The Tes FE Awards 2019 takes place on Friday 22 March. The deadline for buying “early bird” tickets is Friday 15 February. For more information, visit tesfeawards.co.uk.

After 27 years in the sector, 17 of those as a principal, Lowell Williams, chief executive of Dudley College of Technology, was named Leader of the Year at the Tes FE Awards 2018.

Under Williams’ leadership, the college has progressed from Ofsted grade 4 to “outstanding”.

Among numerous initiatives, he has built a successful sixth-form college, led a £60 million development of the new Dudley Learning Quarter supporting the town’s rejuvenation and played an integral role in the economic regeneration of the whole region. He has also implemented leadership and management training projects in India and Saudi Arabia, which bring in resources to use locally, and is involved with numerous local charities. 

Williams had no intention of working in education. After graduating in 1984, he planned to continue in academia with an MA and PhD. He gained a place on the course but couldn’t get the funding, so had to look for work. A keen rock climber during his time at university, he eventually found a job using his outdoor pursuits skills, working for a charity that helped young people who’d been involved in football hooliganism.

The idea was to connect with the young people through physical activities, such as mountaineering. Lowell took some climbing qualifications and mountain leadership courses but for the main part he learned his craft on the job.

‘I learned about the needs of young people’

He says: “You could dangle young people off a cliff and that kept them quiet for a while, but if you actually wanted to make a difference to their lives you had to teach them things, to read and write and get some practical skills.” 

The behavioural issues of the young people he worked with were such that they couldn’t go to college, so along with a small team he ended up running educational programmes.

He adds. “I was working in education at perhaps the toughest end, but I learned on the job about the needs of young people.”

After seven years, he moved into the FE sector just at the time of incorporation, when colleges moved out of local authority control. This change wasn’t welcomed by all and Williams’ teacher colleagues were not enthusiastic about the new way of working.

“The principal was looking for managers but nobody wanted to do it, so I said, ‘Well, I’ll have a go.’  He pointed out that I didn’t know anything about FE and I’d only just started, but I said, ‘You haven’t got any other choices so you might as well give me a go.’ And he did.”

Within 10 years, he became principal of what is now South Leicestershire College, before moving to Dudley College of Technology, gaining his MBA along the way.

‘Communication is the key to success’

Williams cites relentless communication with all staff as a cornerstone of his success. “The very simple task of leadership is to get everybody on board the bus and get the bus going in the right direction. To do that you’ve got to articulate to people what could happen. Where we could be if we all worked together.”

The college makes great efforts to reward staff for their hard work, celebrating achievements with an annual summer ball for college staff as well as a Christmas party. There have also been pay awards against the advice of the sector - a stance that Williams is clear about: “We said we couldn’t afford not to! We need motivated people.”

Along with efforts to create a dynamic and positive organisational culture, Williams emphasises the need for solid management practices: “You need technically competent people who can write development plans and translate those into objectives and business plans. Not just a staff of 800 motivated people - that’s great but it’s not enough. But 800 people who are motivated and well organised - they can make a massive change.”

And while the college’s work demonstrates clear links between business and education, Williams is resolute in his stance that learners are central to the business of education: “Our product is changing the lives of our students. So if you take that mindset you have to put them at the centre of everything you do. We don’t work for the government or for Ofsted or anybody like that. We work for the young people and adults of the Black Country.”

The Tes FE Awards 2019, sponsored by the Education and Training Foundation, takes place on Friday 22 March. This year the awards will also host the AoC Beacon Awards. The deadline for buying “early bird” tickets is Friday 8 February. For more information, visit tesfeawards.co.uk.

Q and A

What are you proudest of in your career?

“I’m probably proudest of the Ofsted ‘outstanding’ achievement in May this year. Not because it’s important to be Ofsted ‘outstanding’ - I’m quite critical of the Ofsted framework - but because it meant so much to the staff and the people of Dudley. For them to get the recognition is a great thing to happen.”

What’s been your biggest mistake and what did you learn from it?

“My biggest mistake was that I didn’t know how to handle banks and therefore nearly bankrupted a college by not making a payroll and not dealing with the cash flow properly. So I’ve learned how to do that! My other mistake, in hindsight, was that Dudley could have been an ‘outstanding’ quicker if I was less controlling. The mistake was not being adventurous enough early on, particularly with letting teachers have more freedoms.”

What are your ambitions for yourself?

“I have no ambitions for me at all. I’m doing what I want to do.”

And for the college?

“Our ambition is to embed our ‘outstanding’ practice in the day to day, so we are routinely operating at this level. And then to innovate our products and services so we are not just delivering skills but much more integrated in helping businesses innovate and become more productive. The ambition for Dudley College is to stop becoming a skills provider and become an integrated productivity engine with local industry.”

What is your advice to anyone who wants to become a leader?

“First of all, it’s a brilliant thing to do: come forward and do it, please! We don’t have enough people with this ambition.

“Our sector has been typified by siege mentality principalship, where people develop their fiefdoms at the expense of others. I’ve learned the hard way that leaders need to be learners all the time. If you have that mindset when you become a leader, you’ll progress quicker and develop your skills quicker.”

What does the Tes FE award mean to you and mean to the college?

“It means an awful lot to me. I’ve always been a sort of maverick principal - I’ve never really done things in the mainstream - and to be recognised by the judging panel for the achievements at Dudley is really quite something for me personally.

“More importantly, it’s for the college. There’s no possibility that I could have won that award individually without the massive amount of teamwork that’s been going on here since 2007.”