Pam Whitehead
As a professional trainer, entrepreneur and HR professional, Pam has been contributing her valuable skills to the HR industry for over 25 years.
Pam began her successful career with a major multinational bank before she set up her own training and HR consultancy. She is proud to have contributed to The Prince’s Trust for over 15 years and supports young people as a business and progression mentor, explore enterprise delivery supporter and awards assessor.
Pam always goes the extra mile for clients, and they know they can count on her, even when faced with challenges. She has been described as a great role model for any volunteer and admits to having lost track of the number of young people she has worked with.
Business Mentoring
She said: “As a Business and Progression Mentor I can be working with up to six young people at any one time. The main difference between the two roles is that as a Progression Mentor the relationship is hopefully shorter although more intense. These young people need support quickly to get on to the next stage of their lives getting into employment or back into education to support their aspirations.”
Without regular contact and call for action is where clients will very quickly lose confidence and self-esteem. Business Mentees usually need longer-term support to help them help themselves, with the most important thing being to ensure that they are really focused on what they want, and are doing it for all the right reasons.
Pam explained: “Both jobs are very rewarding. I went into volunteering because I wanted to give something back. I really do understand the challenges that young people are facing and I personally get a great sense of fulfilment being able to use my skills and experience to support them – I gain as much, if not more, from their time as they hopefully do from mine.”
Asked what the benefits of the restructure had been she said: “I have already felt the benefits. The level of support and quality of clients being referred to me has improved. The additional ongoing support they are now getting, working with coaches here in the East Midlands, is already proving its worth.”
Pam’s consultancy has recently gone on to secure a tender to deliver The Enterprise Programme. “I now have the privilege to be a part of a young person’s journey end to end and can see the benefit that the restructure is bringing to them,” she says.
Success Stories
Her best outcomes include a Progression Mentee who was incredibly introverted and disillusioned. He had very poor verbal and written skills but a real desire to want to move forward with his life – he wanted to work. Pam met with him for two hours each week over a period of six weeks to get to know and understand him better and polish his CV. He had been applying for labouring jobs, warehouse operatives, part time and full time. Pam reinforced his efforts by regular texting in between meetings and by telling him she’d be really impressed if he came to her door with his application.
She said: “I was delighted when he finally opened up and told me that he really wanted to work in the outdoors. We went to work by encouraging him to look at his target audience and to begin knocking on doors with his CV in hand. The text landed late one Thursday evening to say, ‘Hi Pam can’t see you tomorrow I have a job! – I couldn’t have done it without you thank you for everything.’ He had secured a job working in the gardens at Nottingham University – how great is that?”
Another was a Business Mentee who wanted to be a personal trainer. Pam explained: “In the early days he struggled with his shyness and didn’t have the interpersonal skills that would readily open doors for him, so I started to work with him during the first six months on all of the softer skills he would need some of which would only come with time, success and all of that stuff. His subject knowledge was impressive so over the two years I helped him explore ways he could diversify.”
Today that man has a successful online business with customers from around the world. He sells bespoke fitness and training programmes and other related products. He also combined his passion for travel and launched a successful travel group and has an ever-growing client base. He still keeps in touch with Pam, four years later. Always sending an email at Christmas and New Year to letting her know how he is doing.