A Big Announcement!

This feels so wild to say but in June, The Land Collective will be turning eight years old! Which is an incredible run since starting it in my tiny university bedroom.

It all began with the mission of attracting more diverse young voices to the industry, to help shape the communities that we live, work and play in. Over the course of this time, I’ve been able to work with young people directly and also with you, the employers that hire them - which has taught me a hell of a lot!

To play a small part in the careers of young people from various backgrounds has filled me with so much joy and very much still does! I’ve learnt so much on this journey and have been privileged to work with businesses of all sizes, develop my skills further and work on deep challenges as it relates to talent development, DEI and social impact.

Over time, I realised something.

Getting someone through the door isn’t enough. What happens after that?

The culture they walk into, the quality of development they receive, the relationships they build, the assumptions made about them, determines everything.

I’ve seen this up close, again and again:

• Apprentices who are bright, capable, and eager, but slowly disengage in a work environment where they struggle personally and academically.

• Graduates who enter their first job full of promise, only to leave 12 months later because the environment never made space for who they actually were.

• Employers with the best intentions but outdated models, under-supported managers, and a generation gap no one is talking about openly.

Over the past six months or so, I’ve been asking myself a few big questions:

• What if we spent as much time designing the experience of staying, as we do on attraction?

• What if development programmes weren’t based on recycled formats, but built for today’s world and workforce, not the one we inherited?

• What if we focused less on performance management and more on building high-capacity environments where learning is embedded, not occasional?

These questions have led me to the next step in my journey.

Designing from both sides

I’m still continuing the work of The Land Collective, but I’m also carving out space to work more directly with employers. I’ll be offering hands-on, strategic support through consulting that lets me dig deeper into programme design, development, and culture change. Here’s how:

Diagnostic: Uncover what’s really going on

Many employers assume that if early talent leaves, it's because the individual "wasn’t a good fit" or "didn’t have the right attitude." In reality, the reasons are often structural, cultural and deeply human. These are things that rarely show up in your engagement surveys or exit interviews.

The Diagnostic process is designed to bring those hidden dynamics to the surface. Through a mix of confidential interviews, anonymous surveys, and internal analysis, I help organisations get a clear and honest view of how their apprenticeship or graduate programmes are performing; not just on paper, but in practice.

This isn’t a finger pointing exercise but more an insight to make intentional, evidence-based changes that strengthen your culture and improve long-term outcomes.

Programme Design: Build something that works

There’s a common fear, especially among smaller or mid-sized organisations, that launching an early talent programme is too resource-intensive, too complex, or too risky. As a result, promising initiatives stall before they start or they get built on templates that don’t reflect the real needs of your business or the young people you're hoping to attract.

My programme design support addresses that head-on. I work with employers to co-create structured, scalable early talent offers from graduate schemes and internships to apprenticeships and pre-employment pipelines that are tailored to your size, culture, and operating model.

The goal is to help you feel confident in what you’re offering, not just compliant and well-intentioned. When done well, a well-designed programme doesn’t just bring in new talent. It shifts how your whole organisation thinks about learning and leadership.

Fractional Work: Expertise without the full-time hire

Some companies know what they want to build, but just don’t have the capacity, huge budgets or internal knowledge to deliver it well. That’s where I step in as a Fractional Early Careers Lead.

This is a hands-on, embedded offer where I join your team for 1 or 2 days a week over a fixed period. I help build out or improve your early careers strategy from the inside not just advising from the outside. That might include developing onboarding processes, managing recruitment cycles, running training sessions, supporting people managers, or designing development pathways.

It’s particularly useful for companies at a transition point, whether that’s launching your first-ever early talent programme or scaling one that’s starting to show signs of strain.

I know these challenges aren’t always easy to untangle. If you’re navigating any of this and want to think it through with someone who’s worked on both sides; I’d love to hear from you.

Thanks for reading, catch you on the next one!

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