As we kick off 2023 and look forward to the opportunities it might bring, I wanted to take a moment and reflect on some of the success achieved by Athena in 2022.
As Athena’s flagship project, Motiv8 continued to deliver support to people who would like to make a change and move forward. Over the last 5 years, Motiv8 has engaged with over 5,800 participants, achieving outcomes that demonstrates how participants have moved forward and are now ready to take their next step, whatever that might be.
With Motiv8 finishing in March this year, its right to acknowledge the impact Motiv8 has had and what we can learn from this delivery that will help shape projects moving forward.
In July 2022, Athena members came together to celebrate the success of the Kickstart project. Kickstart was a government project that paid for young people aged 18 – 24 to take up work placements within Athena members.
Over 180 young people took up an opportunity with Athena members with 60% who completed, moving onto further work or training. Talent is everywhere, opportunity isn’t, is a phrase I use often. Kickstart demonstrated this time after time by creating job roles for young people to step into and shine.
Creating opportunities is one of the unique selling points Athena and its members have. Through the day-to-day work of housing providers, jobs are created and in 2023, Athena will continue to look at ways it can support customers access these opportunities.
One big area of opportunity is retrofit. Before I started with Athena, I knew very little about retrofit. I had an idea of what was involved but didn’t know any detail or how this fitted in with the wider decarbonisation agenda.
Since then, I’ve had more conversations about retrofit than any other topic. Green skills, sustainability, retrofit, heat pumps, EPC C ratings are all terms and phrases associated with decarbonisation however, what do they really mean?
The dictionary definition of retrofit is, “adding (a component or accessory) to something that did not have it when manufactured.”In essence, retrofitting homes is adding products that reduce the carbon emissions that weren’t available when the property was first built.
With GM Housing Providers managing 1 in 5 homes in GM, the scale and cost of retrofit is huge! However, the level of work needed will create a variety of jobs and Athena will be working with its members in the first few months of the New Year to understand how we ensure customers get the skills and opportunity to apply for these jobs.
If you’re interested in learning more about the work of Manchester Athena, please feel free to get in touch.
