East Sussex County Council

About the work

East Sussex County Council runs services for the whole of East Sussex, from schools, social care and roads to libraries, skills and economic development. Based at County Hall in Lewes, it works alongside the county’s five district and borough councils, serving coastal towns such as Hastings, Eastbourne and Bexhill as well as the market towns and villages of the Weald. Its economic development team runs the East Sussex Growth Hub, the county’s first stop for business support, and leads on employability, skills and careers through Skills East Sussex, the county’s employer-led skills board.

Always Possible has worked with the County Council for the best part of a decade, across skills, business support and economic evidence.

Our longest-running work has been with Skills East Sussex. From 2016 to 2020 we ran the secretariat for its sector task groups, bringing employers, colleges, schools and training providers together in construction, engineering, health and social care, land-based industries, the visitor economy and creative and digital. We turned the groups’ priorities into action plans, produced employer videos and career pathway infographics for schools and careers services, and ran apprenticeship roadshows for young people and parents in Hastings and Eastbourne. When Covid hit, we pivoted to online careers events and a skills campaign for people who’d lost their jobs. In 2023 we co-produced the Skills East Sussex Skills Summit in Eastbourne, bringing around 200 employers, providers and partners together to tackle future skills, workforce development and new ways of recruiting.

We’ve also built the evidence behind the County Council’s economic thinking, including a 2023 economic impact assessment for East Sussex.

On business support, we designed >BREAKTHROUGH, a fully funded programme for female-led and ethnic minority-led small businesses, which began under the South East Business Boost programme. The County Council has since commissioned two further rounds, in 2024 and 2025, combining one-to-one diagnostics, specialist mentoring, workshops and peer networking for women founders and senior women in business across the county.

In 2026, the County Council appointed us to deliver its new Sustainable Business Programme. We’re helping East Sussex businesses cut energy costs and carbon emissions through workshops, one-to-one support and energy audits, working with Brighton and Hove Energy Services Co-op.

“The Employability & Skills Team at East Sussex County Council have worked with Always Possible since 2016 on a range of facilitation, digital resource, events and communications projects. They were particularly instrumental in helping us to establish six sector skills taskgroups, which bring together businesses, educators and strategic authorities to think critically about how to maximise information and opportunity for jobs growth in the county.

Always Possible supported with the initial terms of reference, curating membership, appointing chairs, setting agendas, updating councillors and creating resources to update the taskgroups with the latest data and labour market information. A testament to how well these were launched over five years ago is that these groups are still pivotal to our skills strategy, and have helped leverage £millions of national investment into East Sussex careers education programmes. We continue to value the consistent professional and creative thinking and facilitation that Always Possible bring to the table.”
Caroline Bragg – Employability and Skills Strategy Manager, East Sussex County Council