Jaguar and Land Rover drive workplace standards
Good employee-development policies have helped Ford’s Jaguar and Land Rover business to win the Investors in People Outstanding Workplace of the Year award, in the latest UK National Business Awards.
The Gaydon-based organization’s core activities revolve around the design, manufacture and sale of premium cars and 4 × 4s. Operating from six UK locations, five in the Midlands and one on Merseyside, the company also has several smaller support organizations around the world.
The company won the award as a result of its “create the winning team”policy – a people strategy that has been key in creating a collaborative,performance-focused corporate culture. The judges looked for the organization that had achieved success through the design and application of an outstanding workplace-development strategy. The winner had to show how it planned,implemented and measured the performance of its human resources and how success was recognized and rewarded, while all employees had access to continuous development.
The National Business Awards recognize and reward excellence, innovation and success. Open to organizations of all sizes and from any industry sector, public or private, the program allows the best of British businesses to showcase their achievements and benchmark their successes against firms and bodies of all types. The combined turnover of entrants was £366 billion, with a profit of£32 billion, while it represented 1.8 million UK employees and 250,000 personnel overseas. Geoff Polites, chief executive, Jaguar and Land Rover,remarked: “UK businesses cannot compete on a pure cost basis with some of the emerging international competition, so it is vital that companies like Jaguar and Land Rover capitalize on the inherent value of their brands to deliver unique products and services that command a premium. The strength and heritage of the brands are the source of that uniqueness, but it is people that bring that to life, turning potential into reality.
“I am really proud of the innovative and creative work we are doing fully to engage our people in securing a profitable future for these two great British car businesses. This award is great recognition for the team that conceived and developed our people-development strategy, but also for everyone in the business who has played a part in delivering improvements where they really matter, out in the workplace.”
Other finalists were Chess, GenSet, Lindum Group, N4 Solutions, Royal Bank of Scotland, Saga Services, Edinburgh Sheraton Grand Hotel and Spa, Strategic Team Group and Wilson James.
