Pride in our People!
We are absolutely delighted to announce that we clean have been re-accredited for a fourth time by the Investors In People (IIP) accreditation body!
As an organisation we clean has been an Investors in People business since 2012 and we are immensely proud to be formally recognised as a company that continually values the importance of its ‘people’ in delivering exceptional levels of service to our growing and evolving client base’!
Investors in People is the international standard for people management, defining what it takes to lead, support, and manage people effectively to achieve sustainable results.
When being examined against the Investors in People framework there are 9 key indicators upon which an organisation and its staff are judged:
- Leading and Inspiring People
- Living the organisations values and behaviours
- Empowering and involving people
- Managing performance
- Recognising and rewarding high performance
- Structuring work
- Building capability
- Delivering continuous improvement
- Creating sustainable success
Scoring well above the average across all of the above key indicators, the examiners were pleased to see a ‘real positive culture’ within we clean commenting:
“You place great importance on your people and it is great to see that as an organisation you continue to recognise how crucial it is to invest time and resources in trying to make we clean a better place to work. This was a commendable decision made by we clean as it is an opportunity for the good works in the organisation to be recognised and also a platform for you to develop further. The three main takeaways are:
- You continue to promote clear two-way communication and a culture of openness, trust, respect, flexibility, care, and responsiveness in line with your values.
- Your leadership can only be described as passionate and caring, which was mirrored throughout the organisation. There is a strong commitment to developing every aspect of the organisation in a consistent manner so the vision, values, and strategy can be brought to fruition.
- After 3 years, your people are still passionate about working for you and hold you in high regard. As a company, they continue to be your key priority placing emphasis on ensuring they are happy and feel valued!
Special thanks to you Jessica Powell and Gaynor Powell who orchestrated the whole assessment and coordinated people to be in the right place at the right time. It was a pleasure to witness your people’s passion for their work, pride, and focus on the vision, as well as capture thoughts and opinions, examples, and anecdotes. Well done to you all and congratulations!”
We have grown significantly since our last IIP Assessment 3 years ago adding a further 300 staff during this time making a workforce that now totals nearly 700 staff as of July 2024! Despite this significant expansion particularly within the frontline cleaning team our focused and flat-line management structure has ensured that we have continued to support our staff keeping them fully engaged in our unique ‘company ethos’ and empower them to carry on delivering the high levels of service our clients have come to expect from brand we clean.
We employ a number of motivational initiatives throughout the year such as:
- The Dee Richards Pride Awards Programme
- 10 Year Service Awards
- Two weekly attendance bonuses for staff
- Annual Christmas bonuses
- Birthday cards
Management staff are continually encouraged to evolve and excel within their roles with regular one-to-one review meetings allowing the Directors of we clean to identify clear development pathways for appropriate progression.
Every employee within the business has their personal development tracked and managed via a comprehensive Training Matrix which is overseen by the Company’s dedicated Training Manager, Duncan Thomson who is supported by a number of external training partners such as The British Institute of Cleaning Science (BICSc) and Environmental Excellence Training & Development Ltd, to ensure we remain at the forefront of an ever-evolving Cleaning Industry!
The Investors In People audit also identified and were extremely impressed by the opportunities within we clean to develop meaningful careers within the discipline of cleaning and the genuine progression to Senior Management roles within the organization from a frontline cleaning operative position.
The Company can be very proud that employees such as Maureen Francis and Charlene Bowen are now experienced Contract Managers after starting with the business as Location Managers and Jean Green, Sean Wright, Dale Brewer, Melissa Rowe, Ben Shields and Diane Murray are all now operating in Contract Management Support roles after beginning their time with we clean as Cleaning Operatives.
Gaynor Powell, Director of HR alongside Jessica Powell, HR & Recruitment Advisor have worked immensely hard in supporting the whole IIP re-accreditation process and they were genuinely thrilled with the way the re-evaluation of our internal ‘people management’ systems went with Gaynor commenting:
“I am absolutely delighted that we clean have been re-accredited once again as an ‘Investor In People’ business.
It has been a remarkable team effort from everyone within our organisation and it demonstrates clearly the value that we place upon our people, we really are a ‘people business’!
The formal feedback from the IIP Assessor Sharon Rowe was that our scoring was well above the average for the service industry noting that our internal communication was excellent, with staff stating they felt well informed of what’s going on within the business ranging from day to day activities to more longer term future plans such as growing our service offering and broadening our geographical reach”.
Paul Concannon Director was also extremely pleased with the outcomes of the IIP re-accreditation process commenting:
“Firstly a massive thank you to all those involved and who contributed to the IIP re-evaluation process with particular thanks to Gaynor Powell and Jessica Powell who had to invest a huge amount of time in making the necessary preparations to ensure the employee engagements with the IIP assessor ran smoothly”!
“As a people business the IIP programme is the most critical and important accreditation to our organization and it is really pleasing that as the we clean brand has continued to grow, with company revenues increasing by 56% since our last audit back in 2021, we haven’t lost the key essence of our ‘company ethos’ with the report highlighting that everyone assessed fully understood the ‘core values’ of the business and what it means to work for we clean”!
It is this more than anything else that will drive our business forward on a day to day basis ‘to do the job right’ as we continue to be we clean and proud of it!
