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People Policy

  • 4th August 2017
  • At Denim Nation we avoid the use of the words Human Resources as we recognise that the people in our team are the key to our success. We aim to actively encourage their engagement, commitment and enthusiasm.

    To this end we share our values clearly with each team member and follow best practise in terms of recruitment, induction and retention.

    Recruitment

    We are an approachable, trustworthy, friendly and kind team that offer professional expert knowledge and advice to our customers.

    It is really important to everyone in the team that when someone new joins the family they will fit in, so every line manager works with Becki (Retail Director) and Luke (Managing Director) to make sure that a new member joining the team will fit in well with their colleagues.

    As most people are a little nervous in an interview or when filling in application form we think it’s really important to allow prospective new team members the opportunity of working for a few days with their new colleagues to ensure that they have the chance to find out a little more about the business and their colleagues as well giving us all the chance to make sure we are all going to enjoy working together.

    Induction

    Every new member of the team will get a full induction form their line manager.  This will include information on fire procedures, health and safety and company procedures and policies to detailed training on their specific role.

    As important as that is, we want everyone to get to know each other as we are a small tight knit team, so it’s really, really important to us that every new member of the team gets to know the rest of the family so we have regular ‘get-togethers’ where new colleagues get the chance to meet the rest of the team across the whole business.

    This may be over a quick beer after work, a meal to celebrate someone’s birthday or the annual ‘Company Day Out’ where we shut the shops for the day so everyone gets the opportunity to come along.

    Review Process

    Denim Nation believe that it’s important for us all to have regular feedback so Luke operates an open door policy, and colleagues can pop in, email, phone, what’s app, text or just grab him at any time to discuss their thoughts and ideas, this is great as all our best ideas to improve and grow the business come from the team.

    Luke will also sit down with colleagues regularly to chat about progress and where things are going well and also where things need a little nurture to improve and how we can help them with this.

    All colleagues have an annual review where everyone gets the chance to sit down with their line Manager to chat about their achievements for the year and their plans for the future, whether that’s the opportunity to enhance their skills with extra training and qualifications to taking a sabbatical to travel or take part in charity work overseas.  We firmly believe that we should be able to allow team members time to travel and take part in other things outside their work as this allows them to grow both personally and professionally.

    The annual review is also an opportunity for our colleagues to give us feedback on how we can all grow and improve the business.

    Rewards

    Rewards come in so many shapes as sizes, from ensuing we pay people fairly for their work, to a bonus when they hit their targets and being able to recognise someone’s achievements by promoting them to a more senior role.

    But as important as these things are the little things are equally as important, The Christmas Do’, the Annual Company Outing, a few beers after work, a team trip to see one of our suppliers, a buying trip to London, a birthday meal for one of the team, to some fantastic cakes from the Better Bun Company when we have had a good month. Down to little things like borrowing a van when moving house and being able to nip out for a doctors or dentists appointment.

    We think it’s important that every member of the team shares in the benefits that come from being part of a successful business.

    Training

    We are extremely fortunate that we have a fantastic team and our colleagues actively embrace change in fact they drive change within the business. We are continually developing their skills and knowledge.  Our management team are great at ensuring all the team are up to speed on all internal procedures and new developments.

    We realise we can’t do this alone so we work with external providers to buy in courses and training, whether this be First Aid course to Facebook Marketing webinar, we think it’s important that our team have the best tools to do their job.

    In addition to this we are fortunate to work with fantastic training partners including Herefordshire and Ludlow College of Technology, Riverside Training and Nova Training, who as well as supporting our apprentices offer training and development to existing colleagues.

    In conclusion our company ethos ensures means that we have created an environment that puts the emphasis on team work. Our people do have individual responsibility, but through our training and reward and review process we have ensured that our people are multi-skilled and keen to co-operate through the different areas of the business with the aim to deliver more success and flexibility to our innovative business.