People Managers Matter

The company have a 'Your Rewards' programme which pulls together the whole range of benefits offered by Provide. There is a website detailing over 8000 discounts and savings that staff can access on retail and leisure services, supported by a glossy A5 booklet giving discount codes. This has been helpful in engaging staff who do not have ready access to IT. The booklet is handed out at Corporate Induction where details of the scheme are communicated. The programme also details contractual benefits and explains the options staff have around the range of pension and assurance benefits they offer. It includes details of the Credit Union membership they have put in place for staff and their Employee Assistance Programme which offers legal and consumer advice as well as counselling services. The site also promotes healthy lifestyle initiatives run by their own in house teams.

All staff at Provide have an annual Performance and Development Review when a personal development plan is agreed and implemented. This applies to all their staff across all pay bands, clinical and non clinical. A 6 monthly review is held to review progress with objectives and personal development plans. A range of internal and external training opportunities are available and an annual learning prospectus is produced for staff. A strategic learning and development group is in place whose main purpose is to ensure that learning & development across Provide supports the safe and effective delivery of health care to all their customers and patients and also supports the vision and values of the organisation. A blended learning approach is in place so that staff can learn and update their training in different ways. E learning is in place and can be used for the majority of essential training updates as well as CPD and clinical updates. Monthly lunch and learn sessions are held, using in house specialists or external speakers for a range of topics and updates.

Since their last engagement survey Powertecnique have implemented a dress down Friday policy to allow staff a more casual day in the office. This has improved morale without negatively affecting productivity. A win win! They are also currently in the process of investigating improved private health & pension offerings for their staff. A company wide pay review is also due to be commenced as pay was raised as a concern from the latest survey.

Since their last engagement survey Powertecnique have implemented a dress down Friday policy to allow staff a more casual day in the office. This has improved morale without negatively affecting productivity. A win win! They are also currently in the process of investigating improved private health & pension offerings for their staff. A company wide pay review is also due to be commenced as pay was raised as a concern from the latest survey.

Junior consultants are given rewards such as tailor made suits, watches and pens when they achieve certain milestones in their career. This has proven particularly successful allowing them to feel successful and to have visible reminders of their success. These rewards are very sought after. They have also run incentives for colleagues around additional training and enhanced training personal budgets for individuals which have proven popular.

Potensis's internal coaching is very strong. New starters receive 6 months of training and development with a buddy/mentor, formal training, training assignments, weekly reviews and personal projects. This scheme has been really well received by their new starters and has allowed them to hire people with no previous recruitment experience.

In order to enhance the wellbeing of their employees, PM Group display posters from their Health & Safety Department which are displayed on all office and site notice boards and the intranet.

Line Managers often take their teams out for meals on completion of very hectic work schedules. A young lady in her mid 20's has been part of their talent management programme for the last 6 years and on completion of Part III Architect Programme the company has awarded her with a promotion as well as a bouquet of flowers and article in the Group wide company magazine. One Employee who won substantial work for the company was awarded a fully paid weekend away with his spouse.

Plastribution has recently moved into new larger open plan offices, which has provided employees with the chance to take relaxing breaks in their working environment, create meals, obtain snacks and free squash in the adjoining kitchen and enjoy a light, warm and well ventilated workplace.

Plastribution has recently moved into new larger open plan offices, which has provided employees with the chance to take relaxing breaks in their working environment, create meals, obtain snacks and free squash in the adjoining kitchen and enjoy a light, warm and well ventilated workplace.

The company have a suite of Management Development Programmes to assist their existing and aspiring managers and supervisors in developing skills and knowledge to equip them for current and future managerial roles. Two programmes are accredited with the Institute of Leadership and Management (ILM), and tailored to aligned them with their managerial competencies and values. Their third programme is a bespoke modular Leadership Development Programme, coupled with 360 Degree feedback before and after with coaching and support provided. Considerable time is invested for studying, day release, and coaching over a 5 month period for each Programme. Celebrations are held at the end of each programme, with the presentation of certificates and a monetary recognition reward.

Their organisation's Primary Purpose of Opening Doors, Enhancing Lives has a variety of medium term priorities driven by Delivery Outcomes for the Community. These are categorised under 2 key themes, one of which is Enhancing Resources and Governance to ensure they deliver high quality, cost effective and efficient services. One of their key Business Plan priorities therefore focuses on Value for Money and Boosting Productivity. Examples include: Homeworking introduced for 20+ staff to allow better quality of life, saving time and mileage costs going unnecessarily to hot-desking facilities. An app was written to access their HR system to enable mobile users to request holidays and see their wage slips using a tablet and personal computers – removing the need for paper copies and needing to login from a work PC. Automated the collation of information on ‘Notices Seeking Possession' saving 1hr a week compiling stats for housing. A new process agreed with British Gas to immediately transfer gas and electricity supply to BG when a property becomes void, thereby ensuring utility supplies are working allowing work to be carried out immediately on the property by their contactors. This ensures quicker entry and turnaround of void properties, avoids time wasting chasing to get utility supplies transferred.

OrderDynamics have launched a Talent Management Programme which recognises future Leaders of the business to build on their achievements and develop the strengths of the top 5% of future Leaders in the company. Currently, the CEO hand writes anniversary cards for all employees commending them for their achievements over the past year. 5 year anniversaries are spend with the cofounders and other employees over dinner.

OrderDynamics provide Time Out Tuesday's - a complimentary massage service for all staff every Tuesday in the office. They also provide complimentary fresh fruit smoothies all year round made on site. They provide a keeping fit allowance that's not just a Gym subsidy. It's an allowance of £25 each month that employees can use towards anything they do which makes them feel healthy - taking the kids swimming, paying for Boris Bike fees, even towards their family fresh veg & fruit bill each month. We pay 50% of onsite Yoga class fees.

OpenBet supports employee development via a plethora of activities, such as, Brown Bag sessions to share knowledge across the organisation, workshops for hands on programming activities, supervised Google hangouts with subject matter experts at hand to explain specific subjects and topics, internal and external training sessions on soft skills, managerial skills as well as methodologies and technical skills. Traditional classroom training is used in conjunction with e-learning activities and remote teaching via conference systems and remote internet meetings. Training plans are developed for specific roles within the organisation to help new comers or people being promoted internally, handle their new role within OpenBet.

The company have in place a 'Spot Bonus Award Policy'. This is awarded by management on a special basis when employees have made a particularly noteworthy contribution, above and beyond the call of duty. This programme provides managers with a valuable tool to motivate, reward and recognise those employees who distinguish themselves through extra efforts. Significant short-term contributions earns a bonus of £200. A Significant medium/longer-term contribution earns the employee £300-500. A special recognition award to sustained leadership performance over a considerable timeframe, and/or the accomplishment of mission critical, company-wide projects of a major scale is awarded with £1000. To achieve maximum recognition and motivational value, managers are encouraged to provide the employee with a letter of commendation, which will be included in the employee's HR file. They also have a colleague recognition programme; colleagues can nominate an individual or team who has made a measurable contribution to the company; if successful, every quarter a nominated individual wins £1000, or if a team, £2000.

In July 2014 Olive Catering Services employed their first ever L & D Manager. Their role is to support business retention and growth by identifying and designing L & D solutions that are focused on the achievement of the business and people strategy. By investing in this new internal role they aim to further demonstrate their ongoing commitment to people development.

As a contract catering company, Olive is committed to healthy eating and offering healthy eating choices to their customers and staff. In 2012,Olive signed up to the Department of Health's Responsibility Deal pledge to reduce the salt in the food they produce. As part of this pledge they have put together communication packages to educate both their employees and their customers about the dangers of excessive salt levels in food and the benefits of reducing salt usage. Their Operations teams also periodically run Healthy Eating Awareness days at their sites which enable their customers to learn more about general nutrition and health awareness.

The company use a number of formal and informal processes to support employee development. Monthly business reviews between an employee and their manager are time off the desk and cover the monthly results in terms of activity and performance, then touch on areas of concern and areas of strength and a section left for discussion upwards and downwards and then room for manager comments and actions for the next month. Quarterly reviews are a more in depth look at how an employee is doing and cover more areas such as challenges faced across the quarter and training and development discussions which focus on what training the individual needs to succeed and quality of training is evaluated. The quarterly reviews also look at the promotion criteria and discussions are had to ensure the individual is on track for promotion. Ratings are also given to each employee on how well they demonstrated the Nicoll Curtin Attributes over the last quarter, and this rating needs to be at a minimum level in order to be considered for promotion. Annual career reviews work to ensure that an individual's goals and targets are recorded and acknowledged by the business and enables them to create a talent pipeline for the business- knowing who wants to become management or principal billers. These annual reviews do not cover billing performance but more about the individual and how they are doing in terms of their career and satisfaction..

Nicoll Curtin's leadership team knows that the best ideas can come from anywhere in the business so they are committed to learning from everyone and implementing great ideas irrespective of where they have come from. The leadership team reviews any ideas that come through and communicates them with the business. Work hard, work together. The Senior Management team understands why their business is successful and it's because of who they hire and how they develop their consultants. Their MD and Sales Director sit with the teams on a daily basis and operate an open desk policy, meaning anyone can go up to them and ask questions. They sit on the floor and hot desk throughout the teams which demonstrates how involved they really are.

2013 was Multiply's 10th anniversary and to celebrate this they took all their employees away for an overnight stay at Aberfeldy. The theme was a pagan ritual ceremony and each employee had a specially chosen, bespoke outfit waiting for them in their room on arrival. Their team from London flew up to join this too and the whole company had a fantastic evening of entertainment and celebration. This event took several months to plan and was packed with unique and personal touches. All costs were fully covered by Multiply and the event was a fantastic success. They have various other team building events including a yearly Company Update BBQ in the summer which brings the whole agency together in either London or Edinburgh. They have also recently installed their own bespoke bar in the basement, and they have ‘down time Friday' to encourage everyone to get together for a Friday refreshment.

2013 was Multiply's 10th anniversary and to celebrate this they took all their employees away for an overnight stay at Aberfeldy. The theme was a pagan ritual ceremony and each employee had a specially chosen, bespoke outfit waiting for them in their room on arrival. Their team from London flew up to join this too and the whole company had a fantastic evening of entertainment and celebration. This event took several months to plan and was packed with unique and personal touches. All costs were fully covered by Multiply and the event was a fantastic success. They have various other team building events including a yearly Company Update BBQ in the summer which brings the whole agency together in either London or Edinburgh. They have also recently installed their own bespoke bar in the basement, and they have ‘down time Friday' to encourage everyone to get together for a Friday refreshment.

Each summer the company holds a themed summer party. This year it was based around the Football World Cup finals. The company provided food, drinks and a variety of entertainments and competitions throughout the day with colleagues positively encouraged to get involved. In the weeks leading up, they also launched a fantasy world cup league competition with prizes for 1st, 2nd and 3rd places - nearly 60 staff took part. This year they were able to provide Segway's for colleagues to "try out" along with some more familiar "games", such as "test your strength", "hoop the ducks", and "crazy golf". On the day employees were encouraged to wear casual clothes and were welcome to sport their favourite football teams' shirts if they wanted to. The party featured a face-painting artist, table football and a penalty shootout competition. On the day a fish and chip lunch was provided and a healthy alternative, and soft drinks. The divisions of the company get fully immersed in the activities of the day, and competition between the various departments can get quite fierce. A full range of photos are provided after the event, and a general round up of the day's activities are fed back via the Buzz platforms.

Each summer the company holds a themed summer party. This year it was based around the Football World Cup finals. The company provided food, drinks and a variety of entertainments and competitions throughout the day with colleagues positively encouraged to get involved. In the weeks leading up, they also launched a fantasy world cup league competition with prizes for 1st, 2nd and 3rd places - nearly 60 staff took part. This year they were able to provide Segway's for colleagues to "try out" along with some more familiar "games", such as "test your strength", "hoop the ducks", and "crazy golf". On the day employees were encouraged to wear casual clothes and were welcome to sport their favourite football teams' shirts if they wanted to. The party featured a face-painting artist, table football and a penalty shootout competition. On the day a fish and chip lunch was provided and a healthy alternative, and soft drinks. The divisions of the company get fully immersed in the activities of the day, and competition between the various departments can get quite fierce. A full range of photos are provided after the event, and a general round up of the day's activities are fed back via the Buzz platforms.

Employee development is key to delivering Midas Vision and the roll out of the CLEAR programme supports their long term commitment to developing their staff. Core elements of the CLEAR programme include: Bespoke management and leadership training delivered to operational, commercial and business support staff , Performance Development Review (PDR) training, Introduction of monthly 1-2-1 meetings between staff and their line managers to discuss progress and development needs – known as CLEAR Catch Ups, Training initiatives covering customer service workshops, commercial excellence workshops and team-specific training aimed at improving team effectiveness and performance. The CLEAR programme, which, is cascaded throughout the business is also supported by the introduction of quarterly People Reviews with the senior managers of each division, ensuring that employee development is discussed on a regular basis at a high level and development themes identified in addition to the TNA conducted as part of our annual PDR (appraisal) process.

Employee development is key to delivering Midas Vision and the roll out of the CLEAR programme supports their long term commitment to developing their staff. Core elements of the CLEAR programme include: Bespoke management and leadership training delivered to operational, commercial and business support staff , Performance Development Review (PDR) training, Introduction of monthly 1-2-1 meetings between staff and their line managers to discuss progress and development needs – known as CLEAR Catch Ups, Training initiatives covering customer service workshops, commercial excellence workshops and team-specific training aimed at improving team effectiveness and performance. The CLEAR programme, which, is cascaded throughout the business is also supported by the introduction of quarterly People Reviews with the senior managers of each division, ensuring that employee development is discussed on a regular basis at a high level and development themes identified in addition to the TNA conducted as part of our annual PDR (appraisal) process.

London Square has implemented the Cycle to Work scheme and has also organised corporate membership rates at nearby Hillingdon Sports Club, to help promote a healthy lifestyle to their staff. London Square has table tennis in the garden, which staff can enjoy during breaks throughout the day, giving them a chance to unwind, catch up with colleagues or even help brainstorm new ideas over a different kind of meeting table.

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.

Installation of the water machines, The Colour run event and health and fitness Occupation Health are all part of wellbeing in Leven Energy Services Limited.

Installation of the water machines, The Colour run event and health and fitness Occupation Health are all part of wellbeing in Leven Energy Services Limited.

EAP schemes are available across the firm and include access to online portals where helpful advice is immediately available. Face to face counselling is included, in addition to the 24/7 helpline. Kinetic have annual flu jabs, organising a nurse to come into the office to administer the vaccinations to encourage as many of the team as possible to take advantage of this benefit. Anyone who cannot take advantage of the on site programme has access to a drop in clinic where they can have the jab at their own convenience. Kinetic have gym membership as one of their flexible benefits and encourage staff to use this benefit to encourage well being and exercise in the firm. They also support a charity run every year where around a quarter of the office run in a 5K fun run fully subsidised by the firm called the 'Chartered City Race'. This is a great way of building team spirit, keeping fit while supporting a good cause. They try to arrange wellness weeks annually to raise the team's awareness of what is on offer and how they can benefit.

Kinetic Partners is very good at giving employees the development they desire. People are trusted on projects that stretch them all the time and therefore learn a lot. They are coached/monitored by extremely strong leaders. Kinetic also provide more structured training through their KP Academy which focuses on online training and individual skill sets required to succeed in their industry. Training has included: sales and business development, leadership, excel, word and more industry specific training courses. Kinetic are a great company for knowledge sharing as well and regularly have ‘lunch and learn' sessions to ensure that everyone within the firm has a sound knowledge of their global service offering. Kinetic also hold regular sessions on latest legislation and developments within each service line. Kinetic expect their employees to be proactive in their development and include a PDP in their appraisal process where leaders need to ensure that their teams are stretched by setting objectives that enable both short and medium term personal development goals to be realised. Kinetic's online training portal is accessible to everyone and they encourage the team to spend 2 hours minimum each month on personal development which is linked to the achievement of their objectives as detailed above. Their planned global training matrix will map every level in their organisation and the training required to achieve job success. This will also be a great tool where employees can see how, and in what areas, they need to develop in order to progress in their careers.

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.

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.

Being very proactive in supporting company-wide events, for example the Jelf Sales Conference and Central Services Conferences. The conferences give employees the chance to meet and network with their colleagues, sharing ideas, opinions and best practice.In 2014 these events also gave employees the opportunity to put forward suggestions to improve various practices within the company through a "Dragon's Den" workshop. As a result there is a clear action plan of initiatives sponsored by the Group Executive Board, many of which have already been implemented.

Being very proactive in supporting company-wide events, for example the Jelf Sales Conference and Central Services Conferences. The conferences give employees the chance to meet and network with their colleagues, sharing ideas, opinions and best practice.In 2014 these events also gave employees the opportunity to put forward suggestions to improve various practices within the company through a "Dragon's Den" workshop. As a result there is a clear action plan of initiatives sponsored by the Group Executive Board, many of which have already been implemented.

The International Tennis Federation's Christmas Party was organised around a fun team building event instead of simply going to a restaurant or bar. They have organised a team event in the style of Masterchef where all staff have to work with people they don't usually work with and there is a competitive edge to it too. Additionally, across the Federation, a number of charity fundraising events have taken place, including entering the Corporate Challenge in July plus various other social events which are open to everyone and included representation from all Federation departments.

The International Tennis Federation's culture encourages a healthy work/life balance with flexibility offered around sickness and recovery periods, working time flexibility if needed and support from managers at all levels around physical activities, particularly taking part in lunchtime sporting activities. A daily lunch allowance is provided to all employees for use at on site restaurant facilities or a sandwich ordering service which encourages healthy eating, with a wide variety of both hot and cold food options plus other healthy options such as fruit available. Sports facilities are available onsite, some free and some subsidised, and include use of tennis courts, gym, swimming pool and fitness classes. Their location also encourages activities as they are a few minutes from Richmond Park. Employee safety and wellbeing is taken extremely seriously and a taxi is provided to transport employees to the nearest mainline station at the end of each working day, which is particularly helpful during the darker winter months. 24-hour security is provided around the office which is reassuring for those working or visiting out of standard office hours, a common occurrence within an international organisation. The International Tennis Federation also offer a free employee assistance prorgamme, full medical checks - at some levels and they have in the past paid separately for private counselling or therapy for team members.

One of the initiatives they introduced in 2012 to give something back to their staff and thank them for their ongoing hard work was their sports and social club. The club aims to provide a happy and healthy working environment, with plenty of opportunities for people to relax, enjoy something new or favoured past time in the company of colleagues, friends and family. As a company they acknowledge their duty of care as an employer to provide their staff with different ways to improve their health and well-being but, with the sports and social club, took this one step further to empower staff with ownership and an increased range of activities that staff truly enjoy. Employees are regularly asked which activities they would like to be offered by the company, which are then all employee organised. iCrossing contributes between 50% - 100% of the cost. These complimentary and subsidised activities, open to all, aim to promote a healthy and balanced working life. We've been sailing to the Isle of Wight, gone go-karting, regularly take part in football, basketball and volleyball leagues, visited the opera, comedy, plays, then music festivals, beer festivals, poker nights, gone Back to the Future at the Secret Cinema and chilled out with yoga and massages.

As one of our core values is to be human, they ensure that the way in which they live the values is done so in a human way too. All new team members attend induction sessions from departments across the agency, allowing them to meet the wider team and get a better understanding as to how the agency runs day-to-day. They run a new starters lunch that also includes a long serving team member, with their CEO and CFO so that new team members can meet the senior team members in a relaxed, yet exciting venue. They get together as a whole agency every quarter to spend time together and hold quarterly company meetings as well as regular team meetings with their direct team. One such event was their Momentum roadshow lead by their global president where teams worked on various client problems alongside team members they never usually work together day to day.

Hitachi have recently implemented visual performance boards. These help teams plan their workload, share their vision/mission, cross train and celebrate success. They have enabled workload to be levelled across team reducing pressures and enabling them to deliver a better customer experience. Other new working practices include Qbuster, refreshed Star awards, incentives, call evaluations, career progression structure and functional plan sharing.

Hitachi have recently implemented visual performance boards. These help teams plan their workload, share their vision/mission, cross train and celebrate success. They have enabled workload to be levelled across team reducing pressures and enabling them to deliver a better customer experience. Other new working practices include Qbuster, refreshed Star awards, incentives, call evaluations, career progression structure and functional plan sharing.

Groundworks West Midlands hold two staff away day events for all staff including Sessional Workers. On the 9th September 2013 they held it at Keele Hall, Staffordshire. This included presentations in the morning session from the Chair of the Board, Executive Director, Head Teacher of their school, HR Director and two project leads. After lunch, the afternoon was spent having team building fun activities ranging from building communications and listening skills by use of blindfolds to supporting each other by having to eat chocolate! In addition, staff spent an hour on a guided nature walk delivered by the Ranger across the Country Park that they manage. 21st July 2014 – The Welcome Centre, Coventry - Again, this included initial information sessions, including from the Chair of Board and the Executive Director, thanking people for their involvement in the recent awards they have won and an external presentation from a trainer on Managing Stress in the Workplace. This was followed by a riotous speed networking session. After lunch the afternoon included taster sessions on some of the projects delivered by Groundwork staff to their client groups. These included ‘The Smoothie Bike', healthy eating choices by understanding fat content in food, practical household budgeting and an Urban Wildlife Walk with staff creating head wear from flowers and leaves! GWWM provided transport from each local offices, food and refreshments and, of course, activities for the staff away days. The second event featured more hands on project activities following positive feedback from staff about this element. Also a company funded Christmas event which was in works time and involved indoor ten-pin bowling and a meal which was centrally located and well attended by the work force. In addition a company supported Cycle ride which was in works time and included a paid for halfway lunch for all riders and supporters.

All Senior Management staff have shared their own motivations for working at Groundwork as part of their “Little Green Book” guide, with some motivated by the concepts of sustainability and others by social justice.

GB Group continue to focus on core markets through Business Unit structure. They link all GB messages and propositions together around the common theme of identity, use innovation, quality and excellence in everything they do to deliver unique value proposition. They deliver all of GB Group's principle products online in every area of the business, recruit, retain and develop top quality people who instinctively deliver innovation, quality and an excellent experience to every stakeholder. GB Group deploy the necessary resources across their working environment to ensure they can meet all the above objectives.

GB Group carried out an innovation workshop as part of the business year kick off staff conference. GB staff take part in a physically gruelling challenge to raise money for charity. This is called the GB Challenge and this year it was a 26 mile hike across the Shropshire Way.

Firefish have an annual company team-building event, known as Fireflung. This year's event took place on Osea Island, a former wartime base just off the coast of Essex, which is connected to land by a causeway that disappears as the tide comes in. In the build-up they kept the location secret and created a huge amount of intrigue by giving the event a wartime / 1940's theme. On arrival they spent the morning firstly delivering an update on their progress since the last Fireflung, and then results from the staff survey. Firefish then worked together as a group on a couple of key issues for the business - maintaining growth in their client list and creating more time for people to focus on their primary tasks. This process included splitting out into smaller groups defined by different levels of the business, ensuring that ideas from more junior members of the team were given as much 'airtime' as those of more senior colleagues. Following lunch, they then ran a team-building game where 8 teams competed against each other to defuse bombs hidden all over the island! This involved much running around, pedaling down country lanes on bone-shaker bikes, a few gin and tonics and an almighty bundle to grab the last 'bomb'. The evening was then a 1940's themed dinner and party. Firefish all revelled under the stars and by campfires till the small hours and then those with most stamina kept going until dawn in one of the various cottages.

Firefish have an annual company team-building event, known as Fireflung. This year's event took place on Osea Island, a former wartime base just off the coast of Essex, which is connected to land by a causeway that disappears as the tide comes in. In the build-up they kept the location secret and created a huge amount of intrigue by giving the event a wartime / 1940's theme. On arrival they spent the morning firstly delivering an update on their progress since the last Fireflung, and then results from the staff survey. Firefish then worked together as a group on a couple of key issues for the business - maintaining growth in their client list and creating more time for people to focus on their primary tasks. This process included splitting out into smaller groups defined by different levels of the business, ensuring that ideas from more junior members of the team were given as much 'airtime' as those of more senior colleagues. Following lunch, they then ran a team-building game where 8 teams competed against each other to defuse bombs hidden all over the island! This involved much running around, pedaling down country lanes on bone-shaker bikes, a few gin and tonics and an almighty bundle to grab the last 'bomb'. The evening was then a 1940's themed dinner and party. Firefish all revelled under the stars and by campfires till the small hours and then those with most stamina kept going until dawn in one of the various cottages.