Look to Principia for National Computing Centre's IT events

In June the National Computing Centre bundled many of its events, services and seminars into a new operation aimed at IT corporate users called Principia.

This new departure, together with the activity generated by a number of key acquisitions over the past 18 months, beefs up group chief executive Michael Gough's bid to make the NCC the voice of the IT user with a strong focus on personal and management development.

Principia draws on the activities and expertise of its membership organisations, including CIO-Connect, Certus and the Institute of IT Training, as well as collaborations with outside organisations including Forrester Research and the Impact Programme.

This umbrella service is structured by themes: skills, security, legal, e-business, open source, knowledge management and programme management; and also by sector: manufacturing, education, central government, finance and construction.

Forthcoming Principia events       

• Successful change management  22 September, London   
• Delivering value from IT  23 September, Edinburgh  4 October, London   
• NCC/Impact Programme leadership academy  6 October Manchester   
• Conference on software testing  6 October, London   
• Implementing BS7799  13 October, London  IT governance  13 October, London  20 October, Edinburgh  25 November, Manchester   
• Successful change management  14 October, Edinburgh    BS1500: Understanding the standard for IT service management  25 October, Manchester  3 November, Edinburgh   
• The role of the IT leader - strategies for success  26 October, Newport

Timetable of NCC expansion       

• 2002 - NCC buys user group Certus 
• 2003 - NCC buys the Institute of IT Training 
• 2003 - NCC buys user group CIO-Connect 
• May 2004 - Office of Government Commerce gives NCC a contract to certify and accredit public sector practitioners of the E-Government Interoperability Framework. 
• June 2004 - NCC links up with Ashridge Business School 
• June 2004 - Principia is formed.