As we approach the end of 2022, it’s time to reflect on a some of the excellent work the NAS has completed for the Members – and the sector more broadly – this year.
As always, if there’s something that you feel the NAS should be focusing on, please reach out to us by email or our Contact Us form.
– James Filus, NAS Director
We undertook a comprehensive review of the sector’s training needs, through our 2022 Training Needs Analysis. The intelligence gathered has been used to develop our Skills Strategy. In related news, we announced the development of our Specialist Applied-Skills Programme, the Sector’s Apprenticeship, which will be progressed in 2023.
We launched our 2022 Priorities and began our journey of addressing issues affecting the supply of well-skilled labour and materials, while increasing business opportunities and efficiency, and finally surfacing the importance of sustainability in the sector.
We began returning the NAS’ events programme to a state of normality, with two Shopfitter’s Socials held at Flight Club in London and Leeds. Both events were well attended and regarded, with one attendee commenting: “It was a great event and I met some brilliant people networking wise”. Our full programme of events in 2023 will be announced in the near future.
We launched our World Class Manager programme, welcoming the first 10 delegates. One member company commented: “We are extremely grateful to National Association of Shopfitters for providing this opportunity to us” adding that their employees completed the programme and have already begun applying the skills and knowledge they’ve learned.
We added a dedicated CreditSafe platform to our suite of membership benefits. We now have around 20% of our full members using CreditSafe, safeguarding their business’s interests. An NAS member emailed to say: “We had been paying for the subscription and it was about to be renewed… so another perk of being a NAS member!”
We continued to represent our member’s interests to the CITB – by establishing that >25p in the £1 is returned to members via grant funding and challenging the CITB about this. We attended monthly Prescribed Organisation Leader’s meetings, pushing to get a better deal for the sector.
We developed an e-Learning package for our members, using EdApp, which is free for all employees of NAS members to use. The first wave of modules is now live and you can request a course, or give feedback. Our research into the use of IT in the sector revealed that Cyber Safety is an issue for the sector, so we developed a module on this subject in EdApp.
We continued to publicise new business opportunities exclusively for our membership. Due to the increasing demand, clients can now upload their projects onto a dedicated page on our website to streamline the process. We had almost 20,000 visits to our website in 2022, with nearly half of the visitors viewing our Member Directory.
We issued over 130 SICCS cards, helping workers in the sector demonstrate they are safe and competent. We have plans to further develop and grow the scheme in 2023, so that it is better integrated with our Careers Pathway and also EdApp.
Established a new partnership with Holmes & Hill Solicitors, who offer our members free initial consultations and preferential fees on legal services.
We believe in partnership working and are delighted to count both Darwin Clayton and Thorn Baker as long-term supporter of the NAS.
This year, the NAS also became a company supporter of the Lighthouse Club Charity.
