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Careers Development

Getting started...

Wanting to combine your passion for the outdoors with a career in it and don't know how to get started? 

View our profiles below of professionals within the industry with careers spanning from brand manager for a major international brand to a holiday manager for an outdoor activities company (with more to come!).  All very different career paths and skills, but one thing in common - a love for the outdoors.  If you are thinking about a career in the outdoors but are not sure where to start, get in touch with us here today.

Profile 1: Steve Backhouse, Head of Overseas & Leisure Activities Holidays, HF Holidays Ltd

Profile 2: Chloe Ticehurst, Icebreaker UK Brand Manager, Bradshaw Taylor Ltd

Profile 3: Neil McGuigan, General Manager, Tiso Ltd

Profile 4: Al Gilmour, Outdoor Instructor, Glenmore Lodge National Outdoor Centre

Profile 5: Sam Stephenson, Head of Design, Mountain Equipment

Profile 6: Barry Thompson, Holiday Site Manager, The Camping & Caravanning Club

The Innove-Ex Design Prize

Innov_ex Prize 2010 Winner Veronica Legg Manchester Metropolitan University, Women's Winter Climbing Trousers

Veronica Legg, winner of the 2010 Innov_ex Design Prize gives an update of her experience since winning the prize in April. This has included a research field trip to Spitzbergen, Winning the Textile Institute Young Persons' Award and a job with Equip Outdoor Technologies.

Click here for Veronica's experiences since April 2010 when she won the prize and find out how you too could enter and shape your future career.

The OIA is committed to developing careers and career paths within the outdoor industries.   We are currently working closely with our members to identify and develop key qualifications and training which will add value to both business and individual.  More information will be available shortly.

Another important area of support is that of encouraging careers in innovation within the outdoors.  One such area where our support is delivering real results which both benefit outdoors industries as well as encouraging young innovators to consider the sector as they make career decisions is our partnership with Innov_ex, a conference hosted by Lancaster University Management School. 

As well as Veronica Leg in 2010, Peter Dollman was the winner of the 2009 Innov-ex Prize on 6 May 2009.  Within less than a month, it was announced that his innovation for training on climbing walls for mixed and ice climbing, called Figfour, was going into production through Alpkit.  Graham Thompson, Gear Editor at Trail Magazine, described Pete's design as 'one of the most important innovations in outdoor equipment for many years'.  Pete's innovation is to be launched at the 2009 Tout a Blocs bouldering festival 29 July - 1 August 2009.

Past student prize winners Jan Betros and Lisa Alberti demonstrated the ways in which the Innov_ex prize had allowed them to develop. Jan Betros, the 2007 winner showed how the prize had helped him make his clothing brand RÖJK a commercial reality. Lisa Alberti has used the 2008 prize to inspire an innovative design project in an inner city Manchester School. She aims to develop both interest in going outdoors alongside design of outdoor gear in partnership with the outdoor trade. This prize will develop and grow in future years to help foster innovation of outdoor products by new designers throughout the design teaching and training world.

For more information on the conference, the innovation prize a visit www.innovation-for-extremes.net

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