About
Going for Growth is an initiative designed to support female entrepreneurs, who have been trading at least two years and are seriously committed to growing their businesses.
The programme places participants in groups led by an experienced and successful female entrepreneur, which meet once a month for six months. A series of structured Going for Growth agendas encourage participants to focus on the strategic development of their businesses. The initiative is designed to be action and results orientated and to go beyond classroom style learning and the usual inputs of professional trainers, consultants and academics. The roundtables are not designed to be theoretical or academic, but to be based on real experience of what has or hasn’t worked in real life situations.
Going for Growth was designed and developed by Paula Fitzsimons, the National Director, and is coordinated by the Fitzsimons Consulting Team. Having just started the 14th cycle, Going for Growth has supported over 800 women entrepreneurs to achieve their growth ambitions and measures its success in terms of the participants’ increased turnover, additional employment created and the number of new exporters.
For more information, please visit the website here.
Recognition
Going for Growth was announced as the winner of the Investing In Entrepreneurial Skills category at the European Enterprise Promotion Award 2015.
In 2010, Going for Growth was nominated at a National level for the Investing in Skills category of the European Enterprise Awards 2011. This award recognises initiatives at regional or local level to improve entrepreneurial, vocational, technical and managerial skills.
In January 2014, the OECD LEED (Local Economic and Employment Development) and the EU described Going for Growth as an “inspiring practice” in a joint report “The Missing Entrepreneurs”, which focuses on those segments of the population that are less involved in entrepreneurial activity. Commenting on merits of Going for Growth, the report says: “The key element of this initiative is the manner in which it is led and championed by the private sector and supported by the public sector. The calibre of the lead volunteers underpins the success of the initiative and the fact that the groups are composed exclusively of women contributes to a full engagement by the participants.”
In 2014, the initiative has been highlighted as an inspiring practice by the OECD and the EU, as a Good Practice by the European Institute of Gender Equality and the reason that the Boots WMB Empowering Women Award was presented to Paula Fitzsimons.
Sponsors
The Going for Growth initiative is funded by Enterprise Ireland and KPMG.
