What are companies doing with regards to 'Leadership'

Lucion's Managing Director, Patrick Morton delivers a directors message in each newsletter. Every month Patrick will focus on a different sector and discuss the progress within this sector. He also makes reference to the company values and praises employees on their abilities to act in accordance with these. Regional Manager calls and Commercial calls take place weekly, with Patrick attending both. This enables smooth communication between all departments and ensures that employees are aware of what we are working towards as an organisation. These minutes are all saved onto Google drive, which all employees can access and make comments on. In all our offices throughout the UK there is a strategy board which shows how the company aim to progress from 2015 to 2018. For those working on site this company strategy is available on the Google drive. This strategy has been rolled out and been widely communicated, with Patrick discussing the company strategy in the monthly newsletters and highlighting key points which will help us to reach our goal in 2018. This strategy comes directly from board of directors at Lucion and helps employees to understand the plan of action and where the company has the potential to achieve.

At present, the majority of Lucion Environmental Ltd's workforce is made up as trainees. The company train these employees who have no industry qualifications and knowledge to become fully qualified asbestos surveyors/analysts. For example, in order to service a recent contract awarded by Circle Group, they opened an additional office in Cambridgeshire and recruited six new staff members. Four of these recruits were previously unskilled trainees, who have gone through Lucion's Learning and Development Programme to become fully qualified asbestos surveyor/analysts. The qualifications they hold are national, industry standard, and are the basis of providing long term, sustainable local careers for their new employees and therefore supporting their commitment to social sustainability. Everyone at Lucion, from trainee office admin to senior site surveyor, has a Personal Development Programme which must be updated on a regular basis. This is monitored by Lucion Environmental Ltd's dedicated Learning and Development team. They also encourage employees to take responsibility for their own continuous personal development. There are ways in which they are able to plan their personal development, which takes place via many types of learning experiences. These can be formal, by attending an organised training event or workshop, studying for a formal qualification or being taught to acquire a new skill by a manager or a colleague. Furthermore, employees are encouraged to agree future goals with their Manager in order to keep themselves updated and progress into higher roles within the company.

Each department within London Square has a weekly team meeting in which all members of staff are encouraged to feedback their ideas and suggestions. The divisional director is then given the opportunity to present these ideas to other departments for feedback at the weekly management team. Each department also has a blackboard where they can chalk up jokes, thoughts and anecdotes, with a quote from the divisional director, giving them the opportunity to share these on a daily basis with the rest of their team. Every day, the team, including the Chief Executive, eat together if they are in the office at Wagamama-style tables in the dining room or play table tennis together outside, giving staff the opportunity to discuss their ideas with other members of the company. The open plan office has a relaxed open door policy so staff can approach any member of the company when they need to, including directors in their offices, to share ideas or seek counsel.

Each department within London Square has a weekly team meeting in which all members of staff are encouraged to feedback their ideas and suggestions. The divisional director is then given the opportunity to present these ideas to other departments for feedback at the weekly management team. Each department also has a blackboard where they can chalk up jokes, thoughts and anecdotes, with a quote from the divisional director, giving them the opportunity to share these on a daily basis with the rest of their team. Every day, the team, including the Chief Executive, eat together if they are in the office at Wagamama-style tables in the dining room or play table tennis together outside, giving staff the opportunity to discuss their ideas with other members of the company. The open plan office has a relaxed open door policy so staff can approach any member of the company when they need to, including directors in their offices, to share ideas or seek counsel.

Sam and Michelle are committed to total transparency of business performance lived through their quarterly company meetings, a shared googledoc dashboard of key commercial and purpose metrics such as income contracted year to date, numbers of young people matched up with space on somewhereto, and new recruits to the Live Mag UK team. Sam and Michelle have always been true to the principle Livity have of taking feedback on anything and everything business-wide whether that's face to face, over email, google drive, or anonymously. This regularly comes up as something people really respect and enjoy about working at Livity. As well as these regular collective moments Sam and Michelle also take the opportunity to have individual moments that might make a difference to someone's day or long term - whether that's bringing ice creams in for the team on a hot day, handing out £20 notes to everyone on ‘blue Monday' to make it a bit more cheery, bringing those they don't work with often to meetings with them, having a cuppa with new people, or mentoring those with out-of-work entrepreneurial ambitions - there's a genuine commitment to personal engagement. How approachable and accessible they are is regularly referenced by their employees, and it's something Livity will protect, however much the business grows. They also take their themed socials very seriously! This has seen them over the years dress up as the a King and Queen, Cyndi Lauper and a Storm Trooper, a flapper girl and a gangster.

Their most recent team event was the summer quarterly company meeting, in which they presented the Livity business plan to the whole business. They did this outdoors in the local park, and added in some fun stuff like rounders and a quiz featuring everyone in the business, so they could all find out more about one another (such as guessing who was a childhood opera singer and who has danced with Pharrell Williams). Previously they went for lunch at The Clink restaurant at Brixton prison a restaurant onsite where prisoners gain experience in a real working environment and have a higher chance of sustainable employment post-release. Following this and a company meeting they took the team out to a local venue for a themed night out. They generally have at least two out of four of their events in a local venue to contribute to the local economy. The ‘Livity Talks' team have invited many inspiring people to the office to round off the week with a Friday afternoon talk, designed to inform and inspire. The most recent one was by Rob Burnet from Kenya based Well Told Story, a social enterprise that combines the power of good stories with strategy, creativity, deep analysis and hard science, to design and produce communications that spur positive social changes that can be proved and measured. A really aspirational talk for the teams who are working on projects with similar goals.

Life Fitness has a unique recognition scheme which is in place to celebrate and showcase employees who put their values into practice. As an ACEp employee you should be: Accountable: Say what you mean, Collaborative: Partner to get it done! Execution: Do what you say with deep commitment (Passion) As they strive to achieve their vision and strategy, all employees at Life fitness UK need to demonstrate ACEp in their everyday working lives. Any employee, irrespective of length of service, location, or position can be nominated for an ACEP award and any employee, irrespective of length of service, location, or position can nominate. If the ACEP nomination is supported by the relevant budget holder, the nominee will receive an ACEP award presented on a quarterly basis at the Life Fitness Company ‘stand up' along with a £50 meal for two voucher.

The working environment at Life fitness is pleasant for all employees; it's a comfortable and enjoyable space, physically and mentally, where employees feel welcome and supported by their peers. Along with being open to learning new things, they also embrace change and adapt to new demands which not only keeps the company relevant, but also presents exciting challenges for employees that can make work less routine and even boring. Life Fitness provides a very effective performance management process whereby all employees have a six-monthly and annual review with their line manager. Exceptional work is constantly rewarded though this process and motivates employees to succeed. As part of their mission for best people and culture they have a strong focus on learning and development. Ensuring all employees have the opportunity to develop and be open to learning new things. Life Fitness arrange fun and engaging activities throughout the year to encourage team participation and growth.

The senior management team are directly contactable on a day to day basis by anyone in the organisation. They aim to live by the values which means they value everyone equally and everyone is included. Everyone has a right to express themselves and be respected for who they are and they can influence the way the organisation works. Also each Senior manager has a team who they are nominated to link with in a back to the floor style and celebrate successes or raise issues at senior level.

They update their staff regularly as to changes and improvements which are made as a result of their feedback. Particularly useful is a document created to address the different areas staff wanted to see improvements in over the past few years. They have a Learning Programme called KeySteps. This lays out how someone's development progresses from their date of join. Its starts with Induction, moves through Mandatory training and role related training, leadership development and coaching etc. This is supported by the new Appraisal process, the Personal Development Star.

The Customer Services team raised funds using their crowd-funding product to help re-plant a community garden in local Southwark area, using their 'Make a Difference' days - 3 volunteer days a year.

The Customer Services team raised funds using their crowd-funding product to help re-plant a community garden in local Southwark area, using their 'Make a Difference' days - 3 volunteer days a year.

J N Bentley invests over 1% of annual turnover in employee training and development. In 2014 this totalled over £1.4m. As a company they recognise the importance of building and maintaining a happy and skilled workforce to ensure they are able to readily resource schemes with talented people who can deliver works of a high quality. They work to ensure employees realise their potential and support them in their efforts to achieve their goals. They run their own Apprenticeship Scheme for young people entering the industry, working in partnership with Craven College, Skipton. In 2014, they welcomed 7 new apprentices who have been utilising their new training facilities in Shifnal, learning essential site skills. They have their own in-house development schemes for Civil Engineering, Mechanical & Electricial Engineering and Quantity Surveying for employees that want to learn new skills and responsibilities whilst working towards a professional qualification. Support employees through HE and Professional Qualification. 20 employees are currently working towards a variety of qualifications, including HNC in Civil Engineering, BSc in Civil Engineering/Construction Management/Quantity Surveying, BEng in Electrical and Electronic Engineering and MSc in Geotechnical Engineering. They also support employees who are earmarked to take the next step up or who J N Bentley wants to give additional skills to enable them to fulfil their role to the best of their abilities. This is done through courses like Integral Leadership and ensuring succession plans and suitable talent pools are in place.

J N Bentley invests over 1% of annual turnover in employee training and development. In 2014 this totalled over £1.4m. As a company they recognise the importance of building and maintaining a happy and skilled workforce to ensure they are able to readily resource schemes with talented people who can deliver works of a high quality. They work to ensure employees realise their potential and support them in their efforts to achieve their goals. They run their own Apprenticeship Scheme for young people entering the industry, working in partnership with Craven College, Skipton. In 2014, they welcomed 7 new apprentices who have been utilising their new training facilities in Shifnal, learning essential site skills. They have their own in-house development schemes for Civil Engineering, Mechanical & Electricial Engineering and Quantity Surveying for employees that want to learn new skills and responsibilities whilst working towards a professional qualification. Support employees through HE and Professional Qualification. 20 employees are currently working towards a variety of qualifications, including HNC in Civil Engineering, BSc in Civil Engineering/Construction Management/Quantity Surveying, BEng in Electrical and Electronic Engineering and MSc in Geotechnical Engineering. They also support employees who are earmarked to take the next step up or who J N Bentley wants to give additional skills to enable them to fulfil their role to the best of their abilities. This is done through courses like Integral Leadership and ensuring succession plans and suitable talent pools are in place.

Each year ITC hold a staff party at the end of their financial year and as this year they were celebrating their 40th year, they celebrated in style. ITC paid to transport all their staff to a sailing club on the beach and hosted a Caribbean themed beach party with a live steel band, hog roast, surfboard simulator, authentic rum punch, volleyball and limbo dancing. All food and drink were paid for. As a result of the success of this year's sailing party they have, as a company, committed to next year hosting 'dash for a splash' as a thank you to all of their staff which will be held abroad.

Raving Fans is the most effective and significant process in place for engaging staff in giving and receiving feedback and implementing changes that they would like. The process itself has been changed and adapted based on direct feedback from staff using it to now be a fun, creative, easy and effective feedback and action too. The achievements from Raving Fans are numerous, invaluable and include increased inter-departmental communication, praise and thanks for support, constructive feedback to each other and action taken to improve working practices and processes. Raving Fans has given everyone across the business a voice, the opportunity to listen and to take pro-active action based on feedback from their colleagues, in return to give constructive feedback and praise, creating a win/win for everyone in the company and a much greater sense of team spirit. In addition, there is a bright ideas email address with several managers as recipients. Staff members can email ideas and suggestions at any time, which is reviewed monthly by the senior management team where financial support is required. Where there is no financial approval required managers empower and encourage the ideas and suggestions to be actioned.

Hunter Adams social committee put together a wide range of events with several of them focused solely on the wellbeing of their team. They have entered teams into several 10k races. Their main charity event was a kayaking expedition with a total combined distance of 96 miles. Managers have set their teams pedometer challenges and have organised local hill walking trips. The team also take on personal challenges such as the London Marathon and two of the team have successfully completed the trek up Kilimanjaro. Hunter Adams encourages their team to be fit and active and live healthy lifestyles.

Hunter Adams social committee put together a wide range of events with several of them focused solely on the wellbeing of their team. They have entered teams into several 10k races. Their main charity event was a kayaking expedition with a total combined distance of 96 miles. Managers have set their teams pedometer challenges and have organised local hill walking trips. The team also take on personal challenges such as the London Marathon and two of the team have successfully completed the trek up Kilimanjaro. Hunter Adams encourages their team to be fit and active and live healthy lifestyles.

Griffiths & Armour have always taken a view to not only fund raise for local and national charities but help in the form of volunteering. Their local charity KIND has a Christmas campaign each year to raise funds for Christmas hampers and toys for families in the local community and a number of staff volunteer to help pack those hampers and deliver them to the families in need. Staff members have also taken part in bag packing events in local supermarkets.

Griffiths & Armour have always taken a view to not only fund raise for local and national charities but help in the form of volunteering. Their local charity KIND has a Christmas campaign each year to raise funds for Christmas hampers and toys for families in the local community and a number of staff volunteer to help pack those hampers and deliver them to the families in need. Staff members have also taken part in bag packing events in local supermarkets.