Recruitment Support for Chair and Members of the Cheshire & Warrington Business Advisory Board

On 8 April 2024, ownership of the Cheshire and Warrington (C&W) Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) transferred to the three C&W local authorities and it changed its name to Enterprise Cheshire and Warrington. This followed the announcement made by the Chancellor of the Exchequer in his Spring Budget in 2023 that LEP responsibilities would be transferred to LAs from April 2024. Enterprise Cheshire and Warrington (ECW) will support Cheshire and Warrington's elected members to deliver their vision to make C&W the healthiest, most sustainable inclusive and growing place in the country by • providing strategic economic planning; • delivering key government programmes; and • ensure that a strong, independent business voice is reflected in the advice ECW provides to elected members.

The formation of a Business Advisory Board (BAB) for C&W will play an important role in delivering the third of these objectives. Each Combined Authority and sub-region has been asked to establish a BAB to be made up of local business leaders and relevant representative bodies to provide the view of local businesses and to work with local leaders to create a broad economic strategy for their areas. The Chair of the BAB in C&W will be a non-voting member of the Joint Committee of the three local authorities that has been formed to deliver the sub-region's vision and to oversee the work of ECW.

Following the agreement from the local authorities, Enterprise Cheshire and Warrington wishes to commission a recruitment and executive search consultancy to: i. Help it recruit members of the BAB; ii. Help it identify candidates suitable to fill the role of Chair of the BAB. This commission therefore comprises two parts. Consultancies may bid for one or both parts. ECW is also happy to accept bids from consortia covering both parts.

ECW is seeking a recruitment and executive search agency or agencies, with experience that will enable them to successfully help recruit the Chair and members of the sub-region's Business Advisory Board. Final membership of the BAB will be fully representative of the C&W with-profit and not-for-profit sectors, including by geography, sector and protected characteristics.

The BAB will comprise around 15 - 20 members, of which around 10 will be ex-officio roles comprising former members of the Board of the LEP, representatives of C&W's business representative organisations and the Chair of Marketing Cheshire. They will be appointed through an administrative process run by ECW. The remainder will be appointed via open applications on which the successful consultancy will be expected to take the lead.

Submissions should be sent via email, to [email protected] stating in the email subject which tender the submission relates to. Completed submissions should be sent to the tender contact stated above only and must be submitted by the deadline for submissions.