Dave's career

A quick look back on Dave's career:
  • Pre 2015: Dave has worked in the housing and homelessness sector for many years where he pioneered over 15 supported housing projects in various locations (London, Devon, and various locations in the Midlands) latterly in Herefordshire where he founded the award winning SHYPP Project for Young People). At the end of Dave's time at SHYPP, he was then promoted to the role of Director of Strategy at WM Housing (now 'Citizen') - the 'fastest growing Housing Association in the UK' (2015) with 1,500 staff. 30,000 properties, £160m turnover. 
  • 2015: This was a pivotal year where Dave successfully undertaken his own personal career transition from WM Housing, Dave took on a new senior role in a local Group Training Organisation and begun to work in a Workforce and Organisational Development role. This role is where Dave became more passionate than ever about helping individuals and teams through periods of change and transition. The Mindgap concept was born out of this passion! 
  • 2013-4: One of a number of catalysts for creating Mindgap was Dave's time at Cranfield University Business School  where Dave discovered some radical new strategic thinking and tools/frameworks on which he has learnt to hang his experience and passion on. Some of these approaches have underpinned Dave's thinking in developing Mindgap's tools.
  • 2020-21: Dave become a Fellow of the Institute of Leadership and Management and then went on to undertake an MBA in Leadership and Management which he completed, with Distinction, in 2021 - yes, in the middle of the Covid pandemic!. As well as immersing himself in Leadership theory and practice, Dave's MBA dissertation focused on 'Facilitative practice and its impact in a training context'.  This changed Dave's perspective on training forever!  
  • 2021: Dave launched Mindgap and in it's first six months, in the middle of the Covid 19 pandemic the business has exploded with opportunities opening up abroad and in the UK that he could never dream of!  

Sam's career

A quick look back on Sam's career:
  • Starting out: Sam’s first role was for Reebok International where he was the Global Football Marketing Assistant. This gave him insight into international corporate marketing, manufacturing, distribution and product design as well as an understanding of the professional sports industry.
  • As much as Sam loved working for Reebok he wanted to use his skills to benefit some of the most vulnerable people in society. so he took on a role living on site with the award winning SHYPP Project for Young People) where first met Dave (Founder of Mindgap). Sam was soon leading SHYPP
  • Sam was then promoted to Director of Business Excellence at WM Housing (now 'Citizen'). Sam was responsible for performance analysis, communications, policy implementation, Information Technology and amongst other things, instigated a large scale business transformational project (journey to excellence).
  • Sam then become the Manager Director of West Mercia Homes responsible for the operational performance of the Hereford, Worcester & Birmingham areas of operation within the overall WM Housing business.
  • After 15 years in Social Housing Sam left to become the Chief Executive (Diocesan Secretary) of the Hereford Diocese. Here he leads a charity with a £70m balance sheet and has excelled in managing the people, assets, finances in a complicated and heavily legislated charity.
  • Sam’s skills have brought about a significant modernisation of processes, overhauled governance and enhanced the value of assets to enable investment growth and sustainability.  He advises his colleagues and the national church on a number of areas of strategic importance