Now – whether you want to launch a career in coding, design, or user research – we have an academy for you. Unlike other academies, here you’re an employee not a customer. You’ll earn a full salary while you learn.

Dates for your diary

• 7 February – academy applications open ?
• 20 February – academy applications close 
• 16 May – academy begins ?
• 5 August – academy ends
• 8 August – the first day of your new career as a practitioner in your field ?

What to expect

We’ve designed the new academy to give you a grounding in all areas of user-centred design (UCD). Don’t worry if that’s not a term you’re familiar with. It just means that our approach to design is all about solving real needs of real people – it’s how we approach design at Made Tech.

The academy will give a grounding in:

• user research
• service design
• interaction design
• content design

We think it’s important for our design team to be familiar with all aspects of user-centred design. So we’ve designed the academy to do exactly that.

Maybe you have a particular discipline you’d like to specialise in. Maybe you haven’t made up your mind. Either way, the academy is the perfect place to start a career in user-centred design. It will help you choose a specialism if that’s what you want. Or it will give you a great foundation as a UCD generalist if that’s best for you.

We provide a safe space to learn. As well as our workshops and tutorials, you’ll do exercises solo, in pairs and in groups. You’ll learn from experienced design and user research practitioners. And you’ll get hands-on experience on real-world cases – potentially, live projects. If all goes well, you’ll join Made Tech as a permanent member of the team when the academy finishes. You’ll join a project team as a UCD practitioner.

Open to all, regardless of experience

We’re not looking for professional experience. Above all, we’re looking for an eagerness to learn. If you care about collaborating, communicating and working hands-on to solve problems, we’d love to hear from you.

Though the academy is a great way to kick off a career in design or user research, this doesn’t have to be your first job. We’re keen to hear from people changing careers, or coming back to work after some time out.

And we’re particularly keen to hear from people from under-represented backgrounds.

Apply for the academy

The academy is one way we can do our bit to build digital skills in the UK. And we’re doing what we can to open up design and  technology careers to people from all backgrounds. One way we do that is to remove as many barriers to entry as we can. The main thing we’re looking for is a desire to learn. 

I’m so proud that we’ve been able to encourage 51 people into a new career. By adding design and user research to our academy, I hope we can push that number much much higher.

The post Announcing a new Made Tech academy for design and user research appeared first on Made Tech.

We said a few months back that we’re doubling down on our commitment to improving public sector technology. To do that, we’re going to need to continue to attract the best, most diverse talent that shares our passion for making public sector technology better for everyone. In this post, I want to share 3 reasons why Made Tech is a great place to begin or develop your career in technology…

1. You’ll do the most important work of your career

Our work at Made Tech is all about making public sector technology better for everyone. Most of the work we do is with central and local government organisations. We help them to make world-class digital services, transform old ways of working, and build in-house teams to take their technology forwards themselves.

We’ve done this dozens of times for all kinds of public sector teams, but a project I’m particularly proud of is the work we did to help connect hospital patients with loved ones near the beginning of the COVID pandemic.

We partnered with Hillingdon, Kettering, and London North West University NHS Hospital Trusts to develop a simple but robust virtual visits service so that hospital patients could talk to friends and relatives when it wasn’t possible to see them in person. We built the alpha version in 48 hours, and this technology is now freely available for other NHS organisations to use and build on if they wish.

There’s so much more work we have done and are doing that we’re excited to talk more about, including our work with the Department of Levelling Up, Housing and Communities that will help people all over the country. And it’s no stretch to say that some of our other work with central government will literally save lives.

When we can, we’ll talk more about this valuable work, but rest assured that the work you’ll do at Made Tech will really make a difference to ordinary people in the UK.

2. You’ll be given time and space for learning

Learning, development and mentoring are a huge part of a Made Tech career. We encourage everyone to make time for learning, regardless of where you are in your career. That means everyone has:

• 12 days learning time per year, which can be taken as individual days, or in blocks
• a learning budget of £300 a year (with more funding available from a company learning budget should the need arise)
• access to Learnably, so you can order your own pre-approved books, courses and get access to other learning resources
• access to an array of in-house mentoring, learning and teaching opportunities

A few weeks back, some of the Made Tech team put some of their learning time towards a two-day game jam – a great way to develop creative, collaborative, design and technology skills at once.

Naturally, we want your learning to be relevant to your role, but we’re also big believers in the benefits of continual learning. We want everyone that works at Made Tech to be prosperous and happy, and leave us with their career all the stronger for their time with us.

You can read more about learning at Made Tech in our company handbook, which we publish online.

3. You can work from almost anywhere in the UK

Though these are challenging times for all, Made Tech is thriving, and our plans to grow the company continue. Our next steps are to open offices in Scotland and the North East, joining our hubs in London, Manchester, Bristol and Swansea. As well as helping us support customers in these regions, new offices help us better support flexible working for more people around the UK.

If you’re interested in working at Made Tech, we want to hear from you, regardless of where you live in the UK. The reality of our being a client-focused consultancy is that, when it’s safe to do so, our customers do sometimes want to work with us in person. We just ask that you’re able to visit one of our office locations (current or future) when the occasional need arises.

We want to accommodate as flexible working as we possibly can. Again, you can read much more about these topics in our handbook:

?‍? Remote Working

✈️ Flexible Holiday

?️ Flexible Working Hours

? Flexible Parental Leave

Some extra perks

We have some great employee benefits, including private medical insurance or healthcare cover as standard. I’m particularly proud of the paid counselling support, an anonymous service that provides not only support for people’s health and wellbeing, but also practical independent advice for things like finances and legal issues.

There’s lots more. You can read more about the benefits and perks available to everyone at Made Tech, as well as our culture of learning, on our careers page. And as you’ve seen, we publish our company handbook in the open so you can read up on what it’s like to work at Made Tech in much more detail.

Our open roles

That’s about it for now. It just remains to say, if you’re interested in working at Made Tech, please take a look at our open roles.

The post Why now is a great time to choose a career at Made Tech appeared first on Made Tech.

Better for our customers

One thing we’ve always been clear about as a company is our determination to remain independent – always. Our IPO means we’re laying long-term foundations to be able to help transform public sector technology, not just in the next few years, but in the coming decades. We want to reassure everyone we’ve worked with that we’re here for the long haul. We’re not going to get bought out by an organisation that doesn’t understand public service delivery like we do. This IPO cements that future.

And to be transparent, yes, we’re now better placed to win and deliver bigger contracts. We believe that this benefits everyone. By raising the ceiling on our capabilities, we broaden the skills, partnerships, expertise and ways of working that will only improve the services we provide to customers on contracts of all sizes. The IPO means we’re able to level-up as a business, and do even better for everyone we work with. We also hope that, through the governance and scrutiny that comes with being a public company, we’re providing our customers with extra reassurance about both our stability and credibility.

What doesn’t change is our absolute focus on improving public sector technology. Our IPO today is a doubling-down on our commitment to doing so. That means more than levelling up our existing capabilities – it also means introducing disruptive new product offerings and ways of working that make a real difference to people everywhere.

Better for our team

I’ve always said that Made Tech is the people that work here. I’m very fortunate to work with such a talented team that cares as much as I do about making people’s lives better. So it’s important to me and the rest of the leadership team that everyone at Made Tech feels invested in the future success of our business – and shares in that success. 

That’s why we’ve rolled out an employee share scheme, to make all of our employees shareholders as their awards vest over the years ahead. Our people have never needed extra financial incentive to do exceptional work – but it’s great to be able to offer it all the same. 

I want to emphasise that financial incentives aren’t our main motivation as an employer. Our IPO gives us a robust platform for longevity and growth that, in becoming a better business, means becoming a better employer too. We want to enable bright and talented people to do the most important work of their careers for as long as they choose to be here, and that means us making the best possible decisions for the long term.

Building a better future

It’s always been important to us that we reinvest in the future of Made Tech. And though we’ve seen great success as a company, an IPO significantly opens up options on how we’re able to invest, and therefore what we’re able to achieve.

We have growth in our plans, but not growth for growth’s sake. It’s growth born from our passion to improve public sector technology everywhere. That means expanding our presence throughout the UK, and also overseas. So much great work has already been done in transforming public services around the world – but it’s a drop in the ocean compared to what remains to be done. Our IPO means that geography doesn’t need to be a limiting factor in doing what we do.

I hope everyone at Made Tech enjoys today. I want to say a massive thank you to the whole team, past and present, for getting us here. I’m so excited to see where we can go in the future. 

The post Why a Made Tech IPO – and why now? appeared first on Made Tech.

Along the way, we’ve had some great conversations on some of the most important challenges facing the public sector as it undergoes digital transformation — and it got us thinking…What does making tech better truly mean for us?

For us, it means helping companies improve their processes and culture and helping organisations to make better decisions using their data. It also means empowering teams to collaborate compassionately on creating high quality software that helps the people that really matter — the users.

This is why we’re really excited to announce the launch of our very first podcast dedicated to this topic. Launching on 13th April, Making Tech Better will bring you some of the best minds in tech and public sector organisations for a series of conversations all about improving software delivery.

Led by our Lead Engineer Clare Sudbery alongside other members of the Made Tech team, Making Tech Better will explore topics including team collaboration, digital modernisation and transformation, and diversity to empower digital leaders to improve software delivery in the public sector. To start things with a band, we’re launching our first four episodes simultaneously — which you’ll be able to listen to from 13th April.

Here’s what to expect…

• Do your teams embrace learning? That’s the question Clare aims to tackle in episode 1 when she chats to Jessica Kerr about the concept of symmathesy, and building better collaborations.
• In episode 2, Clare explores what transformation means to software engineer Paula Paul, including its common pitfalls and a few basic principles to follow.
• What’s the difference between coding for fun and coding for your job? Clare asks Google engineer, author, and renowned Stack Overflow contributor Jon Skeet this very question in episode 3.
• Episode 4 sees Clare chat to Kit Collingwood, Assistant Director of Digital and Customer Services in the Royal Borough of Greenwich, about using tech to serve every citizen.

With so much exciting content to delve into, we’ll be launching a new episode every fortnight to keep the conversation flowing. Some of our upcoming guests include former Ministry of Justice CTO and Head of Digital Dave Rogers, and Anne-Marie Imafidon, founder of Stemettes, a social enterprise dedicated to inspiring the next generation of young women in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Maths roles.

What do you want to hear us talk about next?

We’re passionate about having great conversations that inspire others to improve their software delivery. We want you to come away from our podcasts with a smile on your face, and a bunch of useful new ideas in your back pocket — not just for software delivery, but for your whole life.

The post Launching Making Tech Better — a podcast by Made Tech appeared first on Made Tech.

You will hear from members of our team, from our Lead and Senior Engineers to our Head of Product, as they share our experience working with clients across the UK public sector. We will talk about the challenges, success stories and lessons learnt, as well as share some of the best practices, ways of working and actionable insights you can adopt to deliver technology at pace.

Digital service delivery, modernising legacy applications, building high performance agile teams, and government as a platform are just a few examples of the topics we will cover during these sessions.  To ensure everyone can access the information in our webinars, each session will include live verbatim subtitles.

How to successfully spin up digital projects remotely

How can you run successful workshops remotely? Lead Engineer Clare Sudbery and Head of Product Andreas England will be kicking off our Made Tech Talks webinar series by sharing their experience of starting up while locking down.

How to spin up a digital project during lockdown: challenges, tips and tools

Date: Tuesday, 14th July 2020

Time: 1pm – 2pm BST

Register Here

Made Tech are currently partnering with Difrent and Skills for Care to deliver a service that collects data from (and delivers value to) adult social care providers. We planned to spend a fortnight together to kick off our engagement, then lockdown happened and we were forced to go fully remote with only a few days’ notice.

Clare and Andreas will share the highs and lows of bringing together 10 people who have never worked together before, all working from home and in the midst of a global pandemic.

Key takeaways from this webinar:

• Understand the biggest challenges and how to mitigate them.
• Discover tools to help people interact remotely.
• Appreciate the importance of looking after people.
• Learn how to lay the groundwork for successful collaboration.

The post Launching the Made Tech Talks webinar series appeared first on Made Tech.