BDFI involvement in BT Leader Lab Scheme helps win award

Carol Fletcher (BT), Ruth Welters (UoB), Wendy James (BT) and Simon Blenkin (BT)

4 July 2024

Last month BT Group, a partner of BDFI, won highly commended in ‘Leadership Development of the Year’ category at the British Training Awards, for the first BT Innovation ‘Leader Lab’ cohort.

This first cohort came to University of Bristol in June 2022, and BDFI took part in the event by giving a number of presentations to delegates.

BT tracked the outcomes of the 30 BT staff who took part in the scheme and assessed the number of people who had taken a more senior role after a year.

During the June 2022 visit, co-ordinated by Dr Ruth Welters from the Bristol Innovations Partnerships Team, the visitors also heard from MyWorld and Cabot Institute for the Environment and enjoyed a tour of the Smart Internet Lab.

At the event Dr Jenny Knapp, Operations Director at BDFI, gave a presentation on BDFI’s sustainable campus testbed and net zero ambitions.

BT leaders were inspired by research across three Universities. The leaders brought these ideas back from the Universities into BT, to innovate into new products and services.

Dr Jenny Knapp said: “This is a fantastic outcome for our partners at BT and well-deserved recognition for their Leader Lab scheme. We’ve been proud to support and help facilitate the scheme, and we look forward to continuing our collaboration with BT Group going forward.”

BDFI has since hosted another two-day BT Leader Lab in March 2024 which heard from a broad range of BDFI academics and affiliates, and explored the benefits of taking a sociotechnical approach to digital innovation.