First-class staff collaboration and participation at JCB Group has been recognised with an Engagement Leader of the Year award for HR manager Anna-Lisa De Voil.

De Voil was presented with the prestigious accolade at the annual Engagement Excellence Awards, which were held at London’s Natural History Museum.

The awards were hosted by comedian Russell Kane and judged by a 20 strong-panel made up of Human Resources and Reward leaders from companies all around the UK, attracting a shortlist of national and global brands including Vodafone, L’Occitane, Ladbrooks, AXA UK and Specsavers.

DeVoil, said: “As a diverse business with some 300 staff across 12 sites split across three counties, Employee Engagement is extremely high on our agenda, particularly as we have grown so significantly in recent years.”

De Voil said that JCB Group had adopted a ‘Listen and Act Culture’ linked to annual employee engagement surveys.

The group has also introduced an interactive internal social media-style platform, or ‘Smart Hub’, which, she said, “refocusing our Internal Communications Strategy” and provided a platform to launch our brand new reward and benefits scheme to our employees.

A live news blog also keeps employees up-to-date on updates from the business as well as encouraging peer-to-peer recognition, with employees able to send each other eCards to say thank you or well done.

An ‘Ideas Hub’, meanwhile, allows staff to continuously encourage our staff to be creative an innovative with their ideas to help drive the business forward. 

De Voil said: “With these plus many more initiatives we were delighted to see a significant increase in our Employee Engagement score for 2016.

“We’re really proud of everything we’ve achieved with our employees over the last couple of years, so to be awarded Engagement Leader of the Year is the icing on the cake.”

JCB Group managing director, Jonathan Bischoff, said: “Since embracing a ‘Listen and Act Culture’ the Group has won four national awards from Volkswagen.

“Though it’s difficult to prove a hard link, the national Customer Care, Quality of Service Awards and Business Leadership Accreditations we’ve scored of late are no doubt connected to our commitment of engaging our workforce, making them happier, and subsequently boosting productivity and business performance.”

JCB Group currently represents Fiat, Honda, Skoda, Seat and Volkswagen at sites in Kent and Sussex.