What are companies doing with regards to 'My Team'

There are many team building events which run across the year at TGI Fridays. The company's team challenge begins in February, where each of their stores goes through a review process to ensure everyone in their organisation meets the behavioural and ability criteria. Each staff member is then asked to re-certify to ensure they have the knowledge to be efficient in their role, and then they are observed to ensure they display TGI Fridays brand promise to their guests. This is a store activity so that no one is left behind. The store will be visited by a Director of Operations to sign off, the opportunity is used to reward and recognise key individuals who may have stood out in the journey. A series of additional targets and competitions all count towards the aim of finding the very best store. The final event will be a Senior Leadership visit at peak, again taking the opportunity to reward, recognise & energise the teams. The scoring will then determine a regional winner and that store will receive £1K towards a team event. The overall 2nd place store, will receive £100 for every member of the team, and finally the winning store will not only be crowned store of the year, but every member of the team will receive an extra weeks' pay, which they receive the week before Christmas. This is not only a much coveted accolade, but a very welcome sum of money which is cited as giving them a Christmas to remember.

There are many team building events which run across the year at TGI Fridays. The company's team challenge begins in February, where each of their stores goes through a review process to ensure everyone in their organisation meets the behavioural and ability criteria. Each staff member is then asked to re-certify to ensure they have the knowledge to be efficient in their role, and then they are observed to ensure they display TGI Fridays brand promise to their guests. This is a store activity so that no one is left behind. The store will be visited by a Director of Operations to sign off, the opportunity is used to reward and recognise key individuals who may have stood out in the journey. A series of additional targets and competitions all count towards the aim of finding the very best store. The final event will be a Senior Leadership visit at peak, again taking the opportunity to reward, recognise & energise the teams. The scoring will then determine a regional winner and that store will receive £1K towards a team event. The overall 2nd place store, will receive £100 for every member of the team, and finally the winning store will not only be crowned store of the year, but every member of the team will receive an extra weeks' pay, which they receive the week before Christmas. This is not only a much coveted accolade, but a very welcome sum of money which is cited as giving them a Christmas to remember.

This is at the core of the Intelligent Health message. TAQA have worked hard to promote the benefits of regular exercise through various channels including, sponsorship and participation in sporting events, Walk for Diabetes and the Corporate Decathlon. 2013 has seen development of a new Intelligent Health intranet to help promote networks to encourage activities and exercise of all types within the business. A recent highlight has been the establishment of a TAQA sponsored Mountaineering and Walking club.

The TAQA car share programme allows personnel based onshore to share journeys with colleagues who have similar routes to work. TAQA also shares commuter transport with neighbouring companies in the industrial estate at Westhill in order to limit the number of buses needed for the same route. Waste segregation bins and VegWare products are in place to further minimise their impact on the environment and be more sustainable. TAQA recycles waste wherever possible and has waste segregation bins throughout the offices for plastic, cans and compostable waste. VegWare is also used in TAQA's café's to reduce the amount of waste that is sent to landfill. VegWare is disposable food packaging and all TAQA café catering products are made from this recyclable, starch-based material which takes 4 to 6 weeks to become compost.

Sue Ryder's flexible approach to development and their varied interventions makes it easy for everyone to access the opportunities that suit them, their role and their development needs. These include training workshops, development programmes, coaching and mentoring, action learning sets, 360 feedback, secondments and a variety of other interventions.

Sue Ryder hold focus groups and create top level action plans at directorate level, then these are cascaded down to a team or care centre level, where people get to share ideas and feedback and create a plan for how any issues raised will be addressed. Engagement champions are now leading on this and supporting the leadership team to drive the action plans forward. Sue Ryder also have a 'dragons' den scheme for people to submit new ideas and receive funding to implement them.

The biggest company event of the year is the two day company away day which this year took place at Centre Parks, Suffolk, when they closed the office and all 479 employees attend. The Away Day provides a fantastic opportunity to bring everyone together to update them on the latest news in the agency. This year they also had a specific focus on inspiring creativity and creating the environment for creativity to thrive as they prepare to move into a new building in 2015.

They are constantly looking at ways to develop their industry leading learning and development programme. This year they introduced Myers Briggs Type Indicator team sessions into the business. These sessions are about supporting individual growth and ensuring that teams gain a greater understanding of working styles and to ensure further cohesion and harmony in their work. They have taken over a 100 people through the sessions. These are facilitated by the Regional HR Director and Head of Learning and Development, both of whom are qualified MBTI practitioners and bring their own experience and creativity to the sessions. They developed the programme from an initial half a day workshop exploring preference type to a full day session that explores the impact of the different preferences on one another at work. These sessions have been invaluable as they have taken senior teams, client teams and board members through these practical, fun and experiential workshops. This is some of the feedback received “I found it very interesting not just learning about my own typology but also about my peers. I will definitely have some new added perspectives now when managing my team and pitching ideas.”

The HR Manager at St Ermin's created 2 development programmes specifically for the business: For Management: Fish S.U.P.P.E.R (Supports, Unites, Plans, Participates, Energises, achieves Results). For Supervisory Fish S.T.I.C.'s (Strives To Inspire Change). They involve the following: Leadership vs Management, Stages of group development, Behaviour and Motivation Learning styles, Communication Conflict Management, Time Management Problem solving and decision making. Whilst both programmes have the same elements, the Management Programme deals with more complex theories and processes. Both programmes are highly interactive, with a significant range of exercises observing natural and learned behaviours. There are 6 modules, 4 weeks apart with practical work based projects to complete between modules. The course also has a very practical base, where hotel issues are openly discussed with no fear of retribution then analysed and often fixed there and then or a plan put in place by the delegates. The modules are tough and also a lot of fun. At the end of the course, the attendees are then set a project as a group that is work related and needed to improve or launch something within the hotel or help with employee communication. The 2013 project was to make a video that embodies St Ermin's culture, especially fun, love and energy. The pilot courses were run in 2011 and proved such a success that there are courses each year, and to date, 58 employees have attended a course. In 2014, 10 delegates attended the course. The 2015 course is already planned for April.

St Ermin's Operating (UK)'s employee rewards programme encompass the 4 areas within the culture and is designed to reward employees for behaviours that meet the Vision and Mission. Traditionally in hotels, reward programmes are centred on earning credits/points that can be exchanged for items within various company catalogues. The company believe that the most important thing to their team members is the ability to earn extra money outside their normal salary. St Ermin's created a programme called ‘Fish hook', which is split into the 3 of the 4 core value areas, Choose Your Attitude, Make Peoples Day and Be There plus Guest Recognition. The reward is a points based system, 1 point = £1 and the company pays the employee and employer tax on that £1 so that the employee receives the whole £1. Points are issued to employees by way of a personal cheque given by a Manager. All managers are issued with guidelines on what to look for within the business and are able to issue cheques to any employee they see or hear fulfilling the required criteria. Points are totalled at the end of every business quarter and the employee receives the cash value of their points in their salary. The average quarterly cost to the business has increased from £4,000.00 (plus the employee tax) in 2013 to £4,7000.00 in 2014. All new employees receive a travel card wallet with the Vision printed on the back and Fish hook details within.

Spire's Senior Management team 'live' the ethos, principles and values of the organisation particularly on a day to day basis. They take the time to greet colleagues and walk around the office every day and get to know colleagues on a personal level, and not just a work basis. There is an open door policy with no ivory towers at Spire. As is the Spire way, they work hard and always model the positive working culture by remaining in good spirit and not bringing bad moods to work. The Senior Management Team encourages flexibility and don't expect colleagues to stay late and work long hours. If for any reason, colleagues do stay later than normal; Senior Managers will take the time to ask why to see how they can help. A good work life balance is very important to their Senior Management Team who champions the Mi Life initiative and encourages flexibility. They encourage time away from day to day work as it is recognised that this is an important part of the job. They will always treat all colleagues with respect. The Senior Management Team will also challenge where their values are not lived, and encourage colleagues to take appropriate intervention to maintain their positive culture at Spire. The Senior Management Team regularly gets involved in fun activities to generate team spirit.

Every year they hold a Spire's Customer Services week to say thank you to everyone for their continued hard work. It is a week when all Spire colleagues are reminded of the important part they play in the customer journey with fun activities, such as guess the baby competition and awards to nominate colleagues in categories ranging from The Florence Nightingale award to more humorous ones like the megaphone and most accident prone. Work shadowing colleagues from other teams plays an important part as this helps not only increase skills and knowledge, but to also see how best they can work together. Spire's Management Team go back to the floor during the week and then they have a celebratory finale lunch, where team cohesion is at its strongest. To promote team work they aim to do this in a fun, positive and creative way. Their 'Cocktails with their Customer Services and Customer Engagement Team' is a great example of how they promote, share ideas and feedback and get to know colleagues better. Everyone gets involved throughout the week and participates in one way or another. It's a popular team building event with colleagues taking the lead in delivering and bringing it to fruition.

SPF Private Clients plan to arrange meetings with the company's leaders and senior management to discuss the results of the survey.

SPF Private Clients' Sales Consultants are rewarded in line with the company's TCF (Treating Customers Fairly) principles.

Employee development is encouraged at every level within the business within the parameters of Speedy Hire's “Career Journey” and this is evidenced tangibly in the volume of roles that are obtained by individuals already working within Speedy. 25% of vacancies within Speedy are filled internally as individuals are encouraged to complete both role based and aspiration training and development, preparing them well for their next career move. The development of the employee starts at the “Qualified” level of the Career Journey. Inductions to the business are tailored for each discipline and each team member has a career journey that highlights courses required, relevant qualifications and on the job training to support them through three levels of competency through the “Developed” level to “Expert”. At this point, the team member is in a great place to progress to their next career move. Each course is supported by their internal Training Academy to ensure each individual training log is up to date and the booking process is seamless. The leaders in the business are supported with tailor made management courses at different levels that will give each attendee a qualification from the CMI (Level 3 or 5) and there are various leadership plus modules and 360 feedback put in place to develop them further. Development is seen at every level and a number of current Directors started in the business at entry level. The internal mobility supported by the Career Journey is certainly one of the best examples of their commitment to employee development. In addition to this, Speedy Hire have a Human resources Service Charter manual that details all of the services they provide for employees to ensure managers and employees know what they have access to and what extra services they provide to support them in their development.

Employee development is encouraged at every level within the business within the parameters of Speedy Hire's “Career Journey” and this is evidenced tangibly in the volume of roles that are obtained by individuals already working within Speedy. 25% of vacancies within Speedy are filled internally as individuals are encouraged to complete both role based and aspiration training and development, preparing them well for their next career move. The development of the employee starts at the “Qualified” level of the Career Journey. Inductions to the business are tailored for each discipline and each team member has a career journey that highlights courses required, relevant qualifications and on the job training to support them through three levels of competency through the “Developed” level to “Expert”. At this point, the team member is in a great place to progress to their next career move. Each course is supported by their internal Training Academy to ensure each individual training log is up to date and the booking process is seamless. The leaders in the business are supported with tailor made management courses at different levels that will give each attendee a qualification from the CMI (Level 3 or 5) and there are various leadership plus modules and 360 feedback put in place to develop them further. Development is seen at every level and a number of current Directors started in the business at entry level. The internal mobility supported by the Career Journey is certainly one of the best examples of their commitment to employee development. In addition to this, Speedy Hire have a Human resources Service Charter manual that details all of the services they provide for employees to ensure managers and employees know what they have access to and what extra services they provide to support them in their development.

Senior managers at Spectrum Housing are aware of the values and were all involved in deciding what these should be. All senior managers act as role models and are aware of the need to act in line with the values and lead by example. They are all accountable for their behaviours and the values underpin everything that the organisation does. Senior Managers work in creative ways and have backed a ‘smarter working' project group. This has been trailed in Finance with the senior Finance and IT managers overseeing it. The results have been positive and employees have been allowed to come up with creative ways of solving problems. These groups will be set up in all departments. Senior managers go to all sites every other month to give a presentation on Bigger News. These managers give sessions throughout the day then spend the day at the site. Managers go to sites they wouldn't usually therefore meeting new people and developing relationships. These managers offer shadowing to all staff and take part in back to the floor days. There is the ‘one voice' section on the intranet where managers can update everyone on progress and offer thanks or congratulations. Senior managers use the Spectrum leadership competencies to ensure they act in a professional and responsible manner. All senior managers have or are undertaking a coaching and ILM qualification so every day they act as a role model.

Senior managers at Spectrum Housing are aware of the values and were all involved in deciding what these should be. All senior managers act as role models and are aware of the need to act in line with the values and lead by example. They are all accountable for their behaviours and the values underpin everything that the organisation does. Senior Managers work in creative ways and have backed a ‘smarter working' project group. This has been trailed in Finance with the senior Finance and IT managers overseeing it. The results have been positive and employees have been allowed to come up with creative ways of solving problems. These groups will be set up in all departments. Senior managers go to all sites every other month to give a presentation on Bigger News. These managers give sessions throughout the day then spend the day at the site. Managers go to sites they wouldn't usually therefore meeting new people and developing relationships. These managers offer shadowing to all staff and take part in back to the floor days. There is the ‘one voice' section on the intranet where managers can update everyone on progress and offer thanks or congratulations. Senior managers use the Spectrum leadership competencies to ensure they act in a professional and responsible manner. All senior managers have or are undertaking a coaching and ILM qualification so every day they act as a role model.

Spark44 hold an annual Summer Event and this year they arranged a ‘sports days' themed event at a country house in Oxfordshire for the London and Birmingham Offices. Separated into teams, people tried their hands at everything from egg and spoon races to backwards jeep driving. The day culminated in a BBQ. They also held a company party including both UK offices providing transport and accommodation in London for the Birmingham team.

Spark44 aim to always fill positions internally. Their quarterly appraisal programme is objective driven enabling them to identify areas for development. They also support professional training and study leave.