What are companies doing with regards to 'Personal Growth'

The company's mission, vision and values are communicated in all that they do, in their actions, what they say and how they say it and in their interactions with one another, and relationships with those they work with.

The company offers a range of learning and development opportunities. At the early stages they contribute between 80 - 100% of the cost of formal qualifications and provide time off for study, as well as making studio facilities available for colleagues and their fellow students. For mid-level colleagues they offer many opportunities to get involved in the day to day activity of practice life, to gain experience, tap into creativity, and to build knowledge through sharing activities. Activities range from weekly CPD events, evening master classes with external experts, team presentations, external led training workshops, and many different fun design competitions. They run surveys asking colleagues to select the topics and areas that they are interested in learning more about and programmes are created from there to included voice coaching, presentation skills master classes, time management sessions, and leadership training. All of these are developed in tandem with the strategic business plan for the UK each year. Most training is open to all colleagues, however there are a few initiatives which are aimed at certain groups or individuals according to skill level or role within the company. Management and leadership training for example is a perfect example of this whereby learning the ropes of people management and team leadership is important to certain colleagues and not others, depending on the stage they are at within their careers.

Addaction aim to recruit employees who have the right mix of skills, experience, attitudes and beliefs to perform their role in a way that matches their values and standards. They then ensure that each employee has the opportunity to develop and learn to enable them to deliver the best possible recovery services. Employee development adopts a blended approach including qualifications, classroom training and online learning. Their classroom training is delivered by qualified trainers who have extensive experience of working in the substance misuse sector. With a focus on skills development, they develop their front line practitioners in using evidenced based psychosocial interventions with their service users. Their holistic approach to providing recovery services means that they also ensure their front line practitioners develop skills to support service users presenting with a range of issues including mental health, domestic abuse and self-harm. The company consistently achieve over 96% positive satisfaction rating for their classroom training. Their classroom training also supports any non-professionally qualified front line employee to gain a QCF qualification working in substance misuse which they have to achieve in their first year of employment. For non-practitioner employees they have worked with an awarding body to develop a new bespoke CQF qualification to raise awareness of substance misuse issues in their wider employee population. Their online learning is a particular success story. Since they started to develop their online learning provision in 2011, Addaction have won numerous awards and recognition for their provision which includes both mandatory and professional development modules.

Addaction aim to recruit employees who have the right mix of skills, experience, attitudes and beliefs to perform their role in a way that matches their values and standards. They then ensure that each employee has the opportunity to develop and learn to enable them to deliver the best possible recovery services. Employee development adopts a blended approach including qualifications, classroom training and online learning. Their classroom training is delivered by qualified trainers who have extensive experience of working in the substance misuse sector. With a focus on skills development, they develop their front line practitioners in using evidenced based psychosocial interventions with their service users. Their holistic approach to providing recovery services means that they also ensure their front line practitioners develop skills to support service users presenting with a range of issues including mental health, domestic abuse and self-harm. The company consistently achieve over 96% positive satisfaction rating for their classroom training. Their classroom training also supports any non-professionally qualified front line employee to gain a QCF qualification working in substance misuse which they have to achieve in their first year of employment. For non-practitioner employees they have worked with an awarding body to develop a new bespoke CQF qualification to raise awareness of substance misuse issues in their wider employee population. Their online learning is a particular success story. Since they started to develop their online learning provision in 2011, Addaction have won numerous awards and recognition for their provision which includes both mandatory and professional development modules.

We Are Social share the UK and Global vision with the whole agency and have given real understanding of what the key changes were going to be to staff to ensure they achieve this. The company ensure that the global senior management team physically meet twice a year at summits to ensure they all have an opinion and are part of the vision/strategy/how to execute it all.

We Are Social share the UK and Global vision with the whole agency and have given real understanding of what the key changes were going to be to staff to ensure they achieve this. The company ensure that the global senior management team physically meet twice a year at summits to ensure they all have an opinion and are part of the vision/strategy/how to execute it all.

The senior management team have a strong work ethic and feel that transparency is key. Everyone at WE has a voice and the senior management team allow and encourage people to be heard. The new daily hot desking initiative also means that the senior management team sit with people at all levels within the business and are available to answer questions and share best practice. The SAM get involved in office fun and encourage others and join in themselves on MaD. The SAM regularly lead training sessions within the business and share their knowledge to the agency as a whole in our all hands meetings.

Annually WE take part in Business in the Community Give & Gain Day. Give & Gain Day is the UK's only national day of employee volunteering. Every year since 2008, it has given companies a unique opportunity to bring community action to life in a celebration of the power and potential of employee volunteering across the world. By getting unprecedented numbers of people out volunteering on one day, they are championing the talent, skill and energy found in business and the role it can play in helping communities prosper.

Vision Critical encourage their employees to be active by providing bike racks, a free gym onsite and subsidised yoga sessions and massage - along with shower facilities. The company have changed to a Medical insurance plan that provides rewards and discounts for living a healthy and active lifestyle and actively encourages staff to take time out to rest and relax.

Vision Critical held their Summer Picnic on the 3rd of July from 1pm until late. The picnic was held on Clapham Common and the day involved a picnic lunch with drinks, team events and games to have fun and also team building across departments. It is a celebration of all of the hard work and effort from the entire team over the past year - it is an opportunity for the company to say thank you and for the employees to enjoy some fun and social time together away from the office.

All areas of senior management have spent the last 18 months collaborating on the company's proprietary workflow platform, STREAM, in which they manage the lifecycle of their client and translator relationships. TranslateMedia was extremely keen to develop a service and platform that served the company's needs both in the present and future, by facilitating internal communication and ensuring every employee has a perfect understanding of each client relationship. TranslateMedia's senior management team encourages every area of the business to participate and bring their own unique blend of experience and expertise to drive a system that will not only continue to improve productivity, but will provide each team member the historical prospective and communications that have previously taken place by team members in other areas of the company.

All areas of senior management have spent the last 18 months collaborating on the company's proprietary workflow platform, STREAM, in which they manage the lifecycle of their client and translator relationships. TranslateMedia was extremely keen to develop a service and platform that served the company's needs both in the present and future, by facilitating internal communication and ensuring every employee has a perfect understanding of each client relationship. TranslateMedia's senior management team encourages every area of the business to participate and bring their own unique blend of experience and expertise to drive a system that will not only continue to improve productivity, but will provide each team member the historical prospective and communications that have previously taken place by team members in other areas of the company.

The company recently hosted a stress awareness training course for the Store Managers. Hilary Horton delivered the presentation and activities based on her extensive experience in coaching stress awareness through the NHS, H.M Prison Service and while serving as a Squadron leader with the RAF. Other innovative examples of classes and services they company have organised for their employees to enhance their welling include laughter yoga, massage, mock-tail sampling, healthy picnic lunch at the launch of our new financial year and a wellbeing fair.

The fortnightly Head Office Huddle run by the company's CEO and exec team allows the company to share news from product launches to sales figures in an open forum and casual setting. Similarly, quarterly cross-functional Listening Groups occur where colleagues share thoughts on topics and voice concerns. The CEO meets with each head office team/department every 6 weeks to discuss key topics and listen to any concerns. The company use a variety of methods to communicate with their 242 stores including, ChocSource , postal packs and the Retail Managing Director uses a voicemail system to all stores for key messages. Head of Operations runs quarterly factory briefs to all employees across the 24/7 operation and also sends out a fortnightly newsletter containing news,blogs and competitions. Educational displays are set up in the canteen and reception to enhance learning and encourage employee discussion. For example, “From cracking the cocoa pods to chomping the choc” run by 7 cocoa experts from Cargill to educate employees on the cocoa trail from bean to boxed chocolates. The mock shop displays new products and promotions so colleagues in head office are aware of what the shoppers are experiencing in store. The Factory Tours programme has been running for 4 years where employees who are trained as Tour Guides take great pride in voluntarily sharing the factory experience with fellow colleagues. They also benefit from the cross functional teamwork that is an integral part of the factory tours programme.

All of the Directors, in both offices, sit in the open plan space with the wider team at The Test People. This allows for collaboration and communication and a closer relationship with employees. The Senior Management Team are prominent sources of expertise in the TTP Community and also the wider testing community. The SMT commitment to the values has also recently been illustrated by the agreement to include the company values in the new Talent Management framework, which will soon be launched. This will ensure that the values are prominent and reinforced by all of the company's managers to their teams during performance chats. The main way in which the SMT promote their values is to lead by example. At Director level, there is a strong commitment to creativity and ensuring TTP are at the forefront of new initiatives within Testing. Senior Management also empower their teams to work autonomously and find new solutions to complex technical and testing challenges.

All of the Directors, in both offices, sit in the open plan space with the wider team at The Test People. This allows for collaboration and communication and a closer relationship with employees. The Senior Management Team are prominent sources of expertise in the TTP Community and also the wider testing community. The SMT commitment to the values has also recently been illustrated by the agreement to include the company values in the new Talent Management framework, which will soon be launched. This will ensure that the values are prominent and reinforced by all of the company's managers to their teams during performance chats. The main way in which the SMT promote their values is to lead by example. At Director level, there is a strong commitment to creativity and ensuring TTP are at the forefront of new initiatives within Testing. Senior Management also empower their teams to work autonomously and find new solutions to complex technical and testing challenges.

The Red Consultancy has REDucation which is their internal training programme, run by Board Directors internally as well as external training sessions for all staff. There are 26 sessions catered to different levels and the sessions run throughout the year. The company provide every staff member with a booklet detailing courses and explaining which courses are relevant to their levels of experience. They also run some external training sessions and last year have provided different external training for all staff from their Graduates to their Senior Directors. The Red Consultancy also run a graduate training scheme for our graduate intake - this is run by the Board Directors and comprises of 14 different sessions. All staff are given a "coach" who is a senior staff member, responsible for helping with that persons development. They run the employees appraisal and reviews and generally help to give them advice on their career progression.

The Red Consultancy have quarterly individual, team and long service awards which are announced at their quarterly company meetings and are presented by the CEO. Individual awards; Managers and Directors nominate people for outstanding work and contributions to the company. Individuals receive a certificate and £100 shopping voucher. Team Awards: Teams are invited to present on the work/project they have done in the last quarter and show their achievements. The winning team receive a dinner and drinks evening paid for at a top restaurant. The second prize is a team drinks evening paid for at a bar of their choice. Long service awards - these recognise long service contributions to the business (e.g: 10 year anniversaries) and the company announces these at company meetings and give them a gift.