This year's Onefile conference was both a big-hearted celebration and an exciting glimpse into the future.
Onefile customers from Further Education, Higher Education, Independent Training Providers and a range of other employers including Police and NHS joined the team at the Science & Industry Museum, in the company's hometown of Manchester, to mark their 20th anniversary, and to hear first-hand about the ongoing updates and the next innovations.
Customers were joined by learners and representatives from all parts of the Onefile and Harris businesses for the best Onefile Conference yet. We looked back at the journey from an idea taking shape in a back bedroom to winning two Queen's Awards and passing the two-million user milestone. Tales from the early days to a future vision under new ownership.
And throughout the day, we heard from Onefile customers and learners about how they were getting the most from the platform and services we provide.
The theme for the event was innovation-collaboration-celebration.
Welcoming attendees to her first Onefile conference as Executive Vice-President, Davinder Aujla said the company continued to grow, and that she was on a mission to drive innovation and efficiencies. "We'll be talking to you about what we're doing and why we're doing it," said Dav. "Our main ambition is to streamline workflows, to help you unlock more funding, and ultimately to achieve higher success rates with a digital first, human always approach."
Onefile wanted to build strong, successful relationships with its customers, said new Onefile sales director Katie Corrin. "I came from a background in education and ed tech for the last 20 years, and I worked across multiple market sectors during that time," said Katie. "What drew me here wasn't just the products, it was the people and the clear focus on building meaningful, long-term partnerships with our customers."
Katie identified three areas of focus for her and Onefile in the coming weeks and months - driving deeper adoption, making success measurable and identifying smart ways to grow together. "That would mean expanding your platform, introducing new teams or features, or even collaborating more closely with us on future developments and feedback," said Katie.
This year, Onefile marks its 20th anniversary, so Onefile's Adam Fogo and Josh Redmayne took attendees on a whistle-stop tour through time, from the founding of the company to today. What did we learn?
We had the pioneering years, when Onefile's story began in 2005 with husband-and-wife duo Chris Whalley and Susanna Lawson launching a business from a back bedroom in their Manchester home.
Susanna, an apprenticeships assessor, and Chris, a tech expert, created a digital solution that would save training providers and tutors many hours each week and give learners a superior learning experience. Onefile, the first pilot Eportfolio designed for training and assessment, was born. A transformative, end-to-end solution that took apprenticeships from paper-based to digital.
The idea proved a hit with training providers, employers and trainers, and in 2007 the company moved from the back bedroom to its Central Park office, in Greater Manchester. The team started to grow.
By 2013, Onefile had passed the annual £1 million revenue milestone, doubling that revenue figure a year later. The team grew in number to 50 employees and the company scooped the Investors in People Silver Award. Onefile was awarded the Customer Service Excellence award, too. This recognition for excellent customer service was to be repeated in subsequent years.
Onefile's relocation to Arndale House in 2017 coincided, then, with an exciting period of product launches. The Learning Hub, a bespoke learning management system (LMS) was unveiled, to be followed by the enduringly popular RPL (Recognition of Prior Learning) Calculator. The team subsequently scooped the prestigious Queen's Award for Innovation. Onefile's reputation as a tech pioneer in the FE sector was firmly established.
Onefile's brand as a great company to work for was growing, too. The company was named in The Times Top 100 companies to work for in 2019, and in the same year was awarded by the CIPD (Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development) for its best people management initiative.
Then the Covid years. With learner visits ruled out, this award-winning online system removed the need for in-person meetings. Apprentices would be paid on furlough if employers could demonstrate learning. Onefile's Eportfolio and associated applications were providing a lifeline to businesses and organisations trying to survive the restrictions.
Post-lockdown, the adoption of remote learning tools such as Onefile's Eportfolio and Learning Hub became even more widespread.
And finally, to a new era. In 2021, Onefile became a Harris Group company. "We sold to Harris because we wanted the new owners to buy for life and support long-term innovation and the sustainable growth of the business and team," said Susanna. In the same year, Onefile wins a second Queen's Award for Innovation.
Onefile retained its customer service excellence accreditation in 2023 with flying colours, being awarded 'compliance-plus' for customer insight and organisational culture, and by the end of the year the number of learners to have used Onefile since its creation passes the two million milestone.
In 2024, Onefile launched the AI-powered innovation Engage to help employers and training providers keep their learners on track, and the company is awarded Investors in People Gold Status.
Three golden threads run throughout the Onefile story - its drive to innovate, its dedication to its customers and its desire to be a world-class employer. From a back bedroom idea to a multi-award-winning pioneer, Onefile has led the way as an innovator, an employer and a true partner of the education sector.
"It was your belief in us at the time, many of you here were early adopters, taking a risk on what we were doing and what is now known as 'cloud-based software'," said Susanna on stage.
"There are so many of you here in the room today who shared so many highs with us," she said. "We had a vision and never in a million years did I think we would have had over two million users by now."
The journey continues.
Chris Woods, Director of Revenue Operations, thanked the fabulous Onefile partners who support us and our conference on the day.
WorldSkills UK is a four nations partnership between education, industry and UK governments, boosting the prestige of technical and professional education by embedding world-class training standards across the UK to help drive investment, jobs and economic growth.
Metaverse Learning is a global leader in the transformation of education through extended reality, including virtual reality, virtual environment and augmented reality.
sAInaptic uses artificial intelligence to deliver real-time, personalised, examiner-quality feedback on free text and open-ended answers-across any subject, in any industry.
Century has been developed by an award-winning team of experienced teachers, neuroscientists, technologies, using AI to deliver personalised learning.
LearnBox is shaking up adult education with high-impact video content that's engaging, effective, and built for today's learners.
And the Association of Apprentices is a not-for-profit organisation that works with training providers, employers and end-point assessment organisations, supporting those different organisations throughout the apprenticeship journey 'to improve apprenticeship outcomes'.
Thank you to all our partners for playing such an important role in the success of our conference this year.
Jason Ferrett and Collette Jackson, of Onefile's customer success team, are, it turns out, pretty good at an on-stage conference interview. First, they invited Jane Boothman, of the University of Central Lancashire, to share her thoughts on Onefile.
Jane shared what had been a common journey for many Onefile users, from a paper-based existence to folders on computer drives, to a platform (Onefile) that keeps it all in one place. "Onefile is easy to use," she said. "It integrates with other systems, and that's been crucial to us, because a university like ours has lots of different systems all working in conjunction.
"So, when I first started, we had information all over the place, some kept on paper, some on One Drive. But now Onefile holds everything in one place. It holds the web-based, everything, including evidence of progress on the degree."
"We've also got clever and built English and maths development automatically to map into there. And that was the biggest difference. Personal development of each apprentice is now mapped on there. We use the courses to help us with the personal development aspect, and they are already mapped when the learners complete the courses on the courses section. It records off the job. And, last but not least, apprentice standard progress."
"And to the Onefile team, Adam and Josh, a heads-up there. You are brilliant. We come to you with a little idea, and you go away, and you make it happen. The support that we get is really good."
Paul Talbot, of Hampshire and Isle of Wight Constabulary, has seen the demand for Onefile in the Force grow. "As we've grown in volume, the trust in Onefile has increased," he said. "My head of learning and development wants everybody in the force to have a lifelong seat." The constabulary uses Eportfolio, Enrol and the RPL (Recognition of Prior Learning) calculator tool.
"You have to get the training right. We've developed training packages in-house ourselves now, with Onefile user guides. The next big step we're looking at now is how we can start to export data out of Onefile, because the Force is looking at who's got what."
The theme of using the data Onefile produces was picked up by Lindsey Sherring, at Chichester College Group. "When I joined Chichester College Group, it was clear there was outstanding teaching, but we needed greater transparency around data," she said. "Enabling data export tables from Onefile has had a significant impact, allowing us to develop key performance indicators that are consistently used across our multiple colleges. This has fostered accountability and driven real improvements in learner progress reviews and achievement rates.
"By focusing on a few really key measures and consistently using them across the entire college group, from leadership to middle management, we've created a shared understanding of our priorities. This clarity, enabled by the Onefile data exports and our reporting, has been instrumental in driving positive change and improving outcomes for our learners."
Matt Smith, at Realise, eulogised about Onefile's new Engage tool (no, we didn't pay him). "What Engage has allowed us to do is be proactive, not reactive, because we can look at each of our learner's risk level, then look at the individual metric scores and go, okay, this person's high risk. Why are they high risk? When was last review done? That trainer needs to be on that, working to get that review completed."
"Okay, that learner is not completing journal entries, and they're off-the-job learning is well behind. Let's engage with them and understand what challenges are to getting that 'off the job' captured and the journals recorded. So, we've got this overall risk, but then it's got this AI-enabled predicted risk, because Onefile has got 20 years' worth of data of looking at apprentices. So, the predicted risk looks at loads and loads of factors and basically says, okay, if you take away those individual metric performances, there's all this other stuff going on in the background, and based on that, we think this is the level of risk of that learner not completing their journey."
"So, a cracking little tool that tells you all about, you know, what's the risk of that learner not completing that programme? Why are they not engaging with their programme?"
Realise trainers are using Engage to manage their caseloads and spot priority areas for attention, too. This brings a new proactive approach to helping assessors and tutors stay on top of their own performance.
Thanks for the thumbs-up, Matt, and to all contributors for this illuminating session.
Josh Redmayne, Vice President of Research & Development at Onefile, took us through the many and varied ways Onefile is enhancing its tools - and introducing new solutions. Here are 10 things we learned:
Onefile is not only refreshing its marketing and branding with a new look and website but also fundamentally changing how it communicates to ensure clarity and make its products easier to understand, said Onefile's David Howlett. Our core message emphasises that technology alone isn't a silver bullet; successful implementation hinges on making sure everyone is on the same page, and we have the right processes in place to deliver.
Drawing on insights from digital transformation projects, Onefile has identified that a significant majority of companies fail to meet their targets due to issues like organisational unreadiness, unrealistic promises, neglecting process re-engineering and insufficient change management.
Onefile aims to counter these common pitfalls, said David, by prioritising long-term customer success. The company recognises that many organisations struggle to identify their internal 'people and process' challenges.
Onefile's approach to successful technology deployment focuses on:
By fostering a balanced approach that considers people, process and technology in sync, Onefile is striving to make sure that clients maximise the value they get from their investments in our products and services.
Onefile has significantly expanded its Professional Services offering beyond basic support and training, because the team can offer you so much more than first-class software. The team behind the tech can help you further in a range of ways. At conference, we learned how.
Consulting Services
Onefile's consulting services leverage the expertise of the team, many of whom are ex-sector professionals. This includes discovery and planning for complex projects, such as integrating newly acquired training organisations into Onefile's system, where their experience in data extraction and migration can streamline the process.
The team is also offering optimisation and review services to ensure clients are maximising their software's potential and achieving a strong return on investment, with specialists leading efforts to refine workflows and configurations. Additionally, tailored solutions are available for specific requirements, such as change management support, data migration or bespoke reporting needs.
Technical advisory services, using Onefile's extensive R&D team expertise, help clients connect Onefile applications with broader ecosystem tools like MIS (management information systems) and reporting platforms.
Custom Development
A significant new offering is custom development, which enables organisations to address very specific feature requirements that might otherwise take years to reach the top of the product roadmap. This process involves:
This direct approach helps clients solve critical, unique problems efficiently.
Training Packages
Onefile offers a comprehensive range of training packages:
These services aim to transform the tried and tested system from merely a platform to a catalyst for how organisations deliver learning programmes, focusing on the 'people' aspect of technology implementation.
In the afternoon, we heard from learners Yusuf Patel, Hannah Rashidi and Hannah Legerton. These were candid conversations, chaired by Onefile's own Emma Nolan and replied to on stage by Tracey Landon, of Myerscough College. The core message could be summed up in one phrase: listen to your learners.
A panellist called for communication and clear expectations from the outset, with a clear timeline. More engagement was needed, we heard, between employer and training provider. Employer - turn up for your learner's progress reviews. Tutor - you cannot overcommunicate with your learner.
Remember that different learners have different learning preferences. Get feedback from your learners on what's working for them, and what isn't. Listen to your learners.
Reporting on the panel, Sydney Ball, PR Executive at Branagh PR and Onefile user, said: "The apprentice panel later in the day was probably the part I connected with the most. Most notably, hearing other learners talk about the importance of good communication between employer and provider."
"I liked the analogy one learner used - a pyramid where all three sides (learner, provider, and employer) need to stay connected for the whole thing to work. It raised a good point about the experience of trying to join the dots between your workplace and your employer at times, and how a consistent flow of communication between all sides can help the workflow for the learner."
The panel gave us plenty of food for thought. It was an enlightening story of the challenges apprentices and other learners face. The story of the collapsing of one apprenticeship programme half-way through, with little communication to learners, gave us insight into the world of apprenticeships and further education when things don't go to plan.
This session focused our minds on the learner, and the importance of collaboration and communication to ensure we give them every possible chance of success. It reminded us of the duty of care we all have to the learner, too. We have a collective responsibility as a sector to look after our learners, providing healthy, productive environments in which they can thrive.
Thank you to all who took part in this brilliant, thought-provoking panel session. It motivated all in the room to do more.
Onefile Conference 2025, in the heart of Manchester, where it all began, was both a celebration of the first 20 years, and a look ahead to a bright future.
Summing up a hugely positive day, Davinder said: "It's really exciting to be here today, where we're marking our twentieth year. We're also really proud that we get to tell our customers our story of what we're going to be doing over the next five to ten years, so super excited to be here and share that with everyone."
"I think it's incredibly important that we spend face-to-face time with each other, the Onefile team, our customers, our learners. It's something that we will be doing a lot more of going forward. Opportunities like this really enable us to share with our customers what we've been working on and reflect on the past year but also help them understand where we're going in the year ahead. It gives us an opportunity to test ideas and thoughts and really validate parts of, the roadmap and strategic direction."
"Equally importantly, it gives us the chance to listen to our customers, and our learners. To hear where things are working well, and where there is room for improvement. I think it's so important for us to understand our customers, their organisations, and some of the challenges that you are facing."
"It really helps us understand where our products and services fit as their needs change. Knowing what they're focused on and where they see their growth will help us align our strategic vision of innovation and ensure that we're building future proof technologies."
This year's conference celebrated our 20th anniversary and to mark the occasion, our team donated £20,000 to their choice of local charities in Manchester.
- £5,000 was donated to the Booth Centre Manchester (Community centre run to assist people affected by homelessness)
- £5,000 was donated to The Mustard Tree (Combats poverty and prevents homelessness)
- £5,000 was donated to Manchester & Cheshire Dogs Home (Finding forever homes for Manchester unwanted and unloved Dogs)
- £5,000 was donated to Mind Manchester (Improving the lives of people in Manchester with mental health needs)
Onefile is a business that wants to be a force for good. Changing lives for the better, in education and beyond.
It's our 20th birthday so yes, we wanted to hear from our customers about why Onefile is making a positive impact on them and their organisations. This is our Onefile vox pop!
"If you didn't have Onefile I wouldn't be able to find all the learners' work in one place. You can share progress with employers, it's transparent. You can see everything you need on Onefile. When things were paper-based, files would go missing. Not with Onefile. And I'll add that the customer service from Becky and Jade at Onefile is outstanding"
Curriculum team lead for engineering and construction apprenticeships at Rotherham College, Chloë Winfield
"It's just the support it gives the learners to achieve. I can see where they're at, at any one time. You have a good overview, and you can spot when things are not quite right and be proactive to do something about it"
Karen Hudson, programme leader, Nelson and Colne College Group
"It's just really easy to use. Very user friendly. It easily integrates with other platforms, such as text messaging. The dashboards give us a really valuable oversight. The RAG ratings are clear and flag what needs to be done to keep learners in the green"
Natalie Green, Dental Lead, Sandwell College
"It's easy to show the apprentices how to use Onefile. It's clear and easy to use, for learners of all ages and IT ability. If they have very little IT ability, you can still talk them through it. It's great from an assessor's point of view because it flags when the learner isn't doing what they should be doing"
Harjit Jones, Assessor, Sandwell College
Many thanks to everyone who attended our conference in Manchester. To our speakers, our panellists, our partners, our team and, most importantly, the attendees who travelled from far and wide to learn and share their Onefile experiences. Let's do it again next year!
Onefile is the leading learner management platform that streamlines workflows, unlocks funding and enables education and training providers to achieve higher learner success rates, at pace and at scale.
Proud to be part of Harris Computer,
powering positive change.
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© 2025 Onefile Ltd is registered in England with company number 4404879. The registered office is: 6th Floor, Cornerblock, Quay Street, Manchester, M3 3HN. VAT Number 792825685 © Onefile Ltd, 2005-2024. All Rights Reserved.
