My Learning from 2024? Purpose and Belonging
As I jotted down my 2024 reflections, the words, ‘purpose’ and ‘belonging’ came through as themes. With that in mind, here are the five things I plan to carry into 2025.
Before I get to those, I’d like to thank you for choosing to work with us, whether it is by using our software to structure your model of quality assurance, our advisory services to support, challenge and enhance your practice, or attending events to build your knowledge and skills. Your feedback about the impact our work has for you is our rocket fuel.
- Mission before Measures
Have you heard of Goodhart’s Law? If not, I recommend looking it up. In short, it means when the measure becomes the target, it’s no longer a good measure. It speaks to the notion of unintended consequences. By losing sight of what our mission is and focusing solely on targets we might end up ticking boxes but be adrift of what we set out to achieve. This happens often in government-funded provision because the targets are plentiful and consume lots of time and attention.
As we head into 2025, my aim is to ensure we remain close to our core purpose – enhancing the quality of education and employment support one provider at a time. It’s deliberate, ‘roll our sleeves up’ language to remind our team that we’re partners in quality improvement with the many clients we work with successfully. What could you tweak in the year ahead to ensure congruence between your organisation’s aims and measures?
- Celebrating Success Matters
The inspiration behind the Quality Professionals Awards which we launched as a not-for-profit venture in 2024 was simple. There are quality and compliance professionals, who have a significant impact on driving up standards, yet we don’t highlight their contribution often enough. Celebrating them was joyous because we saw how proud people were to be nominated, let alone be finalists or winners.
When people are doing a great job, telling them is a low cost, high impact motivational tool. Our commitment going into 2025 is to continue to highlight the exceptional work of our Mesma clients publicly, ensure the feedback we provide through our quality improvement activity highlights strengths on which people can build, and continue to build a legacy of shining a spotlight on people and projects through the QPAs. What else might you do to ensure you’re celebrating your colleagues, learners, and service users?
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- Living our values
One of the best things a consultant ever did for us was to ring a bunch of people (some clients, some not) to ask them what they think we stand for. It was a crucial lesson to show it doesn’t matter what fancy words we produce in a closed room; our values are what other people say about us. One thing that came through strongly, is that our ability to make them feel part of an inclusive community is what they value about us. Someone used the phrase ‘they out-care everyone else’. I love that. We will keep building that sense of connection because fundamentally, people want to belong to something that fits with their own goals, aspirations, values.
What do people say about your organisation? How does this fit with your own stated purpose and goals?
- AI isn’t Human
We were delighted to be given R&D funding by Innovate UK in 2024 as the only project focused on the use of large language models to improve the efficiency and accuracy of quality assurance in education and employability. We have gone about the development with the diligence you would expect from us, and we are particularly grateful to the AI customer advisory group for their guidance and challenge along the way.
When we launch later this year, we will do so by providing a diagnostic tool that takes inefficiency out of QA and hand-holds you towards quality enhancement, helping you to navigate your most pressing problems that get in the way of achieving your mission. I’m increasingly convinced our collective success will be reliant on our ability to balance the value AI brings in helping us to structure our thoughts in an efficient way whilst retaining the curiosity that comes with being human from the insights the technology provides. It has the potential to unleash our creativity if we use it well and I’m excited that we can help you do this in our area of specialism. The waitlist will put you at the front of the queue to find out more… click for info.
- Homeworking Bothers Me
I don’t mean in a Jacob Reese-Mogg get-yourselves-back-into-the-office way but in a connection and belonging sort of way. Here’s a quick story to illustrate where I’m coming from. My nephew is currently completing an apprenticeship. He has had a poor experience with the national training provider and large employer. He has felt disconnected from his work, colleagues, and studies. Why? Because he spends three days a week working from home and hasn’t met his fellow apprentices as a group in person. Based on his feedback, I’m confident it would have been a much better learning environment if the model for his apprenticeship had been different. I worry about this in the same way for our team at Mesma and plan to invest time in 2025 looking at the strategies we need to have in place. We’re delighted to be starting with a project we have set for Northumbria University final year students to help us investigate good practice. We’ll share this with you when it’s available. In the sectors where hybrid or remote working is becoming more prevalent, what are you doing that ensures people feel connected to their peers and the mission of the organisation?
I’d love to hear from you what you hope to focus on in 2025, so drop me a line at louise@mesma.co.uk.
Happy New Year!
Lou
