Industry Campus: Where Talent Meets Purpose

There’s something electric about watching ideas form in real time; messy, bold, curious, brave ideas with teeth and grit! That’s what Industry Campus was always meant to be: not a replacement, not a critique, but a complement to the incredible foundation that educational settings already provide. A next step. A bridge. A permission slip to take everything that they have learnt in education, and apply it in a real and purposeful way.

Micronomy had the joy of designing and delivering Industry Campus in 2022, working with emerging talent over the years and supporting them to connect with industry within the region, so we can retain the extraordinary talent that we have - or have them leave as advocates, knowing the value of not only themselves, but the city as their springboard. The key idea behind Industry Campus is to make Plymouth a playground for pilots and prototypes - not only allowing students to see their value, but empowering and enabling them to see how that value can be applied to real industry challenges. Not just those of today, but the ones we haven’t yet imagined.

This year, Micronomy brought Industry Campus to Tim Gundry and Arts University Plymouth, invited to design and deliver a six-week creative sprint for final-year students from across disciplines.

Our brief? Simple. Trust them. Give them a live project, a real (and fabulous) client, and a space to make tomorrow better than today.

That client was Leadworks, a volunteer-led creative space in Plymouth, deeply loved and full of promise. The challenge was to reimagine Leadworks as a place that truly embodied welcome. That meant redesigning the space, rethinking its identity, and crafting a campaign that could capture the imagination of the city.

The students didn’t flinch. They mapped skills, formed teams, interrogated the brief, and stepped fully into the world of industry - where design meets deadlines and ideas must stand tall in front of a live and passionate audience. Each Wednesday, our studio buzzed with purpose. One week they were wrestling with layout plans and user research; the next they were crafting brand narratives and building business cases. It wasn’t easy. But it was alive. And absolutely worth it.

This was not about playing at being professionals. They were professionals. Thoughtful, resourceful, ambitious ones. And watching their confidence build week by week, pitch by pitch, was one of the most affirming things we’ve ever experienced.

For us, Industry Campus isn’t a programme. It’s a belief system. A belief that talent doesn’t need waiting for. A belief that students thrive when they’re met with trust. A belief that education is stronger when it spills out into the city and loops back again, creating something more connected, more dynamic, more whole, more real and even more purposeful.

It was a privilege to witness what these students brought to the table and to see them not only respond to a brief, but reshape it, reimagine it and remind us to look in the messy middle where talent emerges and futures begin. They reminded us that creativity is a force, not a flourish. That emerging talent isn’t emerging - it’s already here in our cobbles and in our region.