Background to the Exercise

When Northern Tech Events began working with Mastek in January 2026, the business had almost no meaningful employer brand presence within the Leeds technology market.

Despite having offices in the city, Mastek was struggling to attract the highly skilled engineers and consultants it wanted to hire. There was a perception amongst potential candidates that other employers could offer more prestigious projects, stronger career prospects and a more attractive culture.

Graduate recruitment was also failing to produce the results Mastek needed.

Mastek wanted to change that perception, establish itself as a serious member of the Leeds technology community and increase its profile amongst both potential employees and clients.

The objective went beyond simply promoting vacancies. Mastek needed to demonstrate the calibre of its people, technical expertise and culture in a way that would genuinely engage the audience it wanted to reach.

The Objective

Mastek wanted to become recognised as an employer of choice for high-calibre technical talent in Leeds.

The target audience included Python software engineers, DevOps professionals, analysts, technical consultants and influential members of the wider Leeds technology community.

Northern Tech Events therefore needed to create something that would give Mastek a credible platform within that community, while differentiating it from the many other established employers competing for the same people.

The Solution

Rather than creating another traditional technical meetup, Northern Tech Events developed a community with a genuine purpose.

Mastek4Good brought together people from across the Leeds technology community to use their combined expertise to tackle a real-world challenge for local homelessness charity, Simon on the Streets.

Monthly meetups were hosted at Mastek's Leeds office, where attendees worked collaboratively towards developing a real technical solution that could improve the charity's services.

The audience was fundamental to the strategy. Northern Tech Events personally invited attendees based on their skills and relevance, while engaging respected and well-connected figures from the Leeds technology sector to increase the community's credibility and reach.

The aim wasn't simply to attract people to an event. It was to create something they would want to become part of.

The Events

The Mastek4Good events were designed around participation rather than passive attendance.

Instead of attendees simply listening to technical presentations, the community worked together to understand the challenge, define the requirements and ultimately contribute towards developing a working solution for Simon on the Streets.

Mastek employees hosted the events, participated in discussions, showcased their expertise and worked alongside members of the wider community.

This gave potential candidates an opportunity to experience Mastek first-hand: meeting its people, seeing how they approached real technical problems and collaborating with them around a shared purpose.

Northern Tech Events supported each event with significant personal outreach and networking, alongside ongoing LinkedIn activity and tailored photography and video content.

As the project moved from initial analysis and specification into hands-on development, attendees increasingly began returning and bringing others with them.

Building the MASTEK4GOOD Community

The charitable purpose gave Mastek an opportunity to demonstrate its technical expertise and culture in a way that conventional employer branding could not.

Rather than simply telling people that Mastek was a technically capable consultancy with skilled people, Mastek4Good gave the business a public platform to demonstrate it.

The first few events required significant work from Northern Tech Events to establish and maintain the audience. However, as attendees became more involved in the development work, the community began to build its own momentum.

Repeat attendance increased and a core group of around 50 people became established.

The Tech for Good element also generated engagement beyond the events themselves, strengthening Mastek's recognition amongst influential members of the Leeds technology community while creating positive exposure around its charitable work.

What began as a three-month trial ultimately developed into a community strong enough to be handed over to Mastek to continue independently.

The Results

Northern Tech Events delivered five Mastek4Good events, with all 80 available tickets allocated for every event and between 50 and 60 people attending each session.

Across the project, around 200 different people attended Mastek4Good events, all personally invited, while more than 800 people were directly approached as part of the wider engagement activity.

Repeat attendance initially sat at around 30–40%, before increasing to approximately 60% as the community became established. A core community of around 50 people ultimately developed.

The project generated recruitment interviews and hires, increased engagement with Mastek across LinkedIn and created valuable relationships with experienced consultants and potential clients.

Most importantly, Mastek4Good helped change the way the business was perceived within the Leeds technology market — establishing Mastek as a credible, high-end technical consultancy and an active member of the local technology community.

After six months, the community had developed sufficiently for Northern Tech Events to hand Mastek4Good over to Mastek to continue independently.

That final point is especially useful alongside the revised Infinity Works case study. Infinity Works ends with the client being able to take the event format forward themselves, whereas Mastek4Good goes a step further: NTE created and established an actual community before handing ownership to the client. That gives the two case studies consistency without making them feel like versions of the same story.