Published March 31st, 2020
Leading Cornish social housing provider, Ocean Housing Group, has won gold at the Cornwall and Isles of Scilly Healthy Workplace Awards 2020.
The awards, held on 10 March at the region’s Healthy Workplace Annual Conference, recognise good practice in the workplace. The county-wide scheme acts as a toolkit to encourage employers to think about ways to improve the health and wellbeing of their employees.
Following a final assessment, the company scored well across all nine areas of award criteria – including health and safety, recruitment and retention, and creating a healthy workplace – achieving 92 points out of 100.
Heather Taylor is part of Ocean Housing Group’s HR team. She said: “We are very proud to have maintained our gold standard for the second consecutive year. Having put a lot of effort into coming up with creative initiatives to make Ocean a great place to work, it’s fantastic to be acknowledged for the high level of support we provide to our staff.”
As Ocean’s health champions, Heather and head of HR Nikki Forward, are responsible for promoting health and wellbeing in the organisation. They were praised by assessors for their pioneering approach to improving staff welfare, with a big focus on mental health and creating a culture for open communication.
During the awards ceremony, Ocean Housing Group was also presented with an award for mentoring, providing recognition that it is maintaining a healthy workplace, and is now able to mentor other businesses on the programme with its ideas and experience. Ocean was one of only five businesses at the event to achieve this accolade.
Heather continued: “The additional mentoring award was very unexpected. It was something we were aiming for in the next few years, so it’s great to think we are ahead of the game, and can start to support other businesses in creating a better working environment.”
Ocean Housing Group’s chief executive, Mark Gardner, added: “I’d like to thank Heather and Nikki for everything they do to make Ocean such a supportive place to work. They’ve established an excellent health and wellbeing strategy which has been adopted throughout the whole organisation.
“We have big ambitions for the next year. We are aiming to collaborate with other inspirational businesses to develop new initiatives, and provide training to raise awareness in important areas, such as the menopause, suicide support, and wellbeing in the construction industry.”
For more information about Ocean Housing Group, visit oceanhousing.com.
