Author: Lucy Wood

Its #NationalApprenticeshipWeek and what better way to celebrate than interviewing our very own Westgrove Apprentice; Jordan.    

National Apprenticeship Week aims to celebrate apprenticeships and the positive impact they have on individuals, businesses and the wider economy.  Apprenticeships are a growing option for people to earn while they learn and a vital entry route to gaining the skills and behaviours required to progress in the professional sector.

Jordan is studying Business Administration Level 3, an 18 month course designed to give her the skills she needs to progress her career.  She joined Westgrove 6 months ago as Operations Admin and is now an intrinsic part of the Westgrove team.

Let’s meet Jordan… 

Tell us a bit about your apprenticeship:

I’m studying Business Administration Level 3.  It’s an 18 month course designed to give me on-the-job experience to develop real world skills.  I work full time but also study as part of my working week.

Why did you want to do an apprenticeship?

Doing an apprenticeship has allowed me to study and work at the same time which has helped me so much in gaining the confidence and skills that I can use in the real world.  I knew I wanted to continue learning after school but I also wanted to get a job so this was a perfect decision for me.

What do you do at Westgrove?

I joined Westgrove in July (6 months ago) as Operations Admin.  My job is varied and no day is the same.  I get to work with all the different departments at Head Office like HR and Finance.  I do all the admin jobs like keeping systems up to date, answering the phones and the door and all the general admin work. 

What do you like about your job?

I love the office environment, everybody is so nice and friendly. 

Tell us something we might not know about you?

I’ve been Morris Dancing for 15 years and my favourite holiday destination is Mexico! 

Our Reward and Recognition Awards are our way of thanking our Colleagues for the amazing work that they do everyday.

Here are our latest Outstanding Act winners. Congratulations to them all.

Natalee Watmough & Louise Whitehead – The Lowry Outlet

Natalee and Louise helped to comfort a young girl who had fallen and broken her arm. While waiting for the ambulance to arrive, they kept the injured girl as calm and comfortable as they could as well as reassuring her mother, who later emailed the management team to express her gratitude for everything the team had done. Well done to you both!

Security Team – Birchwood Park

Congratulations to the Security Team for their outstanding professionalism, calmness and confidence in handling a difficult situation. Communication was key in this situation and the full team on site played their part.

Ansaar Hussain – Security Officer – Spindles Town Square

Ansaar was praised for his swift and professional response after helping a woman in distress while he was on patrol.

Mark Driscoll – Dual Services Manager – Templars Square

Mark was also congratulated for his amazing work in a difficult situation.

We are delighted to announce a number of new contract awards which continues to strengthen our position as a leading facilities management partner.

As well as shopping centres, we have been awarded contracts in new sectors including manufacturing and the public sector, offering new service provisions and bringing in some brilliant new Colleagues to help support us. New shopping centre awards include Telford, Corby and Leeds. We are also delighted to have been awarded the cleaning contract for Greenwich Peninsular in London further strengthening our southern portfolio.

These include providing dual security and cleaning services as well as a growth in demand for other services as shopping centres increasingly move away from traditional retail schemes and towards mixed use food and beverage, residential or leisure use.

You can find out more about our work in the new issue of The Westgrove Magazine. Email enquiries@westgrove.co.uk for a copy.

The latest issue of our magazine is hot off the press and packed with lots of Westgrove news.

It has been another fantastic year for the company and the magazine celebrates our strong growth and welcomes new schemes and Colleagues to our portfolio across the UK.

We’ve got interviews with our Partners and Colleagues, news about our new technology, systems and services and the awards we have won.

We showcase our training and development work and our commitment to raising mental health awareness.

And we reveal the incredible work that our people do every day.

Click here to view Issue 10 of the Westgrove Magazine now!

You can view The Westgrove Magazine back catalogue here:

Westgrove Magazine Issue 9

Westgrove Magazine Issue 8

Westgrove Magazine Issue 7

Westgrove Magazine Issue 6

Westgrove Magazine Issue 5 

The Westgrove Group, one of the UK’s leading independent facilities management companies, has been nominated for a prestigious diversity awareness award.

The Warrington based company is a finalist in the Kimberly-Clark Professional Golden Service Awards 2020.

Held biennially, the awards were created 30 years ago to reward the excellence of facilities management and cleaning teams and are a hallmark of quality.

The winners will be announced at The Golden Service Awards ceremony which will take place on March 4^th at the London Hilton on Park Lane.

Claire McKinley Smith, Managing Director of The Westgrove Group, said: “We are delighted to have been shortlisted as a finalist in these prestigious awards for Diversity Awareness, recognising our commitment and investment in raising mental health awareness in the workplace.

“We have seen so many benefits this year in raising awareness of mental health with our colleagues across the UK. This will continue into 2020 with more investment in training and support in mental health and other areas of diversity awareness.”

Earlier this year, Westgrove embarked on a journey to improve mental health awareness across the business.

A number of initiatives were rolled out across the year which aimed to create a work place environment where all colleagues felt comfortable in discussing their own and other people’s mental health.

The whole company, including over 1,000 colleagues across the UK, got involved and it delivered measurable results including the appointment of mental health first aiders, awareness weeks and a new well-being portal with the charity retailTRUST offering 24/7 free and confidential help to colleagues.

Working with bodies such as the Samaritans, MHFA and Revo, the representative body for retail and shopping centres, Westgrove is also looking at good practice and specialist training around mental health and suicide awareness for all their colleagues working in shopping centres.

The Westgrove Group is on course to become a £40million turnover business in the next five years.

The company provides its security, cleaning and PRM (Persons with Reduced Mobility) services to shopping centres, corporates, business parks, retail environments and airports across the UK.

The Westgrove Group, which recently celebrated its 21^st anniversary, was founded by Group Chairmen Simon Whittle and Steve Fives. The Senior Management Team have proven direct Shopping Centre pedigree including operational experience at some of the country’s largest regional Shopping Centres such as the Trafford Centre and Meadowhall.

They have held senior positions for owners such as Westfield and managing agents including CBRE and Lambert Smith Hampton demonstrating strong commercial and operational experience.

Facilities management company the Westgrove Group has engaged with retailTRUST to support the welfare of the company’s colleagues.

Through the partnership, Westgrove can now offer free and confidential support to all its 1,000 plus colleagues 24/7 through an on-line portal and helpline, My RTWellbeing.

retailTRUST is a charity which supports the wellbeing of people employed in the service industry including retail, aviation, manufacturing, corporate and many other sectors.

As well as self-help tools online, downloadable resources, counselling and CBT, the Trust also offers critical incident support.

The Westgrove Group is investing heavily in the wellbeing of its colleagues. The Warrington headquartered company recently declared its first Mental Health Awareness Week a big success.

Over the course of a week the company sent out daily advice and information to its colleagues to help build awareness of mental health. Colleagues were also signposted to advice on podcasts and videos and given tools to test their stress and levels of positive mental health.

As part of the Westgrove Aspire Training & Development programme, colleagues were encouraged to take a ‘Mental Health Awareness’ online eLearning course giving them an understanding of the importance of their own and other people’s mental health.

Over 70 Westgrove colleagues are now qualified as MHFA England mental health first aiders with an additional 50 planned by the end of 2020.

Westgrove HR Manager Hannah Denning said: “Supporting the wellbeing of our colleagues is vitally important to us as a company, which is why we are working hard to increase awareness of mental health issues both generally and within the workplace.

“Engaging with retailTRUST allows us to extend our colleague welfare offer in line with the mental health awareness training we rolled out earlier in the year.”

As well as retailTRUST, the company is also working with bodies including the Samaritans, MHFA and Revo, the representative body for retail and shopping centres.

Our first Mental Health Awareness Week has been a big success.

Over the course of the week, we sent out daily advice and information to our colleagues to help build awareness of mental health. Colleagues were also signposted to advice on podcasts and videos and given tools to test their stress and levels of positive mental health.

As part of the Westgrove Aspire Training & Development programme, colleagues were encouraged to take a ‘Mental Health Awareness’ online eLearning course giving them an understanding of the importance of their own and other people’s mental health.

Over 70 Westgrove colleagues are now qualified as MHFA England mental health first aiders with an additional 50 planned by the end of 2020. MHFA offers mental health training, including Mental Health First Aid (MHFA), a mental health skills and awareness programme.

Westgrove Managing Director Claire McKinley Smith said: “We are working hard to increase general awareness of mental health issues both generally and within the workplace.

“Working with bodies such as the Samaritans, MHFA and Revo, the representative body for retail and shopping centres, we are also looking at good practice and specialist training around mental health and suicide awareness for all our colleagues working in shopping centres.

“We are delighted that over 50% of our colleagues trained via eLearning during Mental Health Awareness Week and are encouraging others to do so by the end of the year.

“We also received some great feedback from colleagues who felt well informed and empowered after taking the course. We are looking forward to holding more Mental Health Awareness Days in the coming months.”

Westgrove will be supporting World Suicide Prevention Day on September 10^th as well as running their own Awareness Week.

Westgrove expands into the South

To head up our continued expansion into the South, we have recruited a new Business Development Director.

Adrian Canale, who has worked extensively in facilities management across a range of sectors, has been appointed to support our continued business development and also bring the company into new sectors including education and healthcare.

Click here to find out more.

Westgrove a winner at the British Security Awards 2019

We are delighted to announce that the Westgrove Group won a prestigious award at this year’s British Security Awards.

Steve Allen, Dual Service Manager at Haymarket Shopping Centre, won the national award for ‘Service to the Customer’. He was presented with his award at the event held at the London Grosvenor Marriott Hotel.

Our BSIA regional winners included Paul Ogden, Market Place (Service to the Customer), Vijay Odedra, Haymarket Shopping Centre (Best use of Technology), Gavin Jones, Matthew Lamb and John Wallbank, Ropewalk Shopping Centre (Outstanding Act), Steven Travis, Arcades Shopping Centre (Outstanding Act) and Matthew Bray, Concourse Shopping Centre (Best Newcomer).

Mental Health Awareness Week

Mental Health is something that Westgrove believes strongly in, which is why we were delighted with the success of our recent Awareness Week.

During the week, we sent out daily advice and information to our colleagues to help build awareness of mental health and offer advice.

Over 50% of colleagues trained via our online eLearning course during the week and we received some great feedback. 

Look out for more Mental Health Awareness Days, fundraising activities and do ask about our eLearning course.

Did you know?

We are proud to have been accredited as a Living Wage Recognised Service Provider. This means we work with our Partners to recommend that they pay the Real Living Wage of £9 per hour (£10.55 in London), rather than the National Living Wage of £8.21.

New Colleague Engagement Survey

Hearing from our colleagues is extremely important to us. This year, we are asking what you think on a quarterly basis.

Look out for the link coming soon to our third Colleague Engagement Survey. This new survey focuses on Health & Safety.

The results of our first two surveys will be appearing in the new issue of the Westgrove Magazine, out soon.

Reward and Recognition Awards – Quarter 2 Winners

Here are all our R&R Award winners for Quarter 2. Congratulations to you all.

Site Manager of the Quarter
Stewart Todd – Security Manager – Birchwood Park

CSR of the Quarter
Joanne O’Neill – Business Manager

Team of the Quarter
Birchwood Park Security Team

Colleague of the Quarter
Martin Davison – Cleaning Operative – Gloucester Quays

Service Excellence of the Quarter
Waqas Maroof – Service Manager – TATA Technologies
Jack Beeney – Guest Service Ambassador – The Galleries Shopping Centre
Carpark Team – Grosvenor Shopping Centre
Istvan Szobollodi & Andrew Gregory – The Galleries Shopping Centre
Gillian Hurst – Cleaning Operative – Liverpool Air Traffic Control
Ajay Shah – MSO Supervisor – MSO Team
Lion Yard Cleaning Team – Lion Yard Shopping Centre
Stan Sinclair – Business Manager

Outstanding Act: May 2019
Lauren Gilhooley – Security Officer, St Johns Shopping Centre
Simon O’Neill and Keith O’Neill – Cleaning Operatives, The Lowry Outlet
Rajdeep Sidhu & Zdenek Lanik – Security Officers, Skydome Leisure World

We’re raising awareness of mental health all week to support the Mental Health Foundation. You or someone you know may at some point in their life be affected by mental health issues and need support. 

We are sending out advice and information each day starting with a special video from our Brand Ambassador Alex Staniforth, himself a champion for mental health awareness.