Business lessons are out of this world

Last week I taught students aged seven and eight at Mount Pleasant Primary School, in Cockerton, Darlington, about business in the community, government and public finance.

The initiative, run under the auspices of Young Enterprise North East, is designed to help children understand how the adult world of business and finance works – and hopefully inspire them to go on to succeed through their own enterprise.

My lessons, run over five weeks, proved such a success that on the children’s final session I brought along Darlington FC footballer Gary Smith with me to present the youngsters with certificates.

I myself am a former human resources (HR) director and senior executive for some of the UK’s best-known companies, including WH Smith, Asda, Royal Mail, Ventura, Pearl Assurance and DSG International. In 2007, the she was recognised for her achievements in Personnel Today’s HR Director of the Year awards and featured in the publication’s Top 40 Powerful People in HR.

Now I run Strategic Change Solutions, a team of change management experts based in the North-East helping companies manage the changes needed to survive the recession, preserve jobs and flourish in the future.

The world of business may seem completely alien to children of their age, but they soaked up every last drop of knowledge and information I could give them about how, as adults, you get a job, earn money, pay tax, and how the Government spends that tax providing such things as the police, fire and ambulance services.

The sessions involved problem-solving, team work, communication and a strong element of numeracy, and I hope that along the way the children have picked up a few life skills that will serve them well in the future.

In truth, it’s been tremendous fun for me. The children have been full of enthusiasm from the first lesson to the last.

The groups I normally talk to groups consist of seasoned businessmen and women, who probably think they seen and heard it all before, but the only difficulty with the children at Mount Pleasant was keeping a lid on their enthusiasm.

Mount Pleasant teacher Karen Bateman said: “It is important that our children learn about the wider community from a different perspective and the responsibility we all share through our life’s work to make it a different and better world. The children loved every minute of Claire’s lessons. At times, they were as much an eye-opener for me as they were for them.”

Claire Walton, Strategic Change Solutions.