Strategic Objective 2
Staff and partner engagement
We will be an employer and partner of choice
Staff and partner engagement
This is about creating an exciting and supportive work environment, and valuing our staff and partners. We want to have long-lasting relationships with the people we work with and build a reputation for being a go-to organisation.
How we will do it – our five-year objectives
- Ensure clarity and consistency of approach to staff throughout CCHA (Year 1 priority)
- Review our staff benefits and rewards systems to ensure that staff remain motivated and committed
- Review all training and development so staff feel supported and developed
- Develop our relationships with our contractor partners to deliver our worklessness objectives
- Build on the relationship with the Croydon Youth Zone to get more young residents involved
- Work with Emmaus and Crisis UK to support homelessness initiatives in the borough
What we are doing now
Our staff are the lifeblood of our organisation and each person plays an important part in helping us to deliver our services. As part of our five-year plan, we want to support, develop and reward the people who are helping ccha make a difference.
Our new values
The starting point for delivering our Year 1 objective is the launch of our new corporate values which, along with our vision, underpin everything we do:
- We CARE about our customers, staff and our wider environment
- We ADAPT and embrace change to achieve our goals
- We are RESILIENT and effective in challenging times
- Our strength is in our unity with EVERYONE playing their part
For staff, having a strong identity creates a sense of belonging and collaboration, which creates a positive and productive work culture. The values are being embedded across the organisation through the staff induction programme, ongoing training, staff appraisals – where each person is asked to explain how they are delivering the values, internal and external communications, and the new customer service standards.
Home working policy
During the year, we established a new home working policy. Staff have the equipment and software to be able to access our core services from any location with an internet connection. This investment enabled us to act quickly and move to full remote working when the Covid-19 lockdown started.
The policy is completely flexible and supports the work-life balance, with staff choosing their working hours inside our core opening times. By connecting with others through video conferencing, we have found this to be an efficient way of working, and our performance targets are still being met.
Equality and Diversity
We celebrate the diversity within our communities and provide services to people from different backgrounds, cultures, and with different beliefs and abilities. In Year 1, we will be reviewing our Equality and Diversity policy to ensure that we are meeting the needs of our residents and staff.
The review will involve workshops with residents, and we will look at best practice and current legislation to satisfy our regulatory responsibilities. The new policy will be incorporated into our management training strategy and our business culture as a whole. We also plan to set up an Equality and Diversity Committee which will be responsible for shaping our approach going forward.
How we will measure our success
We will look at our performance, customer satisfaction levels and the feedback we get from staff to see how well we are doing. During Year 1 we will be entering the Sunday Times Best 100 Companies to Work For list and hope to achieve a ‘one to watch’ status.