The parent body of the South Wales Chamber of Commerce and Centre for Business has been awarded the prestigious Investors in People Gold Award in recognition of its hard work and commitment to implementing organisational change and creating a better workplace for all employees.
The Newport and Gwent Chamber of Commerce Enterprise and Industry (NGCCEI) was recognised for introducing a robust internal communications system, investing in staff training and development, awarding excellence within its team, staff away days and encouraging a work-life balance for its employees.
The award means the NGCCEI is now one of only 57 organisations in Wales to receive the IIP Gold Award and is one of 1,047 organisations across the whole of the UK.
Not simply a box ticking exercise, organisations must implement a series of actions in order to fall within the accreditation framework.
Investors in People is an accreditation which focuses on the nurturing of the people which sit at the heart of any business, and strives to help organisations boost their working culture and increase employee engagement and involvement. Higher levels of accreditation are based on demonstrating best practice by meeting additional evidence requirements.
The NGCCEI had held the standard level accreditation, but achieving ‘Gold status’ now means it holds the highest Investors in People standard.
Sarah Whittle, Director of HR and Corporate of NGCCEI, says: “As an organisation, we have worked extremely hard to become an exemplar in terms of creating the best possible environment for our staff, so we’re absolutely thrilled to achieve the IIP Gold Award.
“Over the last few years we have grown in terms of the size of our team and the reach of our business support services across Wales, so it’s particularly pleasing that this has not been to the detriment of our work to set exemplar standards.
“We recognise that it is our hard-working staff that makes this organisation a success, and we will remain committed to implementing continuous development practices within the workplace.”
Keith Palmer, Group CEO of NGCCEI added “Achieving this award is excellent recognition for the organisation as a whole, and as the new Group CEO I am delighted to have inherited a team who committed themselves to working towards achieving this result.
“The emphasis now is on ensuring that we maintain our standards going forward. We hold regular focus groups and employee meetings to ensure that we obtain feedback from staff on what extra we can be doing to help them.”