With the theme for the Milton Keynes Business Achievement Awards 2025 announced as ‘Bridging the Gap: Skills & Learning for Our Future Workforce’ it comes as no surprise that Milton Keynes College Group has been announced as a headline sponsor.
Here, Sally Alexander, CEO, explains more about why the college wanted to get involved and how raising awareness of the skills gap can benefit both student and businesses alike.
As a new headline sponsor of the Milton Keynes Business Achievement Awards in 2024, what encouraged Milton Keynes College Group to get involved this year?
At Milton Keynes College Group, we’ve been involved with the Milton Keynes Business Leaders Partnership for many years, a group that supports business and employers across the city to network, share ideas and develop a strong community. The college always attends the awards event, taking great pride in submitting nominations for some of our excellent teams and individuals and, in fact, winning the award for Business Impact in the Community last year.
As part of our mission to deliver Fairer Futures for all, working with businesses and employers is at the heart of what we do so when we heard skills would be the theme of this year’s awards, it seemed like the perfect time to explore a different sort of involvement in the event.
Working with businesses on a daily basis, we know that the skills gaps that exist in our city are having a significant impact on employers’ ability to recruit the people they need and to grow their businesses. So, we’re delighted to be a headline sponsor this year, to help recognise the efforts of those who are working to close these skills gaps and support the growth of Milton Keynes.
You have a long track record of supporting a number of community events and initiatives, why is it important for MK College Group to engage with the local community?
Again, it all comes down to being committed to our Fairer Futures strategy. Our campuses are in the heart of our Milton Keynes communities and we think it’s vital to not only understand the areas that our students, colleagues and employer partners live and work in but to help tackle the challenges that we are all facing.
This comes in many forms, including fundraising for local charities, taking part in wider community events such as MK Can and the CEO Sleepout (which we are hosting for the second time this year), visiting schools to help raise awareness of the opportunities open to them after their GCSEs, and encouraging students and staff to volunteer for community projects through our College in the Community Day.
This year’s theme for MKBAA is ‘Bridging the Gap: Skills & Learning for Our Future Workforce’ – why is bridging the gap vital to the businesses in Milton Keynes?
Bridging the skills gap in Milton Keynes is central to supporting the growth we’re seeing in our city. This growth can only carry on if there’s a skilled workforce in place to drive it forward. The skills gap will be closed by businesses upskilling their current employees to support with retention and growth and by ensuring there is a skilled workforce for the future.
Doing so is also important for social mobility – through supporting communities to develop their skills and improve their life chances and opportunities, the whole city can thrive.
Plus, by improving the skills of the people in our city, we can attract inward investment.
Milton Keynes is already home to so many nationally and internally recognised businesses and by drawing in more employers with a plentiful workforce and potential employees with the required skills, we can ensure economic growth for years to come.
Milton Keynes has one of the fastest growing economies in the UK – but with a skills gap that is growing, what factors will play a part in reducing this moving forward?
The key to closing the skills gap in Milton Keynes is collaboration. Through working with the council, employers, businesses large and small, and individuals, we can increase our understanding of each other and establish open communication to discover what’s needed to support our local people with developing the skills they’ll need today and in the future.
It will also be important for local employers, educators and others to keep up with new technologies to ensure that the city can continue to be at the forefront of new opportunities.
And perhaps most importantly, none of this can happen without investment. This, of course, means capital investment, but investment of time is also crucial – time to listen to what businesses and employees need, time to work collaboratively with partners across Milton Keynes and time to support individuals with developing their skills for the future.
How do you see the business and educational sectors working together over the next ten years to help produce the much-needed pool of talent required to help the city grow and evolve?
It’s important to acknowledge and celebrate that we’ve made great progress in recent years in collaboration between business and the education sector. At MK College Group, we currently work with around 700 employers across Milton Keynes and beyond in a huge range of ways, from businesses supporting with our curriculum devel- opment to providing work placements, employers coming in for guest lectures and workshops, to large-scale projects with global brands like Red Bull and Silverstone.
To continue working together to grow the talent pool, communication and mutual understanding will go a long way towards this, as well as a sense of shared responsibility between employers, educators, local and national government, community groups and individuals.
What would you say to companies and organisations who are thinking of entering this year?
Don’t miss out! The Milton Keynes Business Achievement Awards is a fantastic way to recognise the achievements of your business and your colleagues. We’re all busy and entering awards can feel like just another thing on the to-do list, but as a former winner of awards at the ceremony, I can assure you that it’s definitely worth the effort.
To find out more about sponsorship opportunities for the Milton Keynes Business Achievement Awards 2025 or to enter the awards, visit the website and follow @MK_BAA on X and Instagram, and join the discussion on LinkedIn.
To find out more about MK College Group go to the website.
