Collaboration is central to growth strategy for region

We’ve been called on to identify the economic priorities of our local regions, the plans for how we will improve those areas, and we’ve been awarded money to shape the region as well.

And in all of this, perhaps what’s been missed is a nuts and bolts explanation of what a LEP is.

We are groups of organisations (some public sector, some private sector) that work across areas of the country – ours is York, North Yorkshire and East Riding – to grow that region’s economy. And by a partnership, I mean we are just that.

We are a collaboration of bodies that share resources to build capacity and provide the expertise to support the local area where it needs to grow.

Our vision is to make York, North Yorkshire and East Riding the place in England to grow a small business, combining a quality business location with a great quality of life. To do that, we want to help businesses to create 2,000 new jobs, deliver £3bn growth, connect every student to business and double house-building.

At our core sits a secretariat that isn’t particularly large. We have less than 30 members of staff, most of whom are part-time, and work across five different priorities for improving the region: making sure we have profitable and ambitious small and micro businesses; becoming a global leader in food manufacturing, agritech and biorenewables; inspiring the people in our area; ensuring that we are home to successful and distinctive places; and possessing a well-connected economy.

To make those priorities happen, we work very hard with a small amount of resources and an extremely talented team across two sites–Northallerton and York–but the only way we can achieve the growth we need is by working with others.

We collaborate with over 100 partners across our region, everyone from local councils to the Federation of Small Businesses to small accountancy firms in rural towns. As much as possible, we try to involve all of these in contributing to and shaping the development of the LEP and its surrounding area. Increasingly, we invite them to share their knowledge and expertise and in doing so we build and develop our capabilities and capacity to allow us to take on new challenges through stronger networks rooted in our community.

We don’t want to duplicate expertise that already exists and we don’t want to burden taxpayers with increasing our capacity unnecessarily. We want to be able to make the best choices for the area and ensure that the maximum amount of money is spent on making a difference and so we work with local councils, business support agencies and the private sector so that we can pool our resources and create something larger.

This means that we collaborate with the business community to shape the future of the area and develop our vision.

One crucial example of this is how we put together our strategic economic plan with the help of and the consultation of the local community. That’s how we arrived at our vision and five priorities, through consultation, collaboration and partnership.

Together, thanks to the support of our partners, we’ve secured investment from government to start a number of transformative projects throughout the region including the development of the National Agri-Food Campus at Sand Hutton outside York, the development of a BioHub in York and the opening up of housing and employment sites in Scarborough, Selby and Northallerton.

Partnership, that word again, is at the heart of what we do. A recent report from the Federation of Small Businesses highlighted our LEP as an example of great practice in how we work with our partners to develop a strategy suited to the needs of our local area.

Elsewhere, national bodies are talking about the progress we’ve made in engaging with the small businesses of the region through our Pop-up Business Cafes which would not have happened if it weren’t for the organisations we work with being willing to donate time and resources to our LEP.

York, North Yorkshire and East Riding is too wide a region to ever be served by a single organisation and too varied and talented to be effectively served by a closed set of minds.

We work with the resources that we have and collaborate with partners who extend our experience and we are stronger for it. That’s what makes us a partnership.