We were delighted and privileged to be able to welcome a large team from  

Capgemini is a worldwide corporate establishment with a Head Office in Paris and a number of offices in the UK and kindly supported the school by volunteering their business experience and ideas to support the development of our Year 8’s.

The company is a leading business and information technology transformation company, working alongside major corporate establishments, including Airbus, Nestle, McDonald’s & involved in projects such as the Face/Passport recognition system when flying from Heathrow Airport.

The 20 plus staff from Capgemini were at Worthing High School to run a high-profile Entrepreneur Day on Friday 12 July with the entire Year 8 cohort who were based around the school working in groups of up to 4 students, tasked with setting up a business for a Milkshake Bar.

                      This meant that students had the opportunity to learn a vast number of employability skills, including, amongst others -

• Team Working
• Time Management
• Communication
• Problem-Solving
• Leadership
• Initiative
• Decision-Making

Each Capgemini mentor worked with the groups, who, in order to mirror the modern business world, all received instructions via an MS Teams link to Capgemini’s Head Office (based in the school). The Head Office as well as the mentor were able to support students’ activities & students were able to communicate with the Head Office as well as visit it to ask for further advice if and when required.

The use of hybrid working via MS Teams and what that entails, was a great insight into the shifting landscape of work patterns in some business sectors.

Our student activities throughout the day were really diversified and had to be completed on a strict time schedule, mirroring the business world, which they all did admirably well. Tasks included -

• Creating in their individual groups a company name
• Design a Logo. Draw it on their team cupholder and vote for the winning design.
• Agree Ingredients & Sourcing, paying particular attention to the sourcing and its effects on the environment 
  Design 5 creative Milkshake Names & analyse their sustainability factors based on ingredient components
• Hold a Company meeting and discuss what has worked well and what areas they could improve on.
• Students are then actively encouraged to write keynotes on a Memory Wall.
• Design & draw up a menu for the 5 milkshakes.
• Create a fun advert, jingle, dance routine to promote your milkshake bar. Draw it on the storyboard and the video production.
• Opportunities to visit the Head Office to ask any further questions and receive any useful information to share with their team.
• Students had to create and practice their 'presentation/advert', as well as learn their team and individual roles within that.
• Each business team presented their idea to other groups and had to actively promote their milkshake bar and products to these groups.
• Voting took place for each student to vote for their favourite business.
• The Head Office then collected the names of the winning teams using an online Eurovision Song Contest style format.

Some of the very inventive and clever Milkshake Bar names produced by Year 8 were –

• The Cow Shed
• One Way or an Udder
• Human Nose
• Marvellous Moo Shakes
• Never Too Sweet
• Happy Shakes

…and many more!!

Our Year 8 student comments about the day included - 

 “I really enjoyed the creative element of the work and the presentations”.

 “The day was really well laid out and well explained.” I liked having a Head Office and receiving instructions remotely as it was something new and different to a school day. ”

“It was exciting to learn the idea of how to set up a business”

Students spoke really positively about the day and enjoyed the challenge with tasks like the compliment circles as well as having to work with students who were not in their usual friendship or Tutor groups, which meant they had to do something outside their comfort zone. 

Our students have not only benefited from insights into the industry sector and the wider world but gained valuable employability skills that will transfer into both academic lives now and in the future, as well as provide them with the confidence and skills for their next steps.

Worthing High School is very much looking forward to welcoming Capgemini back into our school again next year to visit our Year 8 students in 2025 and exploring further opportunities for us to work together to enthuse our students with the opportunities the organisation offers.

We are really appreciative of their time and energy in making this an extremely worthwhile whole day experience for our students.