Business Advisor

Business Advisor/ Innovation Advisor – Do you have experience supporting businesses to overcome barriers and grow? Do you have an interest in sustainability and biotech innovation? If yes, we are looking for a Business Advisor/ Innovation Advisor to join our team working across our sites in Norfolk, with flexible working options available.

Why Hethel Innovation?

Hethel Innovation is an economic development company, owned by Norfolk County Council, providing a variety of support services to facilitate the economic growth of businesses through our three offerings: space to grow, business insight and connected communities. We provide businesses ‘Space to grow’ through our three sites: Hethel Engineering Centre, Scottow Enterprise Park, and Broadland Food Innovation Centre. These sites provide business space including workshops, offices, hot desks and more.

Fantastic company benefits include:

• Competitive Salary: £30,000 - £38,000 per annum depending on experience.
• Holiday: Starting from 23 days per annum (+ 3 days additional Christmas Leave), increasing 1 day every other year until reaches 28 days per annum (plus Bank Holidays). 2 days volunteering per annum.
• Free Parking:  Available on each site.
• Employee extras such as:. Nest pension (5% employer contributions), flexible working, personalised training and development plans, family friendly policy and enhanced compassionate leave.
• Health Insurance – an opt in employee programme for health insurance.

About the role:

As the Business Advisor/ Innovation Advisor you will work as a member of the Innovation Team. You will lead industry networks and biotech/sustainability projects such as our Seaweed in East Anglia project, as well as supporting businesses in our network through one-to-one support.

The Business Advisor/ Innovation Advisor key responsibilities are:

• A central contact for businesses providing consultancy and project management for funded programmes.
• Facilitate our Algae Innovation Platform and Seaweed in East Anglia project – work with our network of 100+ experts in seaweed to find opportunities to grow this sector in Norfolk by identifying and bidding for future funded projects.
• Lead on the creation and running of new Innovation platforms that could cover a variety of topics or sectors, identify funding streams to support the development of these platforms and any projects that spin out of them which could support the development of other innovative industries that support local economic development.
• Business support activities such as 1-2-1 mentoring, facilitating workshops and meetings, delivering training courses, signposting to additional resources including funding.
• Utilising your knowledge of the business startup and scaleup landscape. Acting as an “honest broker”, connecting businesses with those in the ecosystem who could support their growth and securing income for the Innovation Team.
• Represent Hethel Innovation and the region on a national and international scale at events and meetings, developing relationships with key partners in our region.

About you:

The successful Business Advisor/ Innovation Advisor will be a proactive, ambitious, creative, and capable of working independently. You will have extensive knowledge of SME growth strategies and experience of providing advice to SME’s.

You will have an interest in biotech and/or sustainability and will be leading the charge to expand our work developing the Seaweed Industry in Norfolk.

Have knowledge of Agile Project Management in business, business clusters and excellent awareness of funding opportunities available to businesses. Confident in leading events, meetings and providing high quality presentations and training.
Experienced in engaging with stakeholders including education establishments, think tanks, local councils, and other government bodies. Ideally you will hold a bachelor’s degree (business, sales, or marketing related) or extensive experience in business support/ innovation industry.  

You will be expected to travel to meetings and events as required. It is likely that this will be a frequent occurrence. You will need a clean driver’s license and access to your own car.

This is an opportunity for a high calibre, experienced candidate to contribute to our vision of being the driving force for SME innovation. If you would like to be considered for this Business Advisor/ Innovation Advisor opportunity please forward an up-to-date CV as soon as possible.

No recruitment agencies, please

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Additional keywords: Business, Advisor, Sales, Customer Service, Manufacturing, Engineering, Innovation, Clusters, Business Growth, Project Management, Biotech, Science, Biology, Sustainability

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