South Durham Community Led Local Development (CLLD)

The project offers one to one mentoring support with a qualified and experienced mentoring officer, providing you with information, advice and guidance (IAG) to help to help people get into employment.

This includes:

• talking with you about your motivation and goals
• getting to know you, your situation and what you will need to move forward
• help to access courses and training to improve your skills
• learning about volunteering, work placements and other opportunities
• exploring the benefits of self-employment
• linking in with other services such as housing, health or Money Matters
• practical steps to make your job search more successful
• ongoing support to help you settle in to your next step

For full details visit Employability Mentoring or call 03000 262 009.

The Business Boost Project supports business growth and enterprise, supporting businesses within the South Durham CLLD area. 

The programme offers tailored one-to-one advice, guidance and training for small, medium enterprises (SME's). They also offer a capital and revenue grant programme up to £10k.

For full details visit Finchale Business Boost.

The Reach Project focuses on those who are aged 25+ unemployed or economically inactive, who are looking to upskill or retrain or may have barriers stopping them from moving forward.

The project has fully trained mentors who can offer one-to-one support including help with CV's, digital skills to enhance job searching and will be hosting a job club. 

They will also look at vacancies that will match a your current skills or help you upskill or retrain where there is a need within the labour market.

To find out more information about the Reach Project please contact: catherine@cornforthpartnership.org 

The project is a grant scheme which businesses in the South Durham CLLD area can apply to for grants between £1,000 - £2,000 at a fixed rate of 35%.

The purpose of business growth grants is to enable businesses to make investments in greater sustainability and/or growth and job creation. 

The eligible expenditure for activities includes: 

• purchase of tools or machinery 
• purchase of computer equipment
• premises improvement or expansion 
• consultancy for business growth planning 
• consultancy for business strategy development
• consultancy for HR strategy and staff development 
• consultancy for marketing planning & activities 
• website design & development 
• product or process development & business diversification 
• financial planning 
• consultancy for the development of new or improved systems and procedures 

To find out more about the Durham Business Growth Grant.

My Chance, My Future is here to support unemployed individuals get closer to the labour market and into employment.

The project uses a different approach to achieve this, local history and heritage, building a sense of community between the groups. 

The programme is delivered over 12 weeks with 8 weeks of additional individual support. Sessions run twice a week initially, building to include work taster sessions and supported volunteering opportunities. 

Part of the 12 week programme includes organising a visit or hosting an event, for which you will make all the decisions, have ownership and responsibility of what you do and how you spend your budget. The project will help you develop a range of employability skills.

Find out more information about My Chance, My Future.