Our Commitment to the GM Good Employment Charter
Stockport-based Sales and IT recruiters, Grassroots Recruitment, has signed up to Greater Manchester’s Good Employment Charter and is urging other Stockport businesses to do the same.
The Good Employment Charter was launched by Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham, at an event attended by over 200 companies from across Greater Manchester; 80 companies have since signed up to the charter.
However, compared to it’s neighbouring boroughs in Greater Manchester, Stockport employers are so far under represented. Only seven Stockport businesses have committed to the Good Employment Charter.
Operations Director, Caroline Patten said:
“There are over 12,000 businesses in Stockport, so it would be great to see more companies committing to the Good Employment Charter to celebrate how well they look after their staff.
“It’s not just big corporates who care about best practice and we’re a great example of this. Providing a working environment where our team can thrive and deliver consistently great results is the foundation for our People Strategy.”
What is the Good Employment Charter?
The Greater Manchester Good Employment Charter is a voluntary membership and assessment scheme, created to help deliver good jobs with opportunities for people to progress and develop, along with a thriving and productive economy within the city-region.
Member organisations are expected to adhere to the Good Employment Charter’s seven principles, encouraging equality, diversity and innovation. These are:
- Providing secure work
- Enabling a more flexible workforce
- A commitment to provide the Real Living Wage
- Offering employee engagement and voice
- Demonstrating positive people management
- Supporting employee health and wellbeing
- Recruiting a diverse workforce.
What do businesses need to do to become a Good Employment supporter?
The standards have been developed to not only set aspirations for excellence but to offer the flexibility to ensure employers of all sizes and sectors can be part of the movement, where members assessed on a case-by-case rather than one-size-fits-all model.
For Grassroots Recruitment, their team of 8 full-time employees based in the town centre are already meetng most of the desired criteria:
“We offer a standard 35-hour working week with flexi-time for later start and earlier finish times to encourage a better worklife balance as many of our team have family commitments”, explains Caroline. “We also have a WellBeing Strategy and provide 2 days of training and workshops each year to support positive Mental Health.”
Grassroots is also committed to paying the Real Living Wage, provides a training academy combining e-learning and monthly Lunch & Learn sessions and has a proactive approach to CSR and in supporting their local community.
Caroline concludes:
“We haven’t changed anything to become a Supporter of the Good Employment Charter, but it’s an important way to show the team we’re committed to supporting them and providing a great place to work.”
Other Stockport businesses to sign up to the Good Employment Charter include employee-owned schoolwear manufacturer, Rowlinson Knitwear, and technology reseller, musicMagpie.
To find out more about our quality processes and commitment to best practice, click here to read more about us, our achievements, awards and the GR story.
