Nottingham Trent University supports Affari Media with Enabling Innovation

Supporting Innovation with NTU’s graduate talent

Since July 2016, Nottingham Trent University’s Enabling Innovation programme has supported over 500 small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire.

In the second of a series of snapshot videos, find out how Enabling Innovation has helped support Affari Media

Enabling Innovation with Affari Media

Without the support from NTU, our business would not be where it is today. We have the ambition and desire for growth, and NTU has given us the opportunity to do just that. Not only in terms of funding, but business advice too.

Craig Brothers, Managing Director – Affari Media

Affari Media is a creative marketing agency based in Nottinghamshire, and ever since Managing Director Craig Brothers graduated from NTU in 2005, his relationship with the university has continued.

The company has benefited massively from the support offered by NTU which has helped the business to grow and develop, now employing 19 full-time staff, of which 6 are NTU graduates. In September 2016 Affari enrolled in NTU’s Enabling Innovation programme and since then the company has gone from strength to strength by introducing innovation into their organisation through new graduate talent.

Funding for graduate Talent

The talent that comes from graduates is fantastic, there’s a reason why everyone who has worked here either through work experience or from the Talent for Innovation programme has stayed here as a permanent member of the team

Craig Brothers, Managing Director – Affari Media

The Talent for Innovation team, part of NTU’s Enabling Innovation programme, provided 20% of a graduate’s salary for 12 months which the company used to recruit a new Junior Motion Designer. The new role provided the organisation the ability to expand their animation and video offers to new clients, which now forms a vital part of the growing business.

Innovation Community Lab

Throughout the duration of the course, I identified improvements that could be made to my team's approach to knowledge sharing. I began to create a structure which I slowly started to implement. In turn, this has increased our productivity ten-fold. On the back of this improvement, I have also started to mentor other staff members with structuring their own innovative ideas.

Jordan Daniel - Affari Media

Affari also took advantage of NTU’s exciting Innovation Community lab (ICL), a programme that supports businesses by enrolling their new-starters and graduates in a six month course, providing them with the tools to help their organisation innovate.

Since the start of ICL, Affari have enrolled three of their graduate staff into the programme, allowing them to go back into their organisation and invite innovative change to further grow the business.

Jordan Daniel attended the first series of Innovation Community Lab and describes how important the skills he learnt are to his organisation

Access our support

Are you an SME? Contact our team to find out how to start your journey.

Enabling Innovation is a three-year collaboration between Nottingham Trent University, the University of Nottingham, and the University of Derby to support SMEs in Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire to innovate. It is part-funded by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF)

You can find out more about Enabling Innovation and the support it offers businesses on our website.

Twitter: @NTU_EI
LinkedIn: Enabling Innovation at NTU
Phone: +44 (0)115 848 8899

Notes for editors
Enabling Innovation will enables NTU to support businesses to invest in research and innovation; to make them more competitive, and help them to grow and create high-skill jobs with a range of schemes. We will achieve this in a number of ways, including:
- dedicated technical hubs in food and drink, materials engineering, computing and data, and design innovation
- innovation management workshops delivered by Nottingham Business School
- a contribution of 20% towards 60 graduate salaries for up to a year, to support businesses to introduce innovative products, services or processes
- academic and student-led projects and consultancy
- intensive specialist support for innovative businesses
- networking and business development workshops and events.
The project has received £10 Million of funding from the England European Regional Development Fund as part of the European Structural and Investment Funds Growth Programme 2014-2020. The Department for Communities and Local Government is the Managing Authority for European Regional Development Fund.
Established by the European Union, the European Regional Development Fund helps local areas stimulate their economic development by investing in projects which will support innovation, businesses, create jobs and local community regenerations. For more information visit https://www.gov.uk/european-growth-funding.