In todays blog post, Head of People and Culture Flora Oram, describes why becoming IIP Gold was so important for her and the company.

Last week witnessed another significant achievement and recognition at Computeam that was cause for great celebration throughout the whole company as we are  immensely proud to be awarded the prestigious Investors In People Gold accreditation.

As the dust settles, I have been reflecting on the impact of going for gold and what it means to us at a time when it has been undoubtedly more important than ever to ensure that we continue to support our people, during the coronavirus pandemic. 

Throughout the past year, working alongside a small team within our People, Culture and Quality board, it has been a main focus of mine to ensure engagement, support and empowerment have been at the forefront of all that we do, and never more have we seen the importance of our culture and values at such a challenging time for all.  

Our people are placed at the heart of our company. Our aim was to create a culture of belonging and engagement by sustaining our positive family and one team culture, supporting mental health and wellbeing, all whilst encouraging and empowering our teams to achieve their highest potential through training, development and opportunity through progression as well as enabling us to continue to deliver the best service possible to our valued clients. 

“There’s trust within the organisation. It’s very open – communication is always there. You can pick up the phone now to the MD and have a conversation, we have regular meetings with the company directors. It’s an open book for us, we know exactly what’s going on.” (IIP Report, 2021) 

Our values are embedded at the heart of our business strategy, signposting to people how they can achieve what we are setting out to achieve. As a result, I feel that we have successfully nurtured a strong culture of performance and improvement, seeking and acting on feedback, and reward and recognition that clearly runs throughout our teams.  

“I found right from the start they really want to keep staff happy and motivated, with values like pride and passion – if staff are happy, clients are going to be happy. That’s the thing I liked when I first started, and it seems to have grown more and more.” (IIP Report, 2021) 

In our strive to achieve gold we put an emphasis on building our company culture through virtual company events, which were cancelled in light of COVID-19. We successfully held a virtual Christmas party, annual company awards ceremony, and monthly company briefings which saw our Managing Director Owen Napier updating all staff with company news – a commitment we have now made on a long-term basis. I also organised care packages to be sent out to everyone's home addresses, each with their own theme, including company branded face masks and sanitizers, ‘Christmas in a box’, and most recently an Easter delivery, made up of easter eggs and prosecco – a small gesture which made all the difference in boosting staff morale. 

‘’They’ve always pushed me to do the best I can do and supported me. Everything about me as a person is better – I’m more confident.” (IIP Report, 2021) 

We have worked undeniably hard over the past 12 months, to get the company in to the best shape possible for our assessment, and in doing so we were able to achieve an advanced level of performance for all 9 indicators of the Investors in People Standard, using a combination of an online survey, individual interviews and a desktop review.  

I am so proud to have been a key team member in going for gold at Computeam. Not only does it show us that our staff are the most important part of our company and our long-term business success rests on hiring, developing and retaining amazing people or that we are among the best companies in the UK when it comes to valuing, listening to and engaging our team, but our Investors in People accreditation also provides a clear benchmark against the very best performing companies, and gives us recommendations to drive improvement into the future and beyond! 

Flora Oram , Head of People and Culture