Unlock Your Potential: Meet the Collinge & Co Training Team

I have been in hairdressing and hairdressing training for many years starting as a stylist and moving into teaching. I have worked for hairdressing specialist training providers for some time and am pleased to have been in my Apprenticeship Director role within Collinge and Co Training since August 2016.

Working for a family company that places people at its heart and always wants to provide the best quality training and support, is a real pleasure. I love the varied and interesting work activity and in particular benefitting from the skills and experience of my training team colleagues.

As Apprenticeship Director I rarely teach apprentices, but I do instead enjoy planning, arranging and delivering sessions for training team colleagues.

I would say I have an approachable, happy personality. I have a few hobbies that I enjoy, such as walking, reading, shopping, and being around my close friends and family.

I have worked in FE for about 14 years. I started working as a Hairstylist after leaving school and I then took on an extra job in an admin role.

In my early 20s whilst working, I returned back to college to gain my Admin Qualification, which led me to work for my first Training Provider. Since then I have worked for a number of Training providers within admin and funding roles.

I began my own journey with the company straight from school in 1995, being an apprentice and working my way through my NVQ level 2 and 3.

I have enjoyed many different roles within the company working my way through to a senior style director in the salon and also a salon manager in my career and a tutor for many years. My current role is a senior style director in Heswall, a senior tutor and an internal quality assessor and I have just completed my Level 5 teaching qualification.

The best part of the job is helping the apprentices develop their skills over the programme and watching them growing into the stylists that they become. Seeing the learners achieve their end point assessment is such a proud moment to know that you have helped them through their hairdressing journey. I love teaching all aspects of the qualification and supporting the learners through any difficult times. 

I started hairdressing 17 years ago and gained my level 2 and level 3 qualification, winning best level 3 hairdresser in my year. Once qualified I progressed from junior stylist right up to salon manager. I then gained my Assessors award by age 22 and went into teaching full time. During this time I gained my Cert Ed and qualified as a teacher in my subject specialism, hairdressing. I then went to work in Dubai for 18 months in a prestigious salon and loved the experience of working with different cultures and living in another country.

I joined Collinge & Co two years ago and I really enjoy watching the progression of learners from the beginning of the course as a first year to them flourishing and becoming confident hair stylists. I particularly enjoy teaching the styling and finishing units and cutting techniques.

I've worked for the company for a number of years, but more recently I've taken a more active role in the training team supporting the team and apprentices, in particular the recruitment of new apprentices

I graduated in 1997 and worked primarily in banking and finance, prior to joining Andrew Collinge’s Training Salon as a part-time receptionist. I have since undertaken IT training and became the IT co-ordinator. I'm responsible for making sure the company's IT systems are well designed and function smoothly. I also support the salon teams as the salon stock controller.

I love the atmosphere of working ‘within a family’; a lot of staff have worked within Collinge and Co for a very long time and some very good friendships have been made.