weaver Vale Housing Trust

This year we were delighted to welcome back Steve Jennings, Chief Executive of Weaver Vale Housing Trust as our Keynote Speaker. Steve first spoke at our conference in 2010 and proved a popular and inspirational speaker. Steve's passion for leading his organisation comes across strongly in everything he does, but what people value the most about hearing him speak is his honesty and willingness to share lessons he has learnt along the way.

2014 is a significant year for Steve's organisation as it is the Trust's 10th anniversary of using UIMPROVE, and for his Keynote Speech Steve chose to share with us '10 Lessons Along the Way'. A particular focus of this piece is the work that Weaver Vale has done on improving organisational strategy and using Team Meetings as a mechanism for improvement across the Trust.

Steve followed his session with an ambitious round of reflections - which all delegates contributed to! We've included the video here for the insightful comments made by everyone at the conference.

Lynette Hamlett, Sabine Issac and James Whalley, Weaver Vale Housing Trust

Following on from Steve's session, our next presentation came from a group of Facilitators from Weaver Vale Housing Trust who shared their own experiences of working in an organisation where UIMPROVE is well-embedded. These three Facilitators completed their training in 2013 and joined a team of 'veteran' Facilitators who had been applying the approach for a number of years. This brought with it a number of new issues around how to navigate the different levels of experience within the new team. In this video, Lynette, Sabine and James share with us some of the lessons they've learned along the way.

Ashley Bray, First Great Western

First Great Western have been using UIMPROVE since 2008 and because of the size and complexity of their operation have trained more Facilitators than any other client. Of course, having a larger resource brings with it issues of its own which Facilitator Coordinator Ashley Bray explores in this session.

Ashley has an infectious enthusiasm for everything he does and in this engaging presentation he explores what it's like to coordinate a resource of 48 Facilitators who are based at different locations on the First Great Western network. He also talks in detail about facilitating assignments with partner organisations.

Nu Caratella, Liverpool Housing Trust

Nu recently trained as a Facilitator although she works for one of the UIC's most long-standing clients - Liverpool Housing Trust - with whom we have collaborated since 1993. Here she talks about her baptism by fire when she and her co-Facilitator, Debbie, ran a session between LHT and one of their Contractors. This is not an easy task for anyone, least of all a new Facilitator, but by following the structures they had learned Nu and Debbie achieved excellent results.

The Corporate Brain

This year, in a departure from our usual format, we added something new to the timetable - a session linked to our 2014 Yearbook that explores one of the UIC's current favourite topics, the Corporate Brain. Those amongst you who work with us regularly will know that we've been exploring this concept for some time - the idea that organisational leadership comes from the body of people leading the organisation and that you need to get the chemistry and the structure right to achieve success. To explore this idea further, this session looked to three perspectives. First, Richard presented some theory, then Steve Jennings joined us again for the 'view from the top' and then Niall Power, Director for Regeneration at City South Manchester Housing Trust talked us through some observations from his perspective as a member of the Corporate Brain in his organisation.

Lou Tribus, Ravenstone Preparatory School

Lou Tribus has delighted audiences at our UIMPROVE conferences for the past seven years. She brings a unique pedigree to the table - she presents not only as a practitioner of continuous improvement but also as a teacher (her profession) and daughter of one of the great Improvement Giants, Myron Tribus. Despite her distinctive background, Lou insists she comes to the conference as a learner as much as anything else and there is always great humility in her approach. In this years' session she explores the lessons she and her class have learned in their 'Year of Data' and teaches us something about how we all learn along the way.

Question and Answer Panel

As usual. we gave delegates the opportunity to ask our speakers any burning questions. You can see their responses in the video below.

Photo gallery

South Yorkshire Housing Association	Great Yarmouth Community Trust	Birmingham Community Healthcare NHS Trust
Pure Innovations	Fife Council	Weaver Vale Housing Trust
emh homes	Eastlands Homes	First Great Western
NHS Kent and Medway Commissioning Support Unit	Liverpool Housing Trust	City South Manchester Housing Trust