INTERNATIONAL property and construction consultant Rider Levett
Bucknall has become one of the first construction professionals to
achieve Investors in People (IIP) Silver status.
This is a remarkable achievement given that fewer than 150 of
the 28,000 IIP Accredited organisations in the UK have been judged
to have attained this standard.
The consultant first achieved IIP status in 2006. The Firm was
immensely proud of this and has since continually strived to
improve its total employee offer and engagement processes to allow
it to move to the next level of IIP accreditation.
IIP has recently introduced three additional levels of
achievement to recognise those organisations whose performance is
considered to be exceptional. Only around 0.5% of the organisations
recognized by IIP have achieved silver status.
Hilary Richardson, HR Manager at Rider Levett Bucknall said the
Practice was aiming very high when it went for Silver status and
used the IIP's enhanced criteria to help it rasie the bar on its
own performance.
IIP assessor Keith Robinson interviewed randomly selected
employees and contract staff to collate evidence against headline
criteria which included business strategy, valuing people,
effective learning, ownership, responsibility and continuous
improvement.
Rider Levett Bucknall met an impressive 139 out of 141 evidence
requirements which ensured it achieved the much-coveted Silver
status with flying colours.
Richardson considers that the Silver accreditation is an
outstanding achievement and demonstrates that Rider Levett Bucknall
is committed to continuous improvement.
Mark Weaver, managing partner at Rider Levett Bucknall in
Birmingham added: "When we decided to go for Silver status we upped
the ante and proved that we'd taken on board all of IIP's previous
comments. We are delighted with the accreditation, particularly as
we are one of the first UK professional construction and property
companies to achieve it. But we won't stop here - we now have our
eye on the Gold! This would put us in the top 0.3%.
"This latest award reinforces our position as one of the UK's
top employers. This year we moved up a place to take the number one
spot in the The Telegraph sponsored Corporate Research Foundation's
'Britain's Top Employers' table and we are also ranked 77th in the
2009 Sunday Times Best 100 Companies to Work For."