People & Culture

Our Workforce

Our sustained success is driven by the commitment and skill of our exceptional people. We invest in building strong teams and shaping a workforce for the future.  We are proud to have held Gold status of the 5% Club consistently since 2022, placing us amongst a network of leading employers.  

We will: 

• build a sustainable, future ready workforce aligned to our long-term business needs, ensuring we attract and retain the skills required for future growth. 
• strengthen strategic workforce planning and improve visibility of future workforce needs. 
• continue to ensure that at least 5% of our employees are in ‘earn and learn’ roles. 
• strengthen attraction into the business, using our in-house team to attract the right talent to support future capability needs.

Performance, Development & Skills

We are working to ensure that our people benefit from clear and transparent career pathways, supported by a career framework and defined competency frameworks.

We offer high-quality training through our in-house, CITB-approved training academy and Learning Management System.

We will:

• strengthen performance, build future-ready skills and create clear career pathways to support the development of our people.  
• roll out an enhanced Group emerging talent development programme and continue to support relevant professional qualifications.  
• build the critical skills and capabilities required to support future business needs.  
• embed a consistent, values-led approach to performance through the roll out of a Group-wide Performance Development Review process.

Employee Experience

Our people are our strongest resource and we take a holistic approach to providing a positive working experience: considering the processes, working culture, initiatives and choices that affect them daily.  

We use our links with the Berkeley Foundation to strengthen employee engagement and wellbeing, through encouraging volunteering and fundraising activities for the benefit of our charity partners. 

We will: 

• deliver a consistent and values-led employee experience across the Group, strengthening employee voice, wellbeing and key people processes.  
• improve consistency; from the on-boarding experience to our daily working practices and people processes. These processes will be transparent and fair. 
• align with external organisations on fair practices, such as paying the Real Living Wage.  
• promote a culture that supports health, wellbeing and sustainable performance, and ensure feedback is listened to and acted upon through the entire employee lifecycle.   
• promote a healthy, supportive and sustainable working environment where employees can thrive, including wellbeing resources and initiatives.

Leadership

Our clear and consistent leadership expectations are aligned to our values, vision and strategy.  

We will:

• strengthen leadership and management capability across the Group to role-model our values, support high performance and develop our people.  
• build effective and inclusive leadership capability through Group-wide management and leadership programmes, and build strong pipelines for future leadership roles. 

Equity, diversity & inclusion (EDI)

Our EDI strategy sets out the five areas within which we are taking action: setting the tone; partnerships to support action; awareness, allyship and celebration; attracting and recruiting the best talent; and using analytics to drive change.  

We are a Disability Confident employer, and supporters of important organisations and initiatives including the Social Mobility Foundation and the Supply Chain Sustainability School’s Fairness Inclusion Respect programme. 

We have clearly defined the required behaviours for our leaders, who must value equity, diversity and inclusion, and lead by example.   

We will:

• embed inclusive and equitable practices across the business, strengthening our processes and culture so everyone can thrive.    
• meet the requirements of the FTSE Women Leaders and Parker Reviews in terms of gender and ethnic minority representation on our Board.
• align with external standards and commitments, to support progress and accountability, including the Social Mobility Foundation, Disability Confident and the Race at Work Charter.   
• strengthen data and insight to better understand diversity and help us to take action on under-represented groups across all levels.  
• support and strengthen Group-wide inclusion networks to drive engagement and inclusion.