Who we are
Our Values
Our values have been in place, almost unchanged, since our company was founded, and they influence the way we work with each other, the way we relate to your organisation and people, and the way we deliver our services. As a team, we are united by our shared purpose; to support organisations in creating outstanding places to work where individuals thrive and businesses grow.
Primeast
Our Story
People have always been at the heart of what we do. From the very beginning, Primeast was a pioneer in corporate experiential learning, and has worked globally, supporting household names such as Unilever, Esso and SC Johnson to develop managers using innovative methods and testing environments. Our early focus on transformational leadership development underpins our approach to training and development today. What makes us different is the proactive management of the learning experience to apply each and every learning exchange directly back to the workplace situation. This results in real, measurable behaviour change which has had a huge impact on the organisations we've worked with, whether that's significant revenue increases, dramatic cost savings or the creation of high performing, highly productive, innovative and effective teams.
1987
Early partnership between Stephen Doughty, WEST (Wilderness Expedition Skills Training) based in northwest Scotland and John Campbell. They incorporate and form EAST (Executive And Staff Training Ltd) and move the HQ to Harrogate, North Yorkshire.
1990
The company begins working with Exxon Chemical to deliver an expansive experiential course to explore the importance of core values in business, and pioneers links with schools and community based projects as part of experiential learning.
1991
We establish our own company values that have remained almost unchanged to the present day. Merger with People Systems International, team extends to 10+ facilitators and support staff.
1990-95
Client portfolio extends to BP, Unilever, British Gas, Transco and Speedo. UK associate faculty grows to accommodate.
1993-96
Project with Boots in Nottingham and Airdrie training 1,800 participants in self-managing teams to win a National Training Award in 1996.
1997
Global faculty expanding with links to our partner Asia Ability in Malaysia. The start of developing a global faculty to deliver training in Asia Pacific, Europe and the Americas.
1998
Attained ISO9001 quality registration for design and delivery. Making us the first management development company in the UK to receive this mark, thus ensuring quality among existing and prospective clients.
1999
Work with SC Johnson allows us to begin delivering at a global scale through a graduate leadership programme in China, Brazil, America and Africa.
2000
Rebrand to Primeast, the name based on taking organisations and individuals to their prime and retaining the heritage of EAST.
2002
Contract to deliver ‘Working In Teams’ experiential course globally to 1,000’s of ExxonMobil staff in dozens of countries including Africa, USA, Apac and South America.
2002
Clive Wilson joins brings the fledgling concept of PrimeFocus and further develops it.
2004-10
New clients include The British Council, Arqiva, Cape and a large project in Fujian China
2005
Simon Tarver joins, bringing our first automotive client Honda UK Manufacturing to Primeast. Russell Evans joins in 2006.
2007
Adopted new brand and logo based on the Fibonacci principles and moved to newbuild offices on Cardale Park in Harrogate.
PrimeFocus although already established begins to be used as a consulting tool for OD and leadership.
2008
Key staff are trained in the Barrett Values Centre techniques reinforcing Primeast's growing organisational development capabilities.
2009
Martin Carver and Sarah Cave join Primeast bringing financial services industry experience and strengthening the consulting and facilitation team.
2010
Primeast forms a formal partnership with Aperian Global allowing access to the GlobeSmart tools, and a partnership with Vantage Partners to share faculty delivering their negotiation programmes.
2010-15
Significant new clients include Novartis, Lloyds Register, BASF and Celgene.
2012
Emma Booth joins Primeast upskilling our design and delivery team as our global programme coordination grows with course delivery on all continents except Antarctica.
2013
Beth Williams comes onboard to run Primeast sales and delivery in New Jersey, ahead of merging her Forward Focus consultancy in 2016.
2014
Primeast LLC company formed in Houston giving us representation in both in Texas and New Jersey
2015
First Primeast book ‘Designing the Purposeful Organisation’ by Clive Wilson is published by Kogan Page.
Primeast receives our first highly respected Queen’s Award for International Trade at Buckingham Palace.
2016
Forward Focus officially merges with Primeast LLC to cement our relationship with Beth bringing onboard some important NJ clients.
Arrow Electronics arrive as a client after we meet them at their nearby Harrogate office, our global faculty a useful addition to their sophisticated global L&D function.
2017
Merger with The Blue Water Partnership adds Honda UK and Europe, Kia UK and Volvo UK to our automotive client portfolio. This enables Gordon Roscoe to retire and his staff and associate coaches to find a new home at Primeast.
2018
We design new programmes at Group 1, our automotive retail dealership client, to fast track high potential staff to be new leaders and heads of business
Arrow Electronics programmes expand their reach and range with Primeast delivery in USA, Europe and Asia Pacific.
2019
Beth Williams joined the company in June of 2019. As head of the NA division of Primeast group of companies, Beth leads a core team of 30 associate consultants, facilitators and coaches in NA and leverage another 75 across the globe and based in 24 countries when working on international projects.
2020
COVID hit, homeworking trial day and we didn’t come back! Primeast had already moved to MS Teams two years earlier as a replacement for Skype this allowed quick adaptation to safe, effective homeworking and moving our clients to virtual classrooms, coaching and training using Zoom and Teams.
2021
Our international clients and our global associate network enables us to apply and win a second Queen’s Award for International Trade. Another proud moment and a visit to Windsor Castle.
Blended learning programmes are now the norm with live virtual training, eLearning packages, face to face experiential events and 1:1 coaching with automated calendar booking now making up almost all of our multi-module programmes.
2022
Leadership and culture change programme for our long term client Arqiva for 130 tier two managers.
Volvo launch a large training intervention delivered by Primeast to support their move to an ‘agency model’ in UK automotive retail.
2023
Launch of our Learning Design Studio to support clients developing innovative training design across the full blended range.
A major NHS hospital, a community NHS service and Bedford College use Primeast consultants and Barrett Values Assessment tools to get their cultures back on track.
New clients this year…
How we do it
Our approach
Our background in experiential learning has evolved into an approach which combines three main areas of adult development: mindset, practice and challenge. This approach balances the development of mental resilience with the development of new skills and a learning experience that tests and challenges with the care and support of highly-skilled coaches and consultants.
Immersive
Deep learning is affected through the use of innovative and proven experiential development techniques, relevant to the learner's reality and in support of the strategic objective.
Empowering
Our coaches are experienced in empowering leaders to share their knowledge, skills and learning with their peers, colleagues and teams for a long term impact on results.
Exciting
The impact of the learning experience has proven to inject energy and excitement into an organisation having a direct impact on performance and results.
Energising
Our highly-skilled, accredited coaches are experienced in testing and challenging individuals and teams to unlock and embrace their personal and professional potential.