Beacon Bingo

Beacon Bingo made a safe bet on its assistant managers

When Beacon approached us with a challenge to develop a recognised professional development route for their assistant managers, we hit the jackpot with a practical, innovative programme.

The challenge

Assistant managers at Beacon came from a variety of backgrounds and there was no recognised route for continuing professional development.

Any programme we developed had to be:

• relevant
• flexible
• able to successfully engage managers of all ages and educational backgrounds
• still be challenging and stretching
• include work-based assessment.

The solution

We created an Advanced Diploma in Leisure Retail Management. This was made up of seven modules, from team building and HR through to strategy, planning, marketing and leadership communications.

Key features included:

• Practical learning that was relevant to managing a bingo club – for example, the HR module focused on recruitment and training, coaching and delegating.
• A teaching style appropriate to the audience – lots of exercises and breakout groups, rather than just ‘chalk and talk’.
• Assessment methods that were not daunting – for example, breaking down a 5000-word business plan into bite-sized chunks.
• Flexibility in how we supported and fed back to delegates – since assistant managers weren't always available on the phone during normal office hours, we altered our approach to suit each person.

“Three of the delegates have been promoted to higher positions. This proves that we have developed our people and that the business has benefited also."

Anthony Vines, Business Development Manager at Beacon