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opening EDUCATING ENTREPRENEURS


The Fit4less facility at North Hertfordshire College has been set up not just as a commercial club, but also as a training facility that encourages an entrepreneurial mindset among students. Abigail Harris reports


T


here’s more to the Fit4less club in Stevenage, Hertfordshire, than meets the eye. Yes, the club has


the same look and feel as its sister sites in the 22-strong budget chain from health club franchise group énergie. And yes, the facility adopts the same, slightly irreverent ethos as the rest of the Fit4less sites – demonstrated by the monthly YouTube comedy sketches by comedy duo McNeil and Pamphilon, as well as the recent billboard campaign that read: ‘Tired of being fat and ugly? Just be ugly at Fit4less for £16.99 per month’. The latter went viral with over one million hits, and even grabbed the attention of Radio One DJ Chris Moyles. But the Stevenage site has a far


wider remit than simply meeting the needs of members and delivering against its commercial targets. With North Hertfordshire College as the franchisee, the aim is for the college to use the club as a vehicle for producing a generation of more commercially astute students, who meet the demands of employers in an increasingly limited and competitive jobs market.


entrepreneurial colleges The idea for the venture sprung from the friendship between Jan Spaticchia, chief executive of The énergie Group, and principal of North Hertfordshire College (NHC) Fintan Donohue. The pair have known and worked with each other for 20 years, ever since Spaticchia was head of the


faculty for leisure management and sports science at Milton Keynes College, where Donohue was deputy principal. “I’ve acted as mentor and background


support to Jan for a long time. We share business ideas and a strong friendship,” says Donohue. In addition to his role at NHC, Donohue is the chief executive of Gazelle Global, which was created in 2011 by five college principals to build a cluster of ‘entrepreneurial colleges’ within five years. Gazelle combines the experience of successful business entrepreneurs with leaders in the further education and wider public sector, to transform curricula and encourage an entrepreneurial mindset among students – all in a bid to serve employers well and


increase opportunities for all. Others involved in Gazelle include the likes of Dragons’ Den’s Peter Jones and Doug Richard, and the former chair of Channel 4 and Pizza Express Luke Johnson. “NHC, along with 20 other colleges in the UK, wants to change the nature of students’ learning experience, creating circumstances in which students and staff can learn and deliver the curriculum in a commercial setting,” says Donohue. The Fit4less club provides the


perfect opportunity to develop these entrepreneurial skills. Gordon Barr, assistant principal at NHC, has the responsibility to lead and successfully develop this exciting venture. “We want students to understand how to the run the business, as well as how to engage with customers. We’re not teaching them to be receptionists – they’re learning how to make a club a success, from how to market the facility and make it profitable to how to improve


retention. We look at the totality of the business,” he says. “The average


health club manager in this industry doesn’t have a clue about balance sheets, profit and loss, cashflow, HR development and so on. You have to live it to


College principal Fintan Donohue (left) and énergie chief executive Jan Spaticchia (right)


38 Read Health Club Management online at healthclubmanagement.co.uk/digital


really understand it, and that’s what these students are doing,” adds Spaticchia. Students studying the BTEC Extended Diploma in Sport, as well as NVQs


in Instructing Fitness and Exercise and in Personal Training, work in the gym as part of their studies. Working alongside


august 2012 © cybertrek 2012


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