New Director for Careers Service

Paul Blackmore has been appointed Director of the Lancaster University Careers Service following the retirement of Lesley Knaggs at the end of September.

Paul first joined the Careers Service at Lancaster in 1997 as the Careers Information and IT Manager, then took on a range of responsibilities including becoming Senior Manager of the Service. Externally his achievements have been recognised by the AGCAS Research Award in 2000 and the AGCAS/CSU International Bursary Award in 2001.

He has also won recognition for projects such as the Business Enterprise Support Team, working closely with the University’s Business Enterprise Centre and the Institute for Entrepreneurship and Enterprise Development, the Graduate Vacancy Partnership which is hosted by Lancaster University Careers Service, North West Students and Graduates Online, North West Business Access projects and TargetedGrad (online vacancy service for multi-national companies) in which he works closely with partners in the region and nationally.

Paul has also been heavily involved in Project-Net and the creation of the Services for Graduates self-directed learning and research project. He transformed the former Employers’ Exhibition into the Career Opportunities Fair where he initiated the integration of related activities such as the Alumni Office’s Careers Fair, Postgraduate Admissions, LUVU, LUSU Jobshop and Management School Admissions into a larger and extended event which has seen attendance nearly triple. It is now one of the largest University HE careers fairs in the North of England.

Paul is looking forward to leading the Service at a particularly crucial time for employability and employment-related issues for the University’s students and graduates.

He said: “At a time when the graduate employment market is becoming ever increasingly complex and competitive, I am reassured by the professionalism of my colleagues (acknowledged recently through the award of the Matrix Quality Standard) and their accomplishments in extremely challenging circumstances that there are great opportunities now and in the future to develop the quality and range of our provision further.

“It is also encouraging to see the increased interest in the employability agenda across campus from colleagues across central services and academic departments alike. Both myself and colleagues in the Careers Service therefore look forward to building more profitable working relationships across the University and with external opportunity providers to help benefit the prospects of our students in their current and future study and work-related opportunities.”