The recent commissioning of BigohCoaching and DCS Training to deliver the South Lewisham Business Support Programme is an important step for our organisations, and for the businesses and communities across Bellingham, Downham and Grove Park. While the programme carries clear targets—supporting fifteen businesses, helping ten introduce new products or services, and safeguarding fifteen jobs—its purpose reaches far deeper. At its core, this work is about strengthening the foundations of South Lewisham’s local economy, widening opportunity, and enabling businesses to build resilience in an environment where structural challenges have long shaped outcomes.

Small businesses in South Lewisham operate in a landscape marked by reduced footfall, limited transport connections and historical underinvestment. Many are led by individuals with extraordinary determination but limited access to consistent support, strategic guidance or skills development. The programme we have been tasked to deliver is therefore not simply a set of interventions; it is a place-based response to long-standing barriers, designed to give business owners the clarity, capability and confidence they need to innovate, adapt and grow.

This is where the partnership between BigohCoaching and DCS Training becomes essential. Our collaboration is grounded in shared values—integrity, empowerment, learning and sustainable growth—and a joint belief that effective business support requires both strategic insight and practical workforce capability. Although our approaches are distinct, they are deeply complementary.

BigohCoaching brings a systems-focused coaching methodology that helps business owners reflect, prioritise and make decisions rooted in a holistic understanding of their business. This approach strengthens leadership, builds discipline and supports owners to identify opportunities, address vulnerabilities and set realistic pathways for growth.

DCS Training adds long-standing expertise in accredited training, enterprise development and workforce progression. Their work across South London equips individuals and teams with the technical and practical skills required to implement change, improve performance and contribute to business resilience. Together, our organisations offer a comprehensive ecosystem of support: strategic direction for leaders and the practical skills needed by their teams to put plans into action. This integration is intentional. It ensures that insights gained in coaching are reinforced by training and that skills developed through training are supported by strategic guidance, creating a continuous cycle of improvement.

The programme itself is built around tailored delivery. Each business we work with will come with its own history, pressures and ambitions. Some will need to stabilise, some will be ready to grow, and others may be seeking the confidence to try something new. Our first step will be a joint diagnostic assessment, enabling us to understand both the strategic context and the operational realities. From this, a tailored action plan will be developed, forming the backbone of the business’s support journey.

Delivery will include one-to-one coaching, structured training, innovation labs, peer-to-peer learning and practical implementation support. This varied structure reflects the complexity of running a business in a challenging environment. It provides owners with a space to think clearly while offering their teams opportunities to develop skills that support long-term resilience.

Although the programme formally concludes in March 2026, its ambitions extend beyond this date. Our goal is to lay foundations that continue to serve businesses well into the future. This includes strengthening decision-making habits, embedding reflective practice, increasing leadership capability and fostering peer networks that endure beyond the programme’s lifespan. We also aim to produce resources and case studies that benefit the wider Lewisham business community, ensuring that the learning generated is shared and accessible.

Both BigohCoaching and DCS Training take a values-led approach to their work. We prioritise transparency, accountability and ethical delivery. We listen deeply to the people we support, recognise the diversity of their experiences, and ensure that our interventions are grounded in respect and practical relevance. This programme allows us to bring these principles to life within a community that deserves high-quality, meaningful and sustained support.

Securing this contract is both an honour and a responsibility. It represents a commitment to Lewisham’s vision for an inclusive, resilient local economy and affirms the belief that carefully designed, values-driven business support can have a transformative impact. We look forward to working closely with the Council, local partners and, most importantly, the business owners who will participate. Their success remains the heart of our work, and we are proud to stand alongside them in the months ahead.