CONTRACT CATERING

Winner The Brookwood Partnership
Employees 445

"They've built on what they did a year ago and now they really have the edge," is how one judge summed up the achievements of this company. It recently developed its management development programme for supervisors and managers, based on 11 training workshops. This has resulted in 20 out of 47 site managers being promoted internally.

The company has also launched an employee forum, enabling staff suggestions to go straight to the board. After last year's staff survey, effort has been put into improving communications. Regular briefings have been introduced and a staff newsletter relaunched. A profit-share scheme offers a bonus of 3-5% of salary to qualifying employees.

Commendation Bartlett Mitchell
Judges were impressed by Bartlett Mitchell's extremely low staff turnover of 12% and its independent counselling hotline available to all staff. Regular salary reviews, six-monthly appraisals and a personal development programme for every employee also won praise from the panel.

Commendation Vacherin
One judge described Vacherin as a company that "put the fun into work". An open communication policy encourages staff to talk to the top and share ideas. Culinary competitions across each unit foster a positive team spirit. In addition, staff perks include individual touches such as birthdays off and two duvet cover days a year.