Business Profile: Vicki Fitzgerald, chief executive of Gateway Family Services

Jun 15 2010 Business Profile

Tom Fleming speaks to the woman leading the latest new business in Birmingham’s healthcare sector.

Vicki Fitzgerald is a little apprehensive about the spending cuts George Osborne is planning for what he regards as the UK’s bloated public sector.

The Chancellor’s remedy for institutional obesity is almost certain to involve some unpleasant medicine, as well as substantial surgery, and she fears that businesses like hers, which was spun out of the NHS four years ago, could become accidental casualties.

As chief executive of Gateway Family Services she is waiting to see where the lancet draws first blood, and whether the local authorities and Primary Care Trusts that constitute her customers will have significantly less to spend.

Healthcare is big business in Britain today, and there are no signs that it will suffer any shrinkage in the long term. But for the present?

“There are some difficult times ahead,” she admits. “I’m aware that the public sector squeeze will affect us in some way, but we can’t let it divert us from our aim of recruiting local people and training them to do local jobs.”

There’s no escaping the strong social aspect to Gateway’s work. It is one of the five “flagship” organisations selected by Social Enterprise West Midlands as beacons of excellence – demonstrating the benefits that flow from applying rigorous business discipline to social enterprises.

Gateway’s stated aim is to tackle health and employment inequality in all its guises – from work opportunities to accessing health services – by recruiting and training people who are often cash poor, but rich in experience and practical knowledge.

That said, it operates just like any other competitive business with an eye to winning and keeping clients through the delivery of first rate services.

True, it’s an unusual business model - for example recruits are not required to have any formal qualifications in order to be accepted onto its range of training courses.

In fact at one stage about 85 per cent of candidates had a reading age below 14. No problem, says Fitzgerald. That is a situation that can be – and is – addressed very successfully, with people routinely graduating from training courses having achieved distinctions in their literacy tests.

Some enjoy the learning process so much that they go on to achieve respectable degrees, no matter how poor an early education they may have had.

While undergoing training, candidates are placed in apprenticeships around the West Midlands, and become hugely enthused when the door of opportunity swings open.

“A lot of people, when they get a job, are really ‘up and at ‘em’ and it can be frustrating for them if they don’t have the literacy skills to progress,” says Fitzgerald. “Improving their literacy is just one of the many things we do which boosts their confidence.”

The direction in which Gateway has developed, in the short time since it first plunged into the third sector and embraced the business ethos, is also remarkable.

Unbundling the business from the NHS had several obvious benefits. Firstly it did away with any geographic obstacles to growth, by removing the primary care trust boundaries that had restricted its operations.

Secondly it opened up sources of funding that were inaccessible to any branch of the NHS, and finally it gave the fledgling business greater flexibility.

“When we were spun out of the health service in 2006, the intention was that we would become a training agency,” Kidderminster-born Fitzgerald confides. “We wanted to equip people with the skills and the confidence to get work.

“But what we discovered was that to make it all operate in the way we intended, we had to become involved in the running of the services.”