Hunter Centre and Santander launch business growth course

The Centre says its Growth Advantage Programme is the first of its kind to be offered in Scotland and is being run by Strathclyde Business School in partnership with Santander.

Organisers of the 10-month course, which offers the latest business focused teaching from academics alongside insight from entrepreneurs such as Sir Tom Hunter (pictured) and Chris van der Kuyl, are seeking 15 bosses to take part.

Eleanor Shaw, head of the Hunter Centre, said: “There are similar programmes available in England. One is the Growth Accelerator Programme, and the other is the Goldman Sachs 10,000 programme, both run through business schools but are not available to businesses Scotland. The other good provider down south is Cranfield and they will accept Scottish businesses.

“At the moment, for a lot of Scottish businesses of mid-market size looking for growth and support they have to go outside Scotland, and it’s incredibly expensive when they access it.”

Santander, which has a global university network, is to provide £5000 of the £7500 cost of the course, with the business owner covering the remaining £2500. It is not necessary to be a Santander customer to be eligible.

Ms Shaw said that the course has been developed with partners such asScottish Enterprise and Business Gateway, as well as business owners and entrepreneurs.

She said it was important for academics to be seen as being in touch with the reality of running a firm.

Ms Shaw added: “The big challenge that universities have is to not be seen as ivory towers and to be seen as working with business. The course has not been designed by a group of academic researchers with their noses in books. Yes, there’s been a bit of that, but we have worked with other business owners, entrepreneurs and have looked at other programmes.”

The course has been designed to minimise the amount of time delegates spend out of their firms, Ms Shaw said. The individuals will attend the Strathclyde Business School for two days every two months, with teaching and networking on a Friday and a Saturday.