Nottingham based credit card company Capital One has been awarded the accolade of UK’s best large employer after winning first place in this year’s Great Place to Work® ‘UK’s Best Workplaces’ award for the second year running.
Capital One has been rated as number one in the 2014 awards large category open to all UK companies with over 500 employees, based on an assessment of its workplace culture and management practices by independent experts from the Great Place to Work® Institute.
Great Place to Work®’s decision was based on a survey of Capital One’s employees as part of its Trust Index©, which accounts for the majority of a company’s score in the awards.
Capital One’s employees praised the company for treating them fairly and with respect while expressing their pride in working for the company. Capital One’s biggest advocates are its employees with around one in five new recruits in 2013 referred by existing employees..
As well as winning the Great Place to Work® ‘Best Workplaces’ award for two years running, Capital One was voted ‘Europe’s Best Large Workplace’ in 2013 by Great Place to Work®. The company has a long term commitment to maintaining a best workplace environment.
Central to the company’s success in the awards are its commitment to its core values of ‘Excellence’ and ‘Do the right thing,’ which drive how the company aims to employ the best people and in turn is open and accountable to staff and customers.
Chris Newkirk, Managing Director of Capital One said: “We could not be happier to win this award for the second year running. It is a testament to our employees, who are dedicated to helping grow the business and supporting our vision. Being a great place to work is beneficial to our customers, as a happy, committed work force ultimately means better service for our customers. The Best Workplaces Programme aims to identify, create and sustain great workplaces through the development of high-trust workplace cultures and this fits perfectly with the ambition we have for our business.”
Tom O’Byrne, CEO of Great Place to Work® UK commented: “Capital One’s commitment to trust, engagement and best practice in the workplace shone through again this year and the company is a well-deserved two time winner. Their corporate vision is clearly translated through an extensive and co-ordinated programme that connects all their employees to the business. They have worked hard to stay ahead of the game across many areas of the business and have set the bar very high.”
What makes Capital One stand out from the crowd?
- Capital One’s vision of ‘Making Lives Better’ underpins everything the company does and this is supported by its commitment to truly meeting customer needs; giving people what they would expect; fostering lasting customer relationships; and having a culture of innovation.
- To develop this culture, Capital One has provided specialist innovation training to more than 250 staff with graduate trainees receiving this within weeks of joining.
- The company holds an annual ‘Vision Day’, which has been voted Best Corporate Event at UK Event Awards for the past three years, for the whole company including contractors and temporary staff. Last year’s event at the National Ice Centre in Nottingham generated almost 100 ideas to tackle business issues. Employees worked in teams and presented their proposals with the help of Urban Rappers
- The company also holds an annual Customer Week aimed at enabling employees to better understand customer experiences. This is now being used as a case study by Institute of Customer Service.
- Over the past year Capital One has improved its internal communications with the development of its corporate social media style internal platform, called Pulse. Currently 94% of employees use Pulse, 80% have joined one of the 256 groups available and 90% have a read at least one of the 600 UK blogs to choose from, giving all employees a choice to be heard.
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