Start up – People Spark Solutions

Scott Smith, owner of People Spark Solutions, always wanted to set up his own business. People Spark Solutions supports organisations of any size with activities in relation to ‘People’ – this includes Learning and Talent interventions supported by the Research part of the business.

After facing redundancy from his job, Scott started researching what he would need to do to get started. He came across Business Gateshead online and got in contact with us for help. Scott worked with our start up adviser Lauren who supported Scott with business planning.

Scott had always planned to start the business in 2020, however he did not anticipate that this would be during a worldwide pandemic. Despite the restrictions, Scott was able to start trading from home. “Following redundancy, I was lucky enough to finish my employment and receive my first call about a project the very next day.” Due to the lockdown restrictions, Scott’s launch party for the business was moved online, however it did not stop the 40 attendees coming along to celebrate.

In July this year People Spark Solutions took on its first intern to help with the launch to market. Dustin was a Masters student of Newcastle University from Germany. Due to the pandemic Dustin was back in Germany for the first few weeks of his internship before returning to Newcastle. Over the summer, multiple pieces of work continued which seen the business taking on associates for busier times.

Scott wanted to support businesses with the impact that Covid-19 may have had on their business. During September they delivered 3 live virtual events titled ‘Facilitating your people to adapt to new ways of working’ and topics included ‘Establishing a resilient mindset’, ‘Future of work’ and, ‘Performance Conversations’ Attendees were UK wide and there were also attendees from wider Europe. The business is now working on bigger pieces of work linked to Employee Engagement during and after the pandemic and future workplace, and supporting clients with a re-design of their Learning and Development provision. Ongoing pieces of work include helping clients develop and re-design traditional learning and training to a virtual setting with maximum engagement.

Not only this, but Dustin’s internship concluded, and he is now a permanent member of the team as a Business Consultant specialising in People & Research. People Spark Solutions are looking forward to connecting with more people and organisations in the future and sharing what we do at People Spark Solutions to help build out pipeline

Scott was supported by Enterprise Support in the North East 2, which is part funded by the European Regional Development Fund 2020.

Credit: Business Gateshead, full article can be found here.