Luminus encourages all employees to be healthy. Their impressive suite of health and wellbeing benefits include an online personal health management system, subsidised gym membership, pension and non-contributory health plan (recently expanded to employees' children). The company believe the most effective wellbeing tool they have is their flexible working policy. Whether it is offering bank workers term-time contracts, or enabling full-time employees to work around rush hour traffic, everyone benefits from this approach. It also ensures that managers are able to monitor their employees' working hours, ensuring a healthy work-life balance. Employees can accrue time and take up to an extra 13 days leave a year, on top of their already generous leave allowance. For some employees, i.e. those with more than five years service, this can amount to up to 43 days (excluding public holidays). Staff are keen to stay with Luminus because of the interest they take in their health and wellbeing, resulting in: an increase in staff retention level to 96.1% (2009: 88.8%), a 40% reduction in sickness absence to 3.4% (8.3% in 2009), and increased staff satisfaction and motivation as evidenced through their 2010 employee survey results.

During Summer 2011 Chan held Premium Brand Employer meetings for all employees over a lunch hour so he could hear views on how they can achieve their 2020 Vision: The Road to Renewal. In these highly interactive weekly sessions he encouraged everyone to be open and honest in their feedback. These meetings greatly impacted on employee engagement as it underlined to all employees that the Senior Management Team were open to constructive feedback. Following these meetings various initiatives have been put in place, including integrating their trades team in their monthly staff conferences instead of holding a separate quarterly meeting for them.

The company's vision statement really sums up what they do - 'No young person or woman, whatever their problems and background, will be without a comprehensive and holistic package of support, until they are truly capable of sustaining an independent and acceptable lifestyle within their chosen community.' Llamau works hard at realising this vision with each and every service user it comes in to contact with. Often service users are referred to Llamau when no other agency will support them due to varying reasons. Their belief is that they can work with almost anyone and will go that extra mile to finding their worth in society. Research: To ensure Llamau continues to develop the most effective services, they are proud to be participating in several research projects. Two of the projects are part of the Knowledge Transfer Partnership (KTP) programme with two Welsh Universities. The organisations are working together in order to improve services at Llamau by transferring research into practice. Developing housing services which reduce reoffending. Llamau has recently undertaken a two year research, strategy and lobbying project to develop effective accommodation services for young people involved in the Youth Justice System.

Llamau operates a core competency training matrix. Clearly listed is the employer's position with regards to employee development. In the last BEST Company survey they won an award based on the principles of how they operate this development programme throughout Llamau.

In summer 2011 the company held an all staff event at the University's sport facilities to promote the facilities to encourage employees to sign up for membership. The event included dodgeball, swimming, 5 a side football, climbing wall, spinning, image consultancy, and walking tours amongst other things. For the last two years the company have also run an employee baking league. This has been particularly effective for engaging their staff in something fun at work , mixing with other people and encouraging them to take a break! In previous years they have offered an employee Wellbeing Week every January. Employees can participate in a number of healthy activities during their working time to improve their health, safety and wellbeing. Free fruit is also provided during the week. The idea for the week is that they provide free of charge taster sessions that employees can then choose to continue in their own time to improve their lifestyles.

The organisation operates an open and transparent management style and their 'flat' structure allows quality communications at all levels. The Chief Executive offers free lunches to all employees three times a year when she is willing to explain and outline proposed changes to service delivery, changes that affect staff and any question which employees feel they want to ask. Since the last survey they have ensured all teams have a breakdown on the results and that they share ideas and suggestions to improve the working lives of employees. Examples have been the installation of water coolers and a tuck shop for staff.

They organise a quarterly new staff lunch where the CEO seeks feedback and ideas from staff who have joined Jewish Care recently. There are also Ask Simon postcards where staff can get in touch with the CEO to make suggestions, give feedback or ask questions. There are also tea and chat sessions where the CEO visits care homes and community centres to chat to staff and volunteers about issues they may have. Since the last survey they have implemented many changes. They have launched their Benefits You booklet giving details of the benefits they offer to all staff, together with their 2011 Reward Statement and have communicated information about bench marked salaries. They have shared results with teams and managers and launched a new leadership award for the manager with the best ‘My Manager' scores - the winner received £500 to use towards their own career development. They are also currently planning a 'not so new' staff lunch for longer serving employees to have lunch with the CEO.

Hospiscare supports employee development best through its comprehensive Learning and Development Programme. This in-house programme offers 71 separate training opportunities between April 2011 and March 2012. These range from one hour sessions on a ‘hot topic', to essential updates to support staff in their roles, to four day courses on Bereavement and Loss. The programme is needs-led and responsive, with managers and employees regularly being consulted on their learning needs. This programme is also informed through analysis of appraisals and the training needs identified within them. Needs are responded to quickly either by provision of an in-house course if demand is great enough and there is capacity within the organisation, if the need cannot be met in-house an appropriate external course is sought.

In the last 12 months there has been the formation of a Senior Managers' Group which means there is a core group of managers responsible for key aspects such as managing attendance and working together to support the Leadership Team as well as managers and colleagues within their teams. It enables idea sharing and a cohesive approach to guiding and supporting colleagues across the Trust, as well as an additional forum for sharing ideas and listening and learning from experiences. Nick Atkin the Chief Executive is an exceptional leader who is the driving force behind the performance, direction and success of the organisation. What makes him distinctive is his approach to business, to the customers; to colleagues and to the working environment he has created. In business, he is very driven and extremely determined. He leads by example, is very well respected and strives for excellence and success. He is innovative, encourages new ideas and radical thinking and embraces change. On a personal level, he is extremely personable and supportive, accessible and takes a personal interest in all colleagues.

GHA knows face-to-face communication is the best way to get staff involved. During periods of change or when new initiatives are launching, the Chief Executive Martin Armstrong takes time out to go round local offices having face-to-face meetings with staff. He talks to them in an honest, open and inspirational way, challenging staff to give their views and listening to their feedback. Teamtalk, their internal communications strategy, ensures information is cascaded to every member of staff to facilitate team discussion sessions and staff are encouraged to give feedback to managers. They have a strong culture of listening to feedback from all surveys and external assessments, celebrating successes and putting in place improvement plans to address all issues highlighted. Their journey to deliver excellent services for their customers has been hugely influenced by survey feedback and external assessment. Staff are involved in shaping the improvements they put in place, through their teams and in joint forums.

Their Staff SVQ programme at their Homeless Person's Project, Victoria House is an excellent example of how the Association supports employee development. They have an annual programme in place for staff going through the SVQ Level 3 in Health & Social Care and to date they have over 75% of staff through the programme which is well ahead of the completion target set by the Scottish Social Services Council. To maximise the support for staff going through this training, the Association invested in training two members of staff as SVQ Assessors this has made a tremendous improvement to the training experience for the staff taking part and it has meant that their training is more focused and minimises travel requirements and disruption to work patterns in this shift working environment.

They have an extensive health and wellbeing programme. The most recent event was the Clyde Valley 10K team. One of the Leaders sought participants in order to raise funds for the chosen charity. He got nominations from all areas of the business and the company paid for entrant's fees and corporate tops. They mixed staff from all areas of the company, who through fun training sessions, became more confident and closer, resulting in improved team working. The team developed a great bond and raised a significant amount of money. The participants were all at different levels of fitness, some ran, some walked, but they all encouraged each other and waited for each other at the finish line. They had a team night out to celebrate and have committed to doing it again next year and encouraging others to join them. The running club has continued and staff now go out for a run once a week. They also did the annual health walk, have an onsite gym, carry out annual health checks for staff and provide advice on general health issues.