On Friday 3rd June, the inaugural Fast Stream and Fast Track Commercial Working Group (FSTCWG) event took place. The FSTCWG is a newly created forum which gives Commercial Fast Streamers and Fast Track Apprentices the opportunity to network outside of traditional departmental boundaries in order to share ideas and experiences.
The group aims to lead by example in the development of commercial capability and the application of commercial best practice across HM Government.
The first event took place at the 1 Victoria Street Conference Centre in London, with a focus on ‘Entrepreneurship in Government’. We were fortunate to hear interesting and inspirational stories from Senior Civil Servants and other influential leaders, including:
- John Manzoni (Chief Executive of the Civil Service)
- Gareth Rhys-Williams (Government Chief Commercial Officer)
- Morag Stuart (Director, Commercial at DE&S)
- Malcolm Harrison (CEO of Crown Commercial Service)
- Richard Masser (President of CIPS and CEO of the Crestwood Group)
- Ian Schollar (Head of Corporate Delivery at CIPS)
The program for the day was highly varied, with workshops, Q&A sessions and talks from the guest speakers. It became evident that both speakers and attendees had some really interesting views about the ways in which civil servants can be entrepreneurial. We chose to explore this topic because it first seemed as though the words entrepreneurship and government were irreconcilably different; we discovered that this was not the case at all.
If we step back and look at the role of an entrepreneur from a behavioural perspective, there are numerous ways in which we can adopt these behaviours within our day jobs as civil servants. At a basic level, entrepreneurs must be innovative and take risks in order to create value; this is equally essential within the Civil Service if we are to become brilliant in everything we do.
Feedback for the day was overwhelmingly positive, with 85% of respondents rating the event as ‘very good’ or ‘excellent’ via an online feedback survey. We would like to thank all those involved for their assistance in making this event a great success.
In particular, we were really encouraged by the strong support shown by senior leaders for our overarching vision and feel that we have a solid foundation upon which to develop this group.
As planned, organisational duties will now shift to a new set of Fast Streamers and Apprentices, with a view to organising another event later this year.
Visit the Fast Track homepage on GOV.UK for more information on who can apply, how to apply and the different apprenticeship schemes on offer.
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