What are companies doing with regards to 'My Team'

Graeme is an approachable leader who leads by example. He is often seen chatting with all members of staff asking about their work and also about their personal lives. He has an open door policy and all staff feel comfortable in approaching him. Graeme's relaxed leadership style influences how the Senior Management team support him in leading the organisation, ensuring that staff are supported and encouraged to be creative and innovative within their work. Staff are encouraged to bring new ideas on how they can deliver better services to their customers. Graeme has been recognised for his strengths in leading Five Lamps by being awarded the North East VCS awards for his outstanding leadership and more recently was the winner in the North as Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year. Also during their recent IIP Assessment the assessor stated 'It was interesting to note that some of the descriptions of top managers chimed with the recognised features of inspirational leadership. Inspirational leadership is a quality attributed to leaders who are able to create a culture of motivation and commitment. Investors in People UK defines inspirational leaders as those “who create an environment of trust in which people can be creative and motivated to fulfil their potential. They tend to: Have passion, Have a sense of purpose, Be honest and trustworthy, Encourage others to share their vision, Inspire others to achieve their potential.”

The wellbeing of all Five Lamps staff and Volunteers is critical to its ability to deliver services. Five Lamps is committed to providing a working environment and management practices which promote employee wellbeing and good health. Staff were asked to contribute their ideas and ways in which they could enhance their current Wellbeing approach and these are a few of the things they have done so far and have been very successful: Free Financial Health checks for all staff, provided by our Financial Inclusion Team. This helped staff who may be experiencing issues with debt or are struggling financially. It also helped members of staff who just needed advice about what to do with their savings and any investments etc. Staff were asked to contribute a plant to their office to reduce stress levels and make their own office a healthier place to work. Free healthy Heart checks, carried out by the NHS on site. Staff also have the option to attend the smoking cessation at one their community venues and seek advice on alternatives such as patches and gums. Five Lamps asked staff to contribute their ideas on a monthly theme i.e. July 'Summer ideas'.

Managers monitor the hours that employees work and ensure that workloads are manageable. Managers accommodate requests to work flexibly where possible. Managers participate in preparing the business plan. A job evaluation scheme has been introduced.

The clinical team have recently been given the opportunity to take part in a facilitated event which enabled them to explore what affect their actions and behaviours had on each other in a safe environment. It was agreed what sort of team they wanted to be and they created a list of actions and behaviours that would enable them to achieve this.

Managers set realistic personal objectives at appraisal and review these periodically during 121 meetings. Every 121 meeeting to to include time for mutual expectations – for the line manager to express how they want their reports to behave and for the line report to express what they want and need from their manager.

Although Rosie had been with London Youth since 2005, upon her appointment to the Chief Executive role in April 2012, she took six months to meet every employee, Trustee, a cross section of young people, members, funders and external stakeholders. Her purpose was to understand how each person viewed London Youth, what they do, their challenges and priorities for the future – what they thought they did well and what they should be developing further. With this feedback Rosie considered and re-articulated the Vision, Mission and Principles cascading these through the planning process in 2013. In this way all employees had a part of the new Vision, Mission and Principles and can connect with either a word, phrase or expressed intention of these. Rosie empowers others to lead, manage and deliver the organisational aims. She creates a shared responsibility for what London Youth is and does. Simple acknowledgements – either personally or through organisation-wide communications – can impact on individuals' sense of achievement, contribution and commitment.

They have for some years run a working group of staff as a forum to raise and discuss ideas and act as a sounding board for management decisions. Since the new Chief Executive started in April they have introduced monthly “exchange sessions”, which any member of staff or volunteer can attend to raise any questions or issues with him. These have been very well attended and have not only enhanced the sense of senior management visibility and engagement amongst staff, but also given the Chief Executive vital insight into the feelings of a wide range of our people. Their ability to engage with their people will be greatly improved in the new year when the new intranet comes into force. As a charity they have not previously had the resources to invest in a comprehensive intranet, but they were recently very fortunate to be donated the development of an intranet pro bono by Interact, a leading developer. They are very excited by the opportunities the new intranet will provide for engaging and communicating with their people.

With over 500 staff and a child-friendly ethos, there are often memorable social events. Recently the staff of one of the residential children's houses climbed to the roof of London's O2 as a teambuilding and fundraising exercise. When the Chief Executive heard about the day he asked if he could come along too! The annual summer barbecue for staff and volunteers is always well attended and gives people from across the organisation a chance to mingle with colleagues from other parts of the charity who they might not see regularly. An excellent big band played at the event and staff were served their lunch by members of the senior management team. More recently, Halloween provided an opportunity for every department to host a spooky, multisensory experience which was enjoyed not only by the children and young people staying with them, but was also their staff.

The central ‘Learning and Development Bursary' Fund – a commitment of between £10 and £15k is made annually by the Trustees to support professional development and the acquisition of qualifications by employees. Application is open to all, and an independent panel sits to assess applications.

The central ‘Learning and Development Bursary' Fund – a commitment of between £10 and £15k is made annually by the Trustees to support professional development and the acquisition of qualifications by employees. Application is open to all, and an independent panel sits to assess applications.

They are fortunate enough that they have two opportunities a year where the entire organisation comes together in London. Although they have increased their staff force by a large amount in the past year, the leaders still value the importance of spending time as a whole organisation. This year in April was the 4th anniversary and they held an event to celebrate. The event began in the afternoon with all staff being split into groups and rotating round a carousel of different sessions. Each session was led by a different group of staff. Each local leadership team led a fun and interactive session, such as a quiz or a treasure hunt, around how their office works and their local area. They also had a session with the senior leaders with the opportunity to ask them any questions staff wanted answered. Another enjoyable session was a ‘getting to know you' game to mix all staff together and find out some interesting things about people they didn't know before. This all lead up to the social in the evening where they all came back together for some food and drinks and opportunity to just relax. They had some entertainment provided by some of the local choirs who sang beautifully and even wrote their own Challenge Network version of a Les Miserable classic. They ended the evening with karaoke and dancing at a local bar which was thoroughly enjoyed by all.

Any issues or trends that come out of the survey results will be taken very seriously and meetings with Senior Leaders and Local Leaders of all zones will be held to discuss them. Depending on the results they may set up working groups to look into how they could make this better next time. The Challenge is very flexible and is not afraid of change. The staff's well being and happiness is more important to them than anything else.

In September 2013, TSL held a summer party at Kensington Roof Gardens to thank everyone for their incredible hard work. This party was fully paid for by TSL and included a sit down meal, a free bar as well as a live band and a video booth which gave people the opportunity have their 5 mins of fame! The feedback was brilliant and everyone thoroughly enjoyed themselves.

TSL are very conscious about the well being of thier employees particularly as they have such a high growth company. They offer the usual well being initiatives such as paid for private healthcare benefit, employee assistance programme and a cycle to work scheme. However their private healthcare benefit is exceptional, their cover includes pre-exisiting conditions. It is great when they are able to offer colleagues with an ongoing health complaint excellent medical cover. This helps remove some of the stress of dealing with the medical condition. Following the feedback from their last years survey they have engaged EnergiseYou to run monthy seminars on a variety of different topics such as nutrition, sleep and how to achieve high energy. They are also looking at other topics such as worklife balance so they can extend this across the year. The new seminars have been well received by colleagues. They also provide free fruit, drinks and smoothies to give colleagues and added boost during the week. They also offer an annual free flu vaccination.

TBG Digital's 6 monthly Staff Happiness Surveys, which are totally anonymous, have been particularly effective. They always receive constructive comments and suggestions and many beneficial suggestions to improve life at TBG have been received and implemented.

This year the company has organised and paid for: Go-Karting, Cocktail making and most recently Silly-Sports day on the Hampstead Heath and they also hold regular monthly ping-pong tournaments. Earlier this year TBG Digital held a Macmillan coffee morning. Everyone was encouraged to bring in a home baked cake or biscuits. The response rate was excellent and the winner of the best home baked entry won a small prize. The office was decorated in Macmillan green. The donations from the staff were generous and the coffee morning was a huge hit, it generated a real buzz in the office and of course, there was lots of recipe swapping going on.

Sweatshop believes running is a force for good. They know that they are able to help provide support for runners of all abilities. If you have never run before but want to start, or run but have no one to do it with, they can help by giving people a place to come to, free of charge, where you will have a chance to go running with supportive and friendly staff at Sweatshop plus other runners to share this experience, with a real community feel. They have created the Sweatshop Running Community, the SRC. It's an entry level running group within every store and runners are incentivised for regular participation. The Running Community doesn't just stop at this entry level running group with many stores offering a variety of running groups for all abilities. With over 20000 registered members in 3 years and over 2000 people running with them every week, they are the largest (and probably most inclusive) running group in the country. The community is growing as is the recognition and appreciation from their runners for providing this free community group. For many it has transformed their lives, enhancing healthier lifestyles with both mental and physical benefits.

Last year Sweatshop launched a staff development programme called 'achieve'. This was in response to staff feedback and with a view to helping internal development of new managers. The company invited applications from staff and had over 20 applications and have had 6 people who started have already been promoted and a large part of this is down to the training and opportunities provided within the programme. They also have 10 people who will be starting Achieve going forward. After the great response to Achieve, they have developed a high performing manager's programme which will aspire those on it to achieve outstanding success. Those on the scheme have the unique opportunity to work closely with senior managers and the board of directors. The most successful managers will be given HPM mentor status and become an integral part in successive managers' development.

A large proportion of Swanswell's executive team have previously worked in front line roles so they are clear about the expectations and pressures on front line team members. The organisation encourages team members to shadow others, especially at induction stage, to ensure a shared understanding of what everyone does, this is especially used for support and head office team members who may not have worked in this arena before. In addition, the corporate induction day is a really important opportunity for team members to learn about what others do and for the senior team and organisation as a whole to learn. All new team members attend these events. Swanswell offers a number of routes for support to understand the pressures and workloads team members have. Flexi time is offered for team members to work when pre-arranged with an executive team member. Occupational health and wellbeing support is available for all team members with a regular occupational health service and a confidential employee assistance programme. Access to a specialist stress management consultant for confidential support is also available within the organisation and Swanswell's give monthly clinical supervision for front line team members and regular performance reviews with line managers for all team members.

A large proportion of Swanswell's executive team have previously worked in front line roles so they are clear about the expectations and pressures on front line team members. The organisation encourages team members to shadow others, especially at induction stage, to ensure a shared understanding of what everyone does, this is especially used for support and head office team members who may not have worked in this arena before. In addition, the corporate induction day is a really important opportunity for team members to learn about what others do and for the senior team and organisation as a whole to learn. All new team members attend these events. Swanswell offers a number of routes for support to understand the pressures and workloads team members have. Flexi time is offered for team members to work when pre-arranged with an executive team member. Occupational health and wellbeing support is available for all team members with a regular occupational health service and a confidential employee assistance programme. Access to a specialist stress management consultant for confidential support is also available within the organisation and Swanswell's give monthly clinical supervision for front line team members and regular performance reviews with line managers for all team members.