Behind the Scenes…Learning & Development Team

The Learning & Development team at AssessTech are responsible for delivering the wide array of specialist railway training courses we offer.

From delivering and supporting you through certified City & Guilds accredited qualifications to our newest railway specific intel driver course, our learning & development team work hard to support our candidates towards their personal and professional development goals.

Let’s meet the team!

Leanne Hammond, Head of Learning & Development

Leanne leads the learning & development team within AssessTech, working with customers to create bespoke courses that meet their specific needs, communicating with our trainers, overseeing that candidates are progressing and achieving their awards and finding gaps in the market for new courses.

Leanne said, ‘I’m really proud to be leading such a dedicated team of trainers. We have a vast amount of railway experience in the team, both at operational and strategic level. It is this experience that allows us to keep growing and expanding our portfolio of courses, as well as the range of services we offer to the industry.’

How would you describe your role?

I have a very varied workload; this can include talking to customers about courses they would want to book to meet their specific needs, communicating with consultants about updating content to keep courses fresh and looking at our suite of candidates (as a City & Guilds accredited centre) as it is our responsibility to ensure candidates are achieving and progressing through their awards.

What are the highlights of your role?

For me, it is talking to customers – interacting and gaining feedback, creating interpersonal relationships, sparking good relations, people management, getting the best out of our team to fulfil their potential in their own professional development.

What do you like to do in your spare time?

When I’m not running around after my 2 children, I’m running around a netball court after a ball! I enjoy Pilates, and any excuse to get out of the house as I am a busy mum!

Simon Grove, L&D Consultant

Simon on holiday with his family and Cavapoochon Haribo!

What are the highlights of your role?

Firstly, I thoroughly enjoy internally working with other assessor and trainers, learning new things, sharing what we do and continually improving what we do. Secondly, being out and about meeting new people, I do feel that the assessor award course and other training we supply is unique in that we work with the candidate from day 1 of the course, right the way through until they gain their own personal qualification. Every course I run I amplify this by explaining that the reward for me as the trainer is that we share a journey together until the full qualification is achieved, a rewarding ‘shared win’.

What have you been working on most recently?

My primary focus is delivering the assessor award course. As the pandemic restrictions lift, more and more of these courses are moving back into the classroom, which for me is great as we all need the interaction. It makes it more fun as we get to know each other better and the rapport is strengthened.

What do you like to do in your spare time?

I love football and F1. I’m looking forward to Silverstone taking in all the racing which I do with family and have done this for the past 5 years. Spending time with my true loves, my wife and our Cavapoochon named Haribo – we named him because I love the Haribo sweets! Most recently we have become grandparents (scary), oh how things have changed!

Gary Howitt, L&D Consultant

What are the highlights of your role?

I love being tasked to write a new course. It’s daunting at first (and even more so the first day it’s rolled out!) but I enjoy the process of brainstorming a rough outline to how I think the product should look, writing material and sourcing information that should be included, then making the presentation as interesting as possible for learners. One of my pet hates in learning & development is ‘death by PowerPoint’, where the trainer just clicks through slide after slide, reading the text out to the audience. This should be avoided at all costs!

What have you been working on most recently?

I have been developing a course for railway managers. Historically on the railway, managers haven’t had much opportunity for training – you learnt as you went – which isn’t very efficient. This course covers risk assessments, planned general inspection, fire-safety, on-call duties and conducting adverse event investigations. It’s still a work in progress but that is the way of things in L&D – it’s like a garden – nothing is truly finished!

Gary with his gorgeous German Shepherd Cruz!

What do you like to do in your spare time?

Outside of work, I have a stunning 3-year-old German Shepherd dog called ‘Cruz’ who I love dearly and makes me burst with pride when I’m out with him. I have brought him up from a puppy, having picked him up from the breeder at 8 weeks old and trained and cared for him ever since. He barely leaves my side and I wish I could take him to work with me!

Katrina Thomas, L&D Consultant

What are the highlights of your role?

I really enjoy working with candidates, from the initial engagement, interaction and going through the L&S process from beginning to end, and ultimately achieving their qualification/ NVQ. I love the standardisation element of my role, working with other trainers and assessors in the business to achieve best practice and consistency.

What have you been working on recently?

I have taken on a co-ordinator role within the team, ensuring all the marking and administration of portfolios is completed. This role is really fulfilling as it means I can facilitate standardisation activities with our trainers and assessors to ensure any learning is fed back into the training we deliver. My role also involves auditing our training material, ensuring that everything we do is continually monitored and improved.

What do you like to do in your spare time?

I love netball and team sports and enjoy attending group fitness classes – my next ambition is to train and complete a triathlon! I love watching sport especially football both on the TV and with my kids as they are all sports fanatics so you will often find me by the side of a pool watching my eldest compete at county and national level swimming or alternatively watching one of my sons play academy level football.

Doug Aitken, L&D Consultant

What are the highlights of your role?

A highlight for me is contributing to a safer railway. Being an ambassador for a forward-thinking business and building relationships with customers across all levels. I enjoy developing new and existing client employees to ensure they reach maximum potential in safety critical tasks, and ensuring they feel confident as well as competent in their abilities. 

What have you been working on most recently?

I am currently engaged with MTR Elizabeth Line, supporting their competence development team in the competence management for degraded train dispatch. This has developed from assessing new and existing employees to most recently delivering training for new intakes in this field.

What do you like to do in your spare time?

In my spare time I enjoy fly fishing for trout and salmon and paddle boarding off my local beach on the south coast.

Doug showing off his fishing catch! 

David Brock, L&D Consultant

What are the highlights of your role?

My favourite part of the job is being able to see the improvement and development of candidates over the time, following the training we deliver. Recently, I have been doing On Train Data Recording (OTDR) courses for GWR and there is something special when a candidates’ face lights up thinking, “This is going to save me hours!”.

What have you been working on recently?

I have recently started marking work for candidates in addition to running training courses. This is great as it allows me to be a coach and mentor to the candidates and see them through their entire journey, all the way to getting their certificate & award.

What do you like to do in your spare time?

In my spare time, I play golf, badminton, and tennis. I have recently taken up UK 8-ball pool with a hope to join a league in the future. I enjoy playing and creating board games, and as some people might know from my courses, I have represented the UK at the World Championships for a board game called KLASK. I flew to Denmark where the game was created and ended up coming 5th in the tournament. That was a fantastic experience meeting lots of new people from around the world!

Lizzie Poulter, Learning & Development Specialist

Lizzie is the newest member of the team as our Learning & Development Specialist. Since joining us in June, Lizzie has been working hard in helping facilitate candidates towards achieving their qualifications and supporting their professional development.

What are the highlights of your role?

The highlight for me is seeing how my support results in someone achieving their qualification. My background is in teaching, so I have a passion for learning. It’s exciting being able to bring my experience and perspective to the railway industry.

What have you been working on most recently?

I’m currently working with an engineering customer, providing coaching support to apprentices. I really enjoy how every apprentice is different, so I can really put my skills to the test in how best to support every individual to achieve their qualification.

What do you like to do in your spare time?

I am a keen reader and enjoy a good book on my way into work every morning – expect to see an AssessTech book club coming very soon! Alongside my love for books, I enjoy showing off my impressive general knowledge at pub quizzes with my family.

Lizzie looking pig-ture perfect!

If you have a question regarding training courses, don’t hesitate to get in touch with the Learning & Development Team on +44 (0)1483 338646 or via our email info@assesstech.com.

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