Rebekah Wallis, Director of People & Corporate Responsibility…

RICOH: A Golden Journey

Ricoh empowers digital workplaces using innovative technologies and services that help people to work smarter. We have offices in London, Europe, the US and Singapore, operate in nearly 200 countries and regions and our global headquarters is in Tokyo.

Five into one

Between 2007-11, Ricoh UK went through a period of real change as we integrated five organisations into one. At the end of those four years, we were assessed by Investors in People, but that assessment was unsuccessful because some areas of the business didn’t meet the benchmarks for good people practices.

As disappointed as we were, we took the news as constructive feedback rather than a defeat, and used that feedback as the starting point to really get to know our people.

And we started that journey by sharing the results from our Investors in People assessment and our own engagement surveys. This was essential for us, as was working closely with both our Employee Forum and focus groups. 

Through open discussion with our people we identified immediate and long-term actions to make Ricoh a place where people want to work.

Then – acting on this feedback – we took a leap… And made three key changes.

Three key changes

First, we introduced Leadership Training for first level managers based on Investors in People’s feedback.

Second, we developed a unified reward and benefits package by being transparent with our people.

And thirdly, we developed new ways of working, focussing on building trust throughout our organisation.

New ways of working

We wanted to turn our workplaces into real-life working showrooms for customers, showcasing the changes we were trying to make.

So we transformed our physical space to maximise productivity. We gave people different kinds of spaces to contemplate, to concentrate on individual tasks and to communicate easily with each other. And we created more stimulating areas suited to brainstorming and collaboration.

Going for gold

And once we’d done that, we made a difficult decision: we wanted Investors in People to assess us again.

We thought we had changed rapidly, as the market place and the world of work changed just as fast. But were we ready for another assessment?

In 2014 we took the plunge, and held our breath as Investors in People did their job…

And this time the changes we had made were recognised – as we were awarded Gold by Investors in People.

Our relationship with Investors in People began in 2011. And it has been invaluable in widening our horizons and helping us to shine a spotlight into areas where relatively simple changes continue to produce significant results.

 “We have a lot in common with Investors in People’s philosophy and approach, putting people at the heart of everything we do.”

Joe Turner, CEO…

Bluestone was created nearly 2 years ago because I wanted to challenge both the private and the mainstream. I believe education should be available to everyone and am keen to promote face-to-face learning.

We’ve seen some impressive growth, which I’m very proud of. This has also meant a growing team. I’m a business leader and I know I can grow a business, but I needed some support and direction for the best ways to manage my people. Although I’d never worked with Investors in People, I heard about the One Year Accreditation and thought this could be a good route for us.

We’ve been able to use the feedback to make some big changes for real progression One of the biggest findings was around our vision and values. We realised that they were mine but not representative of the team. The process of assessment really allowed us to articulate our values.

This has led to us being able to recruit based on our purpose and vision and make sure that going forward everyone we hire ascribes to the same core beliefs about the value of education.

People were a little nervous going into the assessment but found the interviews really helpful and the report feels like something we all own and use, it even sits on my coffee table.

I was interested in the one year accreditation because I felt that it would be less time consuming and I liked using an e-platform to share our evidence. The team worked together to gather the best evidence to share so it really felt like something we did together.

Stuart Hearn, Founder & CEO…

We had some great feedback that one of our values – “120%” – had the risk of encouraging people to work long hours which was not the point. When the assessor spoke to our staff about this, they consistently used the words ‘going above and beyond’ instead, so we changed the value to ‘Above & Beyond’. Everyone is now crystal clear on what this means, and we hear the words regularly within our team when talking about successes and giving feedback and recognition