Last night, Harvey Nash were delighted to attend the Digital Skills Feast as part of Manchester Digital’s Festival, which was sponsored and co-hosted by Slalom. The evening event hosted at the Science and Industry Museum in Manchester city centre, invited tech leaders, key decision makers and education partners to celebrate and discuss the region’s tech landscape.

Katie Gallagher OBE, Managing Director of Manchester Digital welcomed everyone and reflected on the Manchester Digital Festival as a whole. This was then followed by Councillor Nick Peel, leader of Bolton Council and portfolio holder for digital and tech for GMCA. He gave a speech celebrating the  region’s success and focus on digital innovation and education highlighting AI growth and high graduate retention for those studying computer science.

Baroness Jones of Whitchurch, the Parliamentary Undersecretary for the Future Digital Economy and Online Safety, shared a video message for the event. The speech emphasised Manchester's role as a tech hub and the government's commitment to fostering tech ecosystems across the UK. It highlighted the importance of digital skills, the creation of Skills England, and reforms to apprenticeship programs to support the tech sector.

Tech leader panel

David Savage, Technology Evangelist and host of our podcast Tech Talks then hosted a panel discussion. The panel included; Caroline Grant, Managing Director at Slalom Manchester; Rob Sugden, Managing Director, ECOM, our Sector Insights Partner and Alison Ross, Chief People and Operations Officer at Auto Trader.

The panel discussed some of the key challenges facing digital leaders currently including: economic uncertainty; regulatory hurdles; funding constraints; infrastructure limitations and talent shortage. 

We recorded this brilliant discussion as a Tech Talks podcast episode which you can listen to here.

David Savage, who hosted the panel commented ‘Manchester is a vibrant hub for business and technology, with strong, passionate local leadership. One message was clear from our panel; we are living through a period of instability that makes business challenging. With that in mind, it is clear that Manchester can be a model for regional growth across the UK to ensure fragile confidence does not evaporate.’

Overall, we were thrilled to be part of Manchester Digital Skills Feast which concluded an excellent week of events as part of the festival. We’d like to thank Manchester Digital for organising the festival week and Slalom for sponsoring this specific event.

 

Panel L-R: David Savage, Caroline Grant, Alison Ross MBE and Rob Sugden.

Manchester Digital 

Manchester Digital is the driving force behind Greater Manchester's thriving tech and digital sector.As a dynamic membership organisation, we unite a powerful community of over 400 members - including large corporations, innovative SMEs, cutting-edge startups, freelancers and leading agencies across all tech verticals.

Find more about Manchester Digital here.