In partnership with


SHORTLISTED FOR BEST EMPLOYER CATEY


FIRMDALE HOTELS In a nutshell Tim and Kit Kemp’s collection of luxuriously designed boutique hotels Locations Five hotels and three townhouse hotels in London, two hotels in New York Employees 1,300 Average staff turnover 34% Annual sales turnover £126m


Yet again, Firmdale demonstrates that good business results can be had from listening to employees, respecting work-life balance, offering career development, promoting from within and celebrating successes. Over the past 12 months, its people strategy has contributed to a 4.8% increase in revenue,


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consistent levels of employee engagement exceeding 83%, and a 74% staff retention rate. Bolstered by the success of its inaugural employee engagement week in 2017, the com- pany has unleashed Firmdale Live, a series of monthly events, masterclasses, competitions and awards to inspire and empower staff. It included the launch of a new training calen- dar, which encouraged a further 68 employees to sign up for an apprenticeship. All this doesn’t go unnoticed. “I love how we are constantly updating systems to fit in with new developments and really develop our people,” comments one employee. And since the 2017 launch of the Year of Incentive, using a engagement platform that


encourages staff to reward colleagues when they’ve demonstrated core values), more than 4,500 rewards have been given, equating to an investment of £6,000.


HR says that this values-led approach has boosted employee engagement, particularly helping the retention of harder-to-engage back-of-house workers, such as housekeep- ers, kitchen staff and head office employees. It will be expanded this year to include guest comments, bright ideas and green initiatives The success of the people strategy is borne out by the survey, which reveals that 84% of Firmdale respondents believe it is a good envi- ronment to work in, and 86.4% feel they work well with a team to produce good results.


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