sync ni magazine - summer 2012

Issue #06

Northern Ireland’s Technology, Science & Innovation Community

FREE

SUMMER 2012

Issue 6q STARTUPS 06q DIGITAL FUTURES 15q IFACToRY 17q LEADERSHIP TRAINING 18

Virtual learning for real success @ SWC

This edition: Focusing on Learning and Development in Northern Ireland www.syncni.com

08 NorthgateNorthgate awarded £302,000contract

12 CitiCiti’s Technology Academy

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We are looking for teams of 5 sporting competitors to represent their organisation and get in the spirit of NICFC's Mini Olympics.

For more information visit nicfc.comContact Joanna or Sorcha on [email protected] or 028 90805599

Registered charity NIO49930Inland Revenue no. XR29768

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3SYNCNI MAGAzINE SUMMER 2012

Our people and their skills are our greatest resource. A high and appropriately skilled flexible workforce has a crucial role to play in a modern, knowledge

intensive, export driven economy. Continuing to develop this workforce is the aim of the Northern Ireland Skills Strategy, known as ‘Success through Skills – Transforming Futures’. The strategy examines the skills we are likely to need in the future to grow the economy in line with the Executive’s economic vision.

These areas include:• the need for more people with higher level

skills;• the need to up-skill the existing workforce;• the need to address subject imbalances,

particularly in relation to science, technology, engineering and mathematics;

• the need to increase management and leadership skills; and

• the need to attract a moderate level of skilled labour.

We cannot rely on the flow of young people into our workforce to provide these skills – more must be done to ensure that those already in the workforce continue to develop their skills in line with future needs of employers to enable companies, and our economy, to adapt in an increasingly competitive environment.

Recently, I have been focusing the work of my Department on a number of key sectors. I am determined to ensure that the ICT sector

Welcome to the Summer edition of the SyncNi magazine

foreword from Dr Stephen Farry MLA - Minister for Employment and Learning

Northern Ireland’s Technology, Science & Innovation Community

EDIToRIAL SyncNi Team Phone: 028 90820944 Email: [email protected]

CoNTENTEmma LeahyEmail:[email protected]

ADVERTISING Sales and Marketing: Email:[email protected] SUBSCRIPTIoNS Email: [email protected]

DESIGN Graphic Design:Niall MooneyEmail:[email protected]

GENERAL ENQUIRIES Postal Address Sync NINorthern Ireland Science ParkQueen’s IslandBelfastBT3 9DT Phone: 028 90820944 Email: [email protected] Website: www.syncni.com

CoPYRIGHTNo part of this publication may be reproduced without the written permission of the copyholder and publisher. SyncNi accepts no responsibility for the accuracy of contributed articles or statements appearing in this magazine and any views or opinions expressed are not necessarily those of SyncNi , unless otherwise indicated. No responsibility for loss or distress associated to any person acting or refraining from acting as a result of the material in this magazine can be accepted by the authors, contributors, editors or publishers. SyncNi does not endorse any goods or services advertised, nor any claims or representations made in any advertisement in this magazine. The recruitment agencies listed are acting as employment agencies on behalf of their clients.

is supported as there continue to be real opportunities in innovative and technology driven businesses. Ensuring that we have a steady flow of appropriately skilled employees to enable us to maximise this potential is vital.

My Department has recently collaborated with South Eastern Regional College and local ICT employers to develop and deliver a Software Testers Academy to meet the specific demands of industry in Northern Ireland. Last March, 19 participants graduated from this pilot programme, which included eight weeks of off the job training and a six week job placement, with all but one gaining employment in the sector. Tailoring training in this way to the specific needs of local business is an important element of my Department’s work and the success of this pilot has led to a second cohort being announced.

As we seek to facilitate the economic growth to which we aspire we must seek to focus on developing the skills base of our population. I believe that Government, employers, individuals and education providers must work together to ensure we can develop and utilise our best resource - our people. It is that approach which will provide the best foundation for growth as we seek to transform the futures of individuals, businesses, and Northern Ireland as a whole.

Dr Stephen Farry MLAMinister for Employment and Learning

4 SYNCNI MAGAzINE SUMMER 2012

contents03 Foreword06 Startups - Farset Labs07 Meeting Astute Labs08 Northgate new contract10 (IPR) - It’s Your Business11 Is formal training obsolete?11 Developing Developers12 Citi’s Technology Academy14 N.I. Cancer Fund for Children15 Digital Futures16 NORIBIC helps boost growth17 iFactory18 Leadership training20 South West College22 Flacknite & Upcoming Events

2012

08

15

22

I’M TALKIN’ ABOUT

www.culturetech.co

A four day festival of digital culture and technologies

29 August - 1 September 2012 Derry City, N. Ireland

SYNC NI readers save £10 off the ticket price! Use discount code syncni02


Startups

q Who are Farset Labs?Farset Labs is a hackerspace

that provides a hub of creativity, technological innovation and entrepreneurship for local professionals, students and interested hobbyists in Belfast City Centre.

q What has been the biggest challenge that you have faced since starting up in Spring?

Time; We soft-launched at the

beginning of the Easter academic holidays, which made it significantly easier to get volunteers to donate their time to developing our space and programme, but that has driven us into (and through) exam time, where it is very difficult for anyone to find time. Add to this that the three directors (David, Eoghan and Andrew) are all in full time study, volunteering their time; the fact that we’re up and running at all is amazing!

q Farset Labs provides a supportive learning environment for technologists and professionals, how important do you think that is in this industry?

90% of the academic preparation for

Introducing: Farset Labsworking in the technology industry involves wrote learning, contrived non-problems, outdated resources and techniques, and being pushed into working in overloaded groups about problems or projects that are of no interest to most of the group.

Outside of academia, professionals often end up pigeonholed in their particular area of ‘expertise’, which ends up with them stagnating both as

a productive team member but as a person.

These factors make education and gaining any wide-raging, continued experience difficult; Farset Labs provides open and accessible workshops, education days, and domain-specific short-courses covering a wide range of topics that are run by the community, for the community. We aim to educate and enlighten our members with enthusiastic peer support networks, rapid prototyping and implementation of ‘crazy’ ideas; a welcoming hub for discussion and critique; and a community in which to grow the next generation of

technological leaders.

q You recently organised and hosted Flaknight, what is next for Farset Labs?

Frankly we’re trying to find our pattern! For a community like this, with such a diverse membership, it’s important to begin to establish some regularity in our events programme. Events such as Flacknite and the Open Data Playground will be regular monthly Farset Labs events, and we’re hoping to

maintain our relationship with Digital Circle to host their #Bloc54 gaming meetups for the coming months. In terms of expansion, we’ve always got an eye on the September period, where we can grab new university starts and get them to contribute and share in our community.

q What advice would you give a start- up company?

Don’t spend 9 months filling in forms that could be spent building a product.

q Finally, if you could sum up your company ethos in 1 word what would that be?

Hackerspace.


q Who are Astute labs?Astute Labs is a Belfast-based start-up

specialising in the education sector. We are the makers of the School App Kit – a one-stop communication platform for schools to publish from anywhere to everywhere using app technology.

Since earning E-Synergy funding and private investment in early 2012, Astute Labs’ client list has grown internationally, with schools now using School App Kit to communicate with parents, engage with students using smartphones and iPads and to make it easier for teachers to update the school’s information channels online and on mobile. Astute Labs was founded by CEO Richard Johnston.

q What has been the biggest challenge that you have faced since starting up?

It is easy to think you know what your customer wants or needs, but it is important to take the time to actually talk to them and find out who they are, how they buy, what they need, how your product will fit into their daily lives.

This can be slower than actually building the product but it is really beneficial. It is one thing to have technology but another thing to know what to do with it.

q How important is it that organisations keep up to date and utilize the latest technologies for Learning and Development?

It is important because students need to learn with today’s tools, not yesterday’s. But it is as important that technology is used well. It

has to be engaging and fun and relevant. q Can you tell us more about your publishing tool, School App Kit, and some of the work you have been doing with it recently?

School App Kit has grown out of my experience as a parent. I was tired of losing crumpled notes about term dates or standing in the supermarket wondering what I had to buy for my daughters’ school trip when the information was pinned to the fridge at home. With more and more people using smartphones to access the Internet, it makes sense for schools to put this sort of information in parents’ hands. Also, my wife is a teacher and she commented that it was difficult to upload information to some schools’ websites, which is why it never got updated on a regular basis.

School App Kit is a solution that saves time for teachers and engages parents and pupils with the school community. We have had great feedback from the schools, and have just released Version 2.0, which is a faster and fresher system for schools. Our constant aim is to make School App Kit as simple as possible to use while providing features that make a difference to the end users.

q What advice would you give a start- up company?

Plan for everything to take four times longer than you initially think. And talk to your customers as early as possible in the development stage.

q Finally, if you could sum up your company ethos in 1 word what would that be?

Astute.

Meeting: Astute Labs


Newtownabbey-based Northgate Managed Services (Northgate), a proven leader in the provision of

education-based ICT services and solutions, has been awarded a two year contract extension worth over £300,000 by Hugh Christie Technology College in Kent.

The award will enable Northgate to

further its work for the college over the last three years by continuing to deliver efficient managed services while also providing more innovative ways to make ICT provision sustainable.

The news follows on from Northgate’s recent success in Northern Ireland where it was awarded a £170million contract by C2K to design, implement, manage and support Europe’s first Education Cloud environment for schools across the province.

Included as part of the package

for the Hugh Christie College will be Northgate’s My-School cloud-based online learning environment which promotes independent learning and Arcadu, a personalised homework and revision solution covering 14 national curriculum subjects, which uses arcade quality games to educate, entertain and engage students.

An upgraded wireless infrastructure to improve speed and reliability of service, particularly with the increase in mobile users, will also be provided, and work will commence on a joint project to deliver Northgate’s managed services to neighbouring primary schools, Long Mead and Kemsing.

Commenting on the contract, Jon Barker, Executive Principal, said, ”We are delighted to renew our contract with Northgate, whose managed services and cloud-based solutions have enabled us to save over 20% on capital costs – an estimated £40,000 per annum. The partnership we have with Northgate is strong and has bought significant benefits, enhancing the educational impact of teaching and learning opportunities throughout the school.We are also very much looking forward to working with Northgate to extend its managed services into local primaries Long Mead and Kemsing and to realise shared objectives to develop community partnerships that will benefit children and their families.”

My-School is an online learning

portal developed by Northgate, which allows students and teachers to access school’s on-line systems and applications 24 x 7 from any device with internet access. The learning platform is a cloud based application offering on demand pay per user licensing costs which schools can deploy without further investment in IT infrastructure.

Concluding, Chris Wiseman, Sales

Director, Northgate Managed Services, said, “The extension of our contract with Hugh Christie is an endorsement to Northgate’s ability to not only provide efficient managed services but to provide exciting and innovative ICT solutions which promote engaging, relevant and personalised learning. We are delighted to extend our partnership with the College and we will work closely together to ensure the services delivered meet the challenges of the school.”

Northgate awarded £302,000 contract by Hugh Christie College Northgate Managed Services

provides infrastructure services to both public and private sector organisations and specialist managed services in the education, government and utilities sectors.

We work in partnership with our customers to gain a deep understanding of their objectives to design, implement and deliver services and solutions to meet these needs. Our goal is to make IT work harder for our customers, delivering efficiencies and unlocking the potential of IT to transform organisations.

Northgate Managed Services have partnerships with leading technology organisations including Microsoft, Compuware, VMWare, Symantec, Cisco, Citrix, Sun, HP and DELL.

We have over 1000 staff across the UK with offices in England, Scotland and Ireland.

About Northgate

Award-winning local talentThe evening also saw BCS Belfast Branch present the prestigious “IT Professional of the Year” award. Beating off stiff competition, the recipient was founder and CEO of Maildistiller, Colm McGoldrick. The accolade was awarded to Fermanagh-born Colm, by BCS Director for Professionalism, Adam Thilthorpe who also gave a thoroughly entertaining presentation to the packed house. “The IT sector in Northern Ireland is wonderful at the minute”, commented McGoldrick. “There’s a wonderful start-up eco-system that is really helping new businesses get up and running, get the funding that they need, plant ideas and take these ideas to an international field. IT is an export business and it’s the best thing for Northern Ireland”. He continued, “This event has been a long time coming and I’m glad that Brightwater have taken the IT sector and shaken it up. The local technology sector has been crying out for a pivotal point to enable companies to come together, meet speakers like those who were brought here tonight and allow ourselves to stand on an international stage”.

Overwhelming responseAlmost 300 of the province’s top software development talent packed the room and there was also a lively Twitter feed throughout. The room was buzzing with positivity about what NI has to offer from both large enterprises but also tech start-ups. Paul Mooney of Bluewave Technology commented, “It’s an exciting time to be in Belfast; it has a really bright future in the technology space. It’s fantastic that Brightwater put this together bringing in industry known speakers to talk in a non sales pitch manner to discuss their technologies, take questions and talk about how they see trends evolving over the next 10 years. It’s a credit to Brightwater for taking the time to get everyone together for an evening of pure education”. Mike Robinson, Head of Deloitte’s National Solutions Centre commented, “The turnout this evening has been phenomenal. I go to events across the UK and even in London it’s unusual to get numbers like this”.

Driving the economic regeneration of Northern Ireland“The IT community in Northern Ireland is thriving right now” comments Michelle Kearns, Commercial Director of Brightwater NI, the province’s leading IT recruitment specialists who organised the event. “Our world-class technology innovators are the key drivers in the economic regeneration of Northern Ireland. Brightwater along with our IT Events Network Belfast partners, BCS Belfast Branch and Sync NI, has definitely taken on board the huge demand to have the biggest names on the international stage come to Belfast and to share what’s going on with our brightest and best”.

To see more about this and future events in Brightwater’s ITE series, visit brightwaterNI.com and the Brightwater NI Facebook page to view slides and exclusive video content.

Belfast Technology Community welcomes

L to R: Barbara McGrath - Director of Brightwater, Mairead Fleming - Managing Director of Brightwater, Prof. Mark Little, Simon Ritter and Michelle Kearns - Commercial Director of Brightwater NI.

to titanic Belfast

April saw Brightwater NI host two of the biggest names in the global IT industry at the Titanic Building. Oracle’s Simon Ritter and Professor Mark Little, CTO of JBoss at Red Hat, were keynote speakers at The Titans Are Coming event. Both are regular speakers at the biggest IT conferences globally but had never before spoken in NI. “From what I’ve seen of the Northern Irish technology sector it seems to be growing rapidly”, commented Professor Little. “The people I’ve met today have the right skills to compete with pretty much anybody in the many regions around the world that I have people working in. The evening has been great.”

10 C SYNCNI MAGAzINE SUMMER 201210 C SYNCNI MAGAzINE SUMMER 2012oNtEMpoRaRY MAGAzINE MoNth 20XX

IPR is at the hub of any creative or innovative business and can be among its most valuable assets. It can help you grow markets for products or services and, most

importantly, give you an advantage by preventing your competitors from making use of the technology and other IPR that you own or have developed.

Effective intellectual property management can help ensure that you have the right protections in place to effectively exploit the IPR that your business has invested in creating.

Identifying IPRConduct an intellectual property

audit to identify the key IPR that your business owns. There are many different types of IPR including copyright, patents, trademarks, design rights, moral rights, database rights and even know-how (trade secrets) may form an important element of an IPR portfolio.

How might I recognise my business’ IPR?

Typically IPR includes innovative products, designs, novel processes and technology. IPR may also include aspects of your brand such as brand names, trademarks and logos that you use to identify your business. Copyright can attach to a wide range of items such as, instruction manuals and technical reports, computer programs and code diagrams as well as more obvious artistic, literary or musical works and even photographs of your products.

Intellectual property Rights (IpR) - It’s Your Business Why should I care about IpR and managing it?

Protecting IPRHaving identified your intellectual

property, how much of it is really worth protecting?

Not all IPR may be worth protecting. You can often decide whether it is or not by considering its potential value to others; generally ”if it’s worth copying then it’s worth protecting”.

Protecting, developing and exploiting those ideas of value is a fundamental part of effective IPR management. Deciding what methods of protection are most appropriate depends on:

• the type of IPR you have;• if it can be registered; and • your business aspirations.

Some forms of IPR such as copyright automatically arise on a work’s creation and do not require registration. However it is important to be aware that such rights are arising and to put in place the appropriate contracts, policies and statements (especially with employees and contractors) to further protect them and assert ownership since without such measures the default position is that the ”creator” owns the copyright in a work not the person who paid for it.

You also need to remain vigilant to protect the value of your IPR. There may be a risk that other businesses will infringe your rights and it is up to you to identify infringers and to take action against them. If infringement happens you should seek specialist IPR

legal advice to assess what options are available.

Exploiting IPROnce you have identified and

protected your IPR, you can exploit it by manufacturing or selling products which incorporate that alternatively, you might license or assign your IPR to another business so that it can exploit it as part of a commercial deal. Franchising your business to independent franchisees can also be an effective and lower risk way of exploiting your brand and know-how.

Ultimately, properly drafted commercial contracts which reflect your business aspirations are essential to ensure that your IPR is controlled and exploited effectively. For further information or training on managing IPR in connection with your business please do get in touch with Gilian Shaw at: [email protected]

DisclaimerPlease note the content of this article is for information purposes only and further advice should be sought from a professional advisor before any action is taken.

Gillian ShawCleaver Fulton Rankin


Formal training in the workplace: Is it obsolete?

Formal training is now very low on the list of worker’s preferred learning methods. This is a key finding of a recent survey by the Centre for Learning and

Performance Technologies into how people learn best in the workplace.

It revealed how workers are swapping traditional methods, such as attending conferences, for more informal continuous approaches. The appetite now is for interactivity - online research, participating in social networks, conversing with colleagues, team meetings, on-line videos, webinars and searching the learning management system among others.

New methods in the world of Learning and Development provide organizations not only with a more effective modern learning toolkit that can deliver better results but it can be more cost effective too. This reinforces the 70/20/10 learning model, which states that 70 percent of learning within the organization comes from on-the-job experiences, tasks, and problem solving, 20 percent from feedback & worked examples and approximately 10 percent from formal courses and reading. Despite this evidence; formal training

remains a preferred style with many organizations still developing staff in the more traditional way. This is not only expensive in terms of time and money but ineffective in that stand-alone classroom learning can make its practical application sometimes obsolete.

Blended, more flexible, learning techniques are often an effective solution. It gives employees independence; the freedom to fit it into their own schedules and a more engaging, interactive learning environment. Clients stand to benefit too with the availability of bespoke training on company products and services through engaging eLearning content and Learning Portals.

Logicearth provides advice and services for IT and business skills training courses, eLearning content development, off-the-shelf eLearning and learning technologies. For more info visit: www.logicearth.com

Developing Developers Across the GlobeA t Instil, training is more than just about delivering

canned course-ware, it’s about getting under the skin of a technology, learning its do’s and don’ts, learning

its culture and ultimately finding a better way of doing things. Invariably all technologies bring their share of noise and dogma. Instillers filter out the noise and instead focus on the things that matter most, allowing developers to quickly start on creating value.

Central to the Instil philosophy is a focus on developer discipline and technique. Learning syntax is the easy part. Learning how to program effectively and productively requires a huge amount of basic engineering know-how, and it’s in this area that Instil has particularly helped companies and developers from across the globe really grow and improve. Indeed much of Instils reputation for excellence has been built around its ‘discipline’ offerings - advanced unit-testing and engineering principles, etc. These courses offer knowledge that is hard to Google, much

of it earned over many years of hard-won experience.

“We are first and foremost a bunch of developers who just like to share what we’ve learned.” explains Tara Simpson, CEO of Instil. “We bring lessons direct from the coal-face. It keeps our training fresh and most importantly relevant.”

This desire to give something back to the community, led to the creation of ‘Bash!’ a successful developer event focused on upcoming trends within the industry. As well as placing Instil at the heart of the developer learning experience in Belfast, ‘Bash!’ has enabled Instil to bring industry-renowned domain experts to speak to local developers but also provide high-end specialist training in niche areas such as performance programming and agile development. This has attracted developers from London and beyond to attend their courses.

For more information visit: www.instil.co

12 C SYNCNI MAGAzINE SUMMER 2012

Citi’s Technology AcademyIt is that time of year. The exams

are done and the results will soon be posted on the universities’ notice boards. For hundreds of our undergraduates it is an anxious time

of year as they wait to see if they have got the degree classification that that they were hoping for, and for most of them they will be thinking forward to starting their new careers in IT.

There has never been a better time for graduates to start a career in technology. Companies large and small have been falling over themselves to attract the brightest and the best to apply for the roles within their companies, and for many employers there has been an added step this year of convincing prospective new employees why it is that their offer of a job that the graduate should accept rather than one of the several others that they may well have. The supply of suitably skilled graduates for IT does not meet the demand from the buoyant technology sector in Northern Ireland.

The biggest differentiator that an employer can bring to the table is the prospect of getting a graduate’s career off to the best possible start. At its most basic that means an attractive salary package, but much more importantly it means the opportunity to work on exciting projects with

exciting technology challenges and a commitment from the employer that they are going to continue to develop the graduate and push them along throughout their career.

Here at Citi we are in the third year of our Technology Academy. We realised that the old model of hiring in great talent and then putting those people straight to work without any context of what it is to work in financial services technology and without the technology skills to be successful from the start was not sustainable. We sat down and evaluated what it is that we needed for our graduates to make an impact and from that developed a programme that has been so successful for both Citi and the graduates that we have exported it from Belfast across the globe within Citi.

Citi in Belfast has grown since it opened in 2005 from the original plan to have 375 people working here in technology jobs to where we are today with 700 people employed working across application development, production support and infrastructure teams. Technology within Citi is seen as key to delivering competitive advantage by delivering the most efficient and effective platforms in the financial services industry, and we do that through a culture of continuous

improvement at all levels, including our new graduates.

The Citi Technology Academy provides an unrivalled opportunity to build a career in technology. The programme is designed to attract graduates from Technology, Science, Engineering and Maths disciplines, but also those from any technical discipline with relevant experience who aspire to work in technology and build a career with Citi.

The Citi Technology Academy participants benefit from a bespoke programme of ‘best in class’ technical and business training which is delivered by a local training provider, and this training provides a platform of knowledge and experience upon which our new graduate build their career with Citi.


The Citi Technology Academy comprises an initial 6 week training period covering an Introduction to Investment Banking, Operating Systems, Database Technology and Software Development and soft skills training. The remaining 5 weeks of the programme is set up to allow participants to focus on training in either Advanced Programming or Application Support. Along the way the graduates on the programme are given the opportunity to obtain relevant technical certifications before joining a business area to gain direct experience within Citi.

The Citi Technology Academy uses classroom based technical training, practical application sessions, project work, team building sessions and guest speakers to ensure the delivery of a comprehensive and

valuable training programme for the participants.

There are four core components • Introduction to Citi and Capital

Markets• Operating Systems • Java Foundation• Database Technology – SQL

Programming and ScriptingOn successful completion of the

training, Academy participants begin their career in Programming, Application Support or Quality Assurance in one of the technology teams in Citi.

The selection process to join the Technology Academy is rigorous and comprises interviews, technical testing and a group exercise. This may look like a lot to undergraduates studying and preparing for exams, but we believe that this process helps us to

identify those who will be successful in the Academy. Importantly it also offers the graduate the opportunity to learn more about Citi and meet people who already work here.

The Technology Academy has been a huge success for Citi here in Belfast. The Citi brand is now well recognised on campus and the calibre of student applying to join is exceptional.

The scalable model of hiring and training has allowed us to build a strong pipeline of talent to join the technology groups and the investment that we have made in our graduates pays dividends in terms of the quality of the work that is delivered and the fulfilment of the graduates who are fully prepared for their careers within Citi.

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Q>What does your role involve?

A<I work with children and young people aged 8-24 who have cancer as well as their siblings in order

to help re-integrate them back into their communities following their cancer diagnosis. I work on a one-to-one basis with them, doing various activities that they enjoy and providing a listening ear. After five or six meetings, they’re normally ready to join NICFC’s youth groups where we bring them away for residential trips to our base at Narnia and do lots of fun activities with others of a similar age. These can range from outdoor pursuits to cookery lessons to Duke of Edinburgh and First Aid training and many more.

Q>What are the biggest rewards of the job? And the biggest challenges?

A<The most rewarding part is when the young people really appreciate the work that you do. If you can

move a child or young person forward in their cancer journey and help them deal with the issues they’re facing, then you’ve done a good job.

Q>Are there any particular projects you’re currently working on?

A<NICFC has implemented a new Ward Support Programme in the Royal Belfast Hospital for Sick

Children which I and a number of colleagues are very involved with. Staff at the hospital approached the charity, having become aware that not only were the young people facing tough treatment, but they were also becoming increasingly bored and isolated due to the lack of social interaction; particularly in the evenings. So we now visit the ward once a week and spend several hours chatting and listening to any issues the young people have and we organise activities such as artwork, group discussion and interactive games. Already, we’ve had great feedback that the programme is having real benefits.

Q>What is NICFC’s role in the local community and how does your role fit in as part of this?

A<NICFC aims to build awareness of the needs of children and young people living with cancer as

well as their families and to bridge the gap where other charities or organisations don’t meet. My job is to meet the specific needs of young people- it’s not about replicating what the medical professionals do, but more about meeting

their psycho-social needs and being there to instil some normality to their lives at time when it’s been turned upside down.

Q>What sort of personality and qualities do you need to do your job successfully?

A<Working with young people requires a lot of patience and an understanding of the underlying issues

associated with a cancer diagnosis. You must be able to build trust and develop a close rapport with young people and their families and always deliver on what you say you will do. Young people always remember and won’t understand if you can’t deliver. You also need good time management to keep on top of a busy case load.

Q>What do you enjoy doing outside work?

A<I enjoy spending time with my family and watching Newcastle Utd play- I try and get over to see them

a few times a year. I also enjoy long walks with the dog and running- I’ve completed the London and Belfast Marathons and hope to do New York next! In conjunction with my role at NICFC, I was nominated for the role as an Olympic Torchbearer and am looking forward to running on Sunday 3 June in Carrickfergus.

For more information visit www.nicfc.com

Darren McKinley: Youth and Community Worker for Northern Ireland Cancer Fund for Children

Q>A

Darren McKinleyNICFC


When we started the business back in 1999, we focused on custom e-learning –

working with clients who wanted to deliver existing classroom training online. Since then we’ve extended our service offering to include learning management systems, online learning portals, training on how to develop your own e-learning, and more recently, mobile learning tools. Clients want to be able to access learning content 24/7, from their laptop, tablet or phone, and the demand for mobile learning solutions is really taking off, says Dr. Maureen Murphy, Managing Director of Aurion Learning.

”This has brought its own challenges because in the past we used flash for interactivity in e-learning programmes. But now to ensure our mobile learning works on all mobile platforms, our designers use HTML5, JQuery and responsive design.”

What is mobile learning?Mobile learning or m-learning is

learning that you can take with you and access whenever and wherever you need it. You’re probably already m-learning without even realising it - any time you use your laptop or smartphone to access Wikipedia or a reference site to check a fact or get information – you are mobile learning.

Dr. Murphy goes on to explain, ”Aurion Learning develops mobile learning to support job performance – so imagine a social worker out on

Digital Futures: Mobile LearningAward-winning e-learning company, Aurion Learning talks to SyncNI about the growing demand for mobile learning solutions.

the road who needs to check safe guarding procedures, a community nurse who wants to double check records management procedures, or a maintenance worker who wants to read about the latest techniques for repairs. We develop mobile learning content, tools and applications to help employees access information and training when and where they need it, and to improve organisational performance. The real advantage of mobile learning is that it’s flexible, self-paced and self-directed.”

Learning by phone?Mobile learning is supported by

a variety of mobile devices and technologies that facilitate the delivery of documents, presentations, multimedia, notifications, news, assignments, quizzes and educational courseware. These can include: smart phones, laptops, tablets, ipods, Kindle, personal media players, and gaming devices.

Rising Popularity The rising popularity in mobile

learning can be attributed to better internet networks and increased use of mobile devices according to Dr. Murphy. ”Mobile learning has been around for a while but it’s only now that we have 3G networks that it’s really taking off. More of us are using handheld, portable and mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets every day, with fast internet connections. Delivering work-based training via these devices is convenient for workers – they can learn on the

job, at the very moment they are delivering a service, or on the train on the way home. They can also share their knowledge with co-workers, take control of their own learning, and have supported decision making. All round – a win, win situation.”

Good-bye classrooms? ”Some people argue that mobile

learning signals the end of the traditional classroom but it’s unlikely that’s going to happen overnight”, states Dr. Murphy. “There are certain benefits to group learning and sharing learning experiences in a live environment – but a lot of training is now delivered via virtual classrooms rather than face to face. One thing I am certain about though is that the importance of mobile learning is going to grow exponentially over the next few years – and people who are not connected will be missing out.”

NORIBIC helps boost growth for Northern Ireland’s Digital Media businesses

NORIBIC is the North’s only dedicated EU Business Innovation Centre. Founded in 1986, it provides a core support function for the growth and development of entrepreneurs and SMEs throughout NI.

Since 2004, NORIBIC’s Digital Media Works incubator (NI’s first digital multi-media sector-specific incubator) located in Derry’s North West Regional College, has supported pre and early-stage digital businesses through the provision of a co-working environment, offering technology and business support, desk space, hardware and software facilities. With clear evidence that economic growth is best supported by the development of new business, we asked some of the current occupants of NORIBIC’s Digital Media space about their current projects and the benefit of the support provided.

Troll Inc is a video games studio developing for mobile. They’re a young team of game developers working together to create a unique experience for gamers across the world. They’re hoping that their debut title, Jellyflug, due for release in June via the Appstore, will be the first of many success stories. Jim Murray of Troll Inc explains,

”NORIBIC has supported us from concept through to development by providing invaluable advice on setting up our business, provision of incubation facilities which have allowed us to work together in an office environment to the provision of mentoring support.”

Such mentoring is a fundamental benefit of any business innovation space. Having a good idea or creative project is all well and good; however, it is essential to learn and develop business skills too - a fact which is often missed by young businesses who start up without any real business support at their disposal.

Another company, benefiting greatly from NORIBIC’s hands on business support is UPROAR COMICS. Initially known for the ‘ZOMBIES HI’ series of paper-based comics they have now diversified into a trans-media company: developing apps; exploring the options of film; and also actively promoting the Comic scene, both locally and further afield.

Kevin Logue of UPROAR remarks ”Co-working has

provided us with invaluable peer-to-peer knowledge, expertise, advice and support especially in identifying how we could use trans-media platforms to tell the ZOMBIES HI story through multiple channels. Interacting with digital media enthusiasts with different business and technical backgrounds has been really beneficial for us! We feel like a family and we all work in support of each other and having tailored specialist support from NORIBIC is a required bonus.”

The Employable team also based in NORIBIC have a multi-faceted approach to their business development and their soon to be launched platform for the self-starter, Startacus, has been shortlisted for a national start-up competition. Their website www.TheEmployable.com offers empowering careers advice and they’re soon to release their first eBook.

For them, NORIBIC provides that essential business element - a proper work-space. Alastair Cameron, of TheEmployable comments; ”Along with the benefits that a shared office space gives you - support, advice, and a bit of well-intentioned banter, it also allows us the space to act and think like a business, having that mentality and rigour is key to our future success.”

Dr Bernard Toal, CEO of NORIBIC has the greatest admiration for these young entrepreneurs: ”It never ceases to amaze me that so much talent exists in this city. I am proud that NORIBIC, through our Digital Media Works Incubator, is able to provide support to these growing digital businesses, to help translate that talent into successful businesses that will help drive forward the economy locally”.

For further details contact: W: www.noribic.com E:[email protected] T: 028 7126 4242

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iFactory – Pushing the Message of Innovation to achieve Business Growth

NORIBIC, the Northern Ireland Business and Innovation Centre, is currently delivering iFactory, a business and innovation support programme - part financed by the European Union’s European Regional Development

Fund through the INTERREG IVa Cross Border Programme managed by the Special EU Programmes Body. iFactory provides a bespoke innovation development plan to eligible small businesses with the potential for growth.

Its tailored support provides a mix of consulting, technical mentoring, market research and world class best practice seminars for small companies throughout Northern Ireland and the Border Counties. The added value for participants on iFactory is they are assigned an individual Innovation Agent that will work with the company to ensure the implementation of the mix of support received is embedded within the company. Clare McGee, Senior Business Consultant with NORIBIC explains,

“An Innovation Agent develops a close working relationship with the business owner, motivating the business to grow and jointly developing an Innovation Action Plan over 18 months with continual adjustment to provide the optimum support to the business. We identify any deficits in knowledge, technology and expertise, and work with the business owner to address those deficits for the benefit of the business.”

North West based Arrant Technology, a software business specialising in the development of websites and bespoke applications for SMEs and public sector clients, have been benefiting from iFactory support over the last 12 months. Raymond Lyttle, Director, Arrant Technologies explains,

“We initially approached the iFactory programme with an idea for delivering an event-based system focusing on city areas, after meeting with the client representatives from NORIBIC, we established our goals and a plan of action for delivering the skills we didn’t have in house, such as business planning and sales and marketing. From this, we were assigned two mentors who had extensive experience in the areas we were lacking.

After initial meetings with the business mentor, we realised that, although our idea was a good one and the brand we had developed looked well, in order to make this a viable profitable business would be an uphill struggle and, even with a massive amount of effort, it still may not deliver enough revenue to sustain the business.

We took time out and looked at the platform we had created from data capture to user management and decided to pivot our idea and develop the platform into an aggregator tool for social media, sms, email and web content delivery branded as MessagePush.

Since then, and with iFactory support, we have developed the brand, identified customers and secured an R&D grant from Invest NI. The product is currently in private beta test.”

Raymond concludes, “Without the iFactory programme support, we would not have achieved so much in the short period of time.”

Dr Bernard Toal, Chief Executive of NORIBIC and iFactory Programme Director, encourages businesses in the region to get involved in iFactory to unlock their innovation potential. “iFactory provides that additional knowledge, expertise and, perhaps most importantly, experience for SME owners to assist them to grow their businesses in the most effective way. Our pool of over 120 professional mentors brings a wealth of support across many areas and will help and equip the client to make those important business breakthroughs on the road to success.”

For further details on support offered visit www.noribic.com/ifactory or contact us E:[email protected] T: 028 7126 4242


It is hardly surprising that, as the only representative business organisation focussed on the professional development of individual business leaders, the

Institute of Directors (IoD) believes that good leadership is essential for good business, and that good governance is essential for good leadership.

There can be no doubt that improved leadership and management skills are key to driving better productivity. Back in 2010, Bill McGinnis, the NI Adviser on Employment and Skills produced a report for the Employment & Learning Minister on Improving Leadership & Management. The report highlighted the fact that Northern Ireland was lagging behind the rest of the UK and other countries in relation to the quality of leadership.

Evidence cited in the report stated that, “On a scale of one to five, a one point improvement in leadership and management practices is equivalent to that produced by a 25% increase in labour or a 65% increase in capital”.

Unfortunately, alongside this impressive statistic, the report also

Leadership training matters by Linda Brown, Director of IoD Northern Ireland

pointed to low levels of investment in leadership and management training here. Has this position changed in the past two years? Well certainly business leaders are investing in the IoD’s flagship Chartered Director Programme – both north and south of the border.

The six module Programme addresses the core competencies that company stakeholders would expect their board members to possess: such as comprehending their strategic role, duties and responsibilities; having a sound understanding of financial terms, concepts and boardroom financial papers; contributing to strategy and marketing; and being well informed of the legal requirements that apply to the company and its directors.

Successful candidates sit two examinations during the Programme, gaining the IoD Certificate and Diploma in Company Direction. Those who can demonstrate that they have applied their knowledge in practice - by compiling a portfolio of their experience - then face a challenging two hour interview before being awarded the Chartered Director qualification. The Institute’s are the only qualifications for board members, and Chartered Director is increasingly being recognised as a quality mark for company directors.

Northern Ireland’s candidates in the national examinations have performed outstandingly well. In the most recent exams, all 16 candidates passed and no fewer than 10 achieved Distinctions. Given that only 36 Distinctions were awarded, these results demonstrate the calibre of our business leaders.

Already 50 Northern Ireland business leaders have gained Chartered Director status and are happy to share their experience of the process as well as the value their qualification brings to their organisations with other leaders.

Many people seem to think that corporate governance is only relevant for large, listed companies, but in fact the global financial crisis should remind us of the need to improve board practices in all businesses. Learning about and applying the principles of good corporate governance can contribute to creating a profitable and sustainable economic enterprise. It is no coincidence that the uptake of places on the IoD’s Chartered Director Programme in the Republic of Ireland increased dramatically in the wake of the 2008 global downturn as Irish business leaders recognised that poor levels of corporate governance had contributed to the problems in many companies.

The European Confederation of Directors’ Associations (ecoDa) has also recognised this link and produced their Corporate Governance Guidance and Principles for Unlisted Companies in Europe. Local business leaders would be well advised to check practice in their own businesses against these principles.

Linda BrownDirector of IoD Northern Ireland

For information on the IoD’s Chartered Director Programme or a pdf of the ecoDa document, contact [email protected]

The local IT community is overwhelmingly positive about inward investment in Northern

Ireland. This is one of the major findings from the recent survey of the Northern Ireland technology sector undertaken by Brightwater NI, the province’s leading IT recruitment specialists. “The purpose of this survey was to gauge what issues are particularly pertinent right now”, commented Michelle Kearns, Commercial Director of Brightwater NI.

Unquestionably, this is one of the hottest topics being debated in the tech sector at the moment. 81% of respondents thought that inward investment has been a good thing for the local economy with 7.1% responding that it puts a strain on recruiting skilled staff. While sentiment was overwhelmingly positive, it was somewhat qualified with one respondent commenting that “there can be too much of a short-term impact in the market”.

Similarly, there was consensus (79%) that we need to attract more students into computing. More notable was that only 28% of those surveyed felt that universities give students the skills they need to secure a job post-graduation. While there are more graduates available, the percentage of those with high-level programming skills is low. “There is still a large gap between what the universities teach and what happens in the real world”, commented one respondent. 81% asserted that graduates need to

be better prepared in terms of what employers are looking for; chiefly with stronger technical and practical coding skills.

Salaries have remained steady over the past 3 years but there is an acknowledgment that in comparison to other professional disciplines the sector is performing well. When considering a job move there wasn’t one dominant motivating factor with 40% of those surveyed considering salary, benefits, career progression, exposure to new technologies and training as equally important. The second most popular answer was career progression at 35% but perhaps most interestingly only 7% considered salary their top priority. “This reflects what our candidates tell us on a daily basis”, comments Brightwater’s William Cranston. “Most often they are motivated by a combination of factors”.

“It’s great to see categorical confirmation that our IT professionals aren’t purely

money motivated”, says Kearns. “This highlights the need for local IT employers to address talent management internally to drive both staff retention and attraction of new staff. Coupled with this, if there is a consistent push to attract top academic talent into the industry, the local IT sector will completely transform the landscape of the NI economy for the better. There is a consensus that local IT companies need to collaborate more effectively with universities to produce graduates who are fully equipped to meet the commercial realities of the market”. Kearns concludes with the thought provoking question, “Are we moving towards the US model where employers offer scholarships to IT students through universities or do IT leaders locally need to force this issue by assisting local universities funding wise to expand current degree places within IT”?

Local technology sector survey reveals need to

To request a copy of the full report, contact Brightwater NI on Tel. 028 90 325 325

engage top talent


Education is advancing into the digital age with a movement towards blended learning, according to experts at South West College.

In November last year, the college became the first further education college to successfully pilot a fully immersive virtual learning week. This saw almost 6,000 students log in remotely over five days to receive lectures and workshops via the web and access learning resources.

According to Director, Malachy McAleer, the virtual learning environment is designed to meet students’ needs and a central part of its future strategy. ”Online learning programmes are a key part of our plans to improve the academic experiences of people who enrol with South West College. The virtual learning system seamlessly blends curriculum delivery from classrooms to online platforms and is a defining strand of our strategy to bring e-learning opportunities into new course development.

”It was important for everyone that we invested time in getting to know how online learning could fully benefit our students and help the college to become more self-sufficient, improve its capabilities and produce more resources. This is the result of three years of strategic planning, investment and training. The platform we have built is ahead of many other academic institutions in the UK and Ireland and will lay foundations for us to explore new services, enhance the student offering and potentially tap into new markets.”

The virtual learning system was recently recognise at the RSCNI

South West College develops virtual learning for real success

inaugural e-Learning Awards Scheme, collecting top honours in the Innovation in Learning Support and Innovation in Technical Infrastructure to Support Teaching and Learning categories.

The awards scheme was open to all Higher and Further Education providers and the Training sector to promote and embed e-learning by recognising and rewarding individuals and teams who are spearheading the development and effective use of technology to enhance teaching and learning.

Taking teaching forwardTeaching is arguably one of the

few professions that has yet to fully embrace on the transformations afforded by modern technology. While medical, legal and media professionals, among others, have capitalised on productivity gains afforded by connectivity innovations and specialisations; teaching has remained largely focused on traditional and classroom-based activities. But that is all about to change according to South West College Virtualisation

Project Manager Ciara Duffy: ”the ground broken by the college has the potential to support teaching and education throughout higher and further education, as well as in the training sector in Northern Ireland and beyond. Our staff have been very supportive of our advancement into online learning and recognise it as their opportunity to lead the way in the use and development of academic technologies.”

She stresses that the introduction of online services is not designed to reduce classroom-based activities or minimise teacher involvement, rather it enhances successful and proven methods already in place.

”The virtual learning environment is designed to improve, not replace, the campus experience. Blended learning is a combination of teacher-led and computer assisted learning and has been shown to enhance the academic performance of students, as well as maintain it. In some instances the

Second year Extended Diploma in Business student from Enniskillen Campus, Paul Wilson explores the South West College virtual learning system on the go.


innovative educational tools can sometimes be better than working from a traditional classroom as it allows students time to absorb and understand course content at a pace that is better suited to them.”

She added, ”Virtual lectures, for example, contain audio and video that allow students to revisit difficult parts of lectures over and over and over again without feeling pressure from peers if they need to revisit the points being made.”

New learning environments The South West College virtual

learning environment provides online resources and support for over 5,600 full-time and part-time students enrolled across four physical campuses in Cookstown, Dungannon, Enniskillen and Omagh. The bespoke online environment enables students to log into a secure portal and access a full suite of resources and tools – effectively providing distance students with remote access to the same electronic curriculum resources as students who are physically on-site.

The system can provide a range of student resources including on-line timetables, lecture materials, tuition videos, course information, examination results, revision videos, podcasts, elective abstracts, course feedback systems, as well as bespoke curriculum tools for both staff and students to facilitate their programmes of study.

According to Malachy, ”The virtual learning environment is used effectively to support and enhance the students’ further and independent learning. Using a virtual platform to assist in academia makes it simple to tailor a course to the preferences and pace of a specific student. Our students can enjoy a greater degree of flexibility in their education, balancing their home or work commitments with their study ambitions.”

Responding to changing timesThe flexibility to take a class at any

time and in any location is one of the greatest advantages of e-learning for students who experience difficulties balancing study with modern life commitments or who have to travel great distances.

For South West College it also presents an added tool to tackle inclement wintry weather that has severely disrupted classes in recent years. ”In December 2010 we lost a number of teaching days due to harsh wintery conditions, but in the future students will be able to continue their studies during situations where the college may be physically inaccessible. That’s good news for everyone and reduces pressure on students to catch up with ongoing studies,” said Ciara.

Online learning has also been championed as a platform that can improve industry by Dr Stephen Farry, Minister for Employment and Learning. In April he launched the inaugural e-learning innovation awards to encourage greater update and said that, ”The use of technologies to deliver and promote learning in the education sector is an area of immense and rapid growth and change.”

”Business and industry look to the

Garry O’Neill, Lecturer at South West College, introduces BTEC Extended Diploma in Business students Conor McArdle and Anna Oszluk to virtual learning.

tertiary sector as a key provider in terms of their personnel and company development. Technology must be exploited to the full to enrich the learning experience to the benefit of individual students and the economy.”

Malachy agrees, noting that the experiences of the virtual learning environment will sustain students beyond their courses. “We recognise that we have a role as a provider of skills at all levels and an obligation to meet the needs of employers, individual learners and the communities in which they live and work.

”Technology will continue to have a major role in shaping every aspect of our lives and it is important for our students to have an opportunity to access new learning initiatives that can equip them for future careers. The virtual environment provides students with a chance to improve skills including research and IT that will benefit them through their post-academic careers.”

He added, ”we are dedicated to providing world-class technology and learning options for the future and proud to be advancing ground-breaking teaching methods that will benefit all students and staff.”


Back in April, Farset Labs launched in Belfast, this made Farset Labs Northern Ireland’s

very first hacker space.

Just a month on, and they are settling into their flagship event; Flacknite, where creative technologists of all kinds come together to share experience, knowledge, and passion for their craft, creating a pressure cooker of ideas and projects, developed and often finished within

the very concentrated timeframe. During their launch event over

the weekend of the 19th of May, a wide variety of innovative projects were worked upon, including a game developed by Ryan Grieve in 64x18 pixels for an international competition, a native OSX administration application for MondoDB by Rob Elkin and Pete Hawkins, a Coffee Tracker application by local developer Steve Wilkin, the establishment of a solid web presence by Andrew Luke, a comic artist whose work includes the recent epillepsy awareness booklet,

Event Recap:

FlackniteThe Absence, and several more.

Beyond the work done by the local Farset Labs membership and friends, the Farset Labs team were very busy working on their RFID based access control system, that will allow members near-24/7 secure access to the space, as well as the associated CCTV and security systems.

Catering was kindly provided by the Crafty Devil and Planzai teams, who sponsored a Boojum run (and a beer

run) that kept people going through the day.

The major flavour of the Flacknite blend is the idea of intensive but playful productivity; individuals and groups are socially encouraged to have something to show for their time at the end of the event. This, combined with a healthy spirit of constructive criticism, freedom of comment, dynamic collaboration, and the unique venue at Farset Labs, ensure that this event will become a mainstay of the Northern Ireland technology calendar.

1 ITIL / Service Management & Cloud Computing

BY BCS Belfast WHEN Wednesday, 27 Jun (18:30) - Thursday, 15 Mar (21:00)WHERE The Pavilion, Stormont Belfast

2 Embed our Knowledge in your BusinessBY ECIT WHEN Thursday, 28 Jun (09:30 - 12:30)WHERE ECIT Institute, NI Science Park, Belfast

3 Culture Tech FestBY Digital Derry WHEN Wednesday, 29 Aug - Saturday, 01 SepWHERE Derry City, Northern Ireland

4 2012 Halo Funding EventBY NISP CONNECTWHEN Thursday, 21 Jun (18:00 - 21:00)WHERE Northern Ireland Science park, Belfast

Upcoming Events

Some of those who atteneded Flacknite at Farset Labs

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You know Northern Ireland has a spectacular landscape, but did you know our workforce is behind some of the world’s most sophisticated banking systems.

Belfast beats cities like Dublin, Glasgow and Beijing, and even major IT centres such as Bangalore and Singapore, which speaks volumes about the quality of our software specialists.

Belfast is the world’s top destination city for financial technology R&D investment.

Carrick-a-Rede Rope Bridge, Northern Ireland

Northern Ireland offers competitive operating costs, an advanced business infrastructure, and generous financial assistance and support.

To learn more about what makes Northern Ireland the smart choice, visit www.investni.com/invest

smart at workwww.investni.com/invest

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