UK EO Awards Highly commended: Duo the cornerstone of culture change

Highly commended for Employee Owner of the Year are Ali Jennings and Simon Drewett from East Coast Community Health. Ali, a qualified nurse of 33 years, and Simon, a Training Officer, were elected by employee shareholders to join the board to represent the interests of the shareholders.

East Coast Community Health became employee owned, after spinning out of the NHS 6 years ago, and has more than 880 employees. Judges were impressed with Simon and Ali’s accomplishments as employee shareholder representatives including helping to raise the number of shareholders from 55% to 80% of employee. They were also impressed by their work to drive a 90% response rate to the latest staff survey in which staff said they felt their opinions mattered, the establishment of the Shareholder Council and that they are cited as being “the cornerstone for changing culture at the organisation, which has resulted in improved recruitment and retention of staff”.