Author: Lucy Wood

Around the world, someone takes their own life every 40 seconds – that’s nearly one million deaths by suicide every year.

It can be upsetting and potentially triggering to read about suicide. In the event that you’re feeling vulnerable at the moment, you might want to consider reading this content at a time when you don’t feel distressed.

Saturday, 10th September 2022 marks World Suicide Prevention Day and this year it’s all about creating hope through action. We are providing our colleagues with the tools they need to have a conversation and potentially save a life. Our thoughts are with our colleagues at this time.

We’ve also asked our colleagues to make a pledge and commit to looking after family, friends, colleagues and others. By making the pledge they are agreeing to take a suicide prevention online training course run by the Zero Suicide Alliance to help spot the warning signs in others and signpost them to help.

If you would like to join us in making a pledge, please click here.

You can find more information and ways to signpost people to help using these links:

www.retailtrust.org.uk

www.samaritans.org

www.healthierlsc.co.uk/OrangeButtonScheme

Revo’s ‘A Celebration of Place‘ is an industry and UK wide recognition campaign to celebrate the good within the industry over what has been an extremely challenging couple of years.

Covering three categories; Represent, Reflect and Reinvigorate, our partners and colleagues are being recognised for their contribution to the industry during and after the global pandemic.   

REPRESENT

Our Security Team at Templars Square Shopping Centre feature in the Represent category.  During the pandemic, the team took it upon themselves to look after vulnerable members of their community by collecting and delivering essential supplies.

This was a fantastically selfless act which made a real difference in their local community. Their actions ensured that many of the elderly and vulnerable people around the centre and local community had essentials supplies during a difficult time.

REFLECT

The Galleries, Bristol are being recognised for supporting the NHS throughout the pandemic, offering free parking to NHS staff in a neighbouring hospital.

Quadrant Shopping Centre are being recognised for the positive contribution their community initiatives have had in their local area.

REINVOGORATE

Telford Centre have been recognised for work they did during the pandemic to help their independent traders survive. 

Castle Quay Shopping Centre are being recognised for the development work they have done to Lock29, supporting local and independent traders.

We wish our colleagues and partners the very best of luck in the A Celebration of Place Recognition Night, Judges Choice Awards, being held in London on the 13^th September. 

We are extremely pleased to announce that Sandra Perry from Templars Square Shopping Centre has been recognised as a Finalist in the Women in Security Awards 2022. 

Sandra has been nominated by Dual Service Manager, Mark Driscoll for her contribution to Templars Square over the past year.  Mark commented, “Sandra is such an inspirational female officer, she is passionate about the job she does and every shift that she works, she gives 100%.” 

We wish Sandra the very best of luck in the finals which take place in London on 14^th September. 

Huge congratulations to Gillian Davidson, our Guest Services Manager at Market Place Shopping Centre for being shortlisted as a finalist in the She Inspires Awards 2022!

The awards celebrate the huge wealth of outstanding contributions women have made to Bolton and Gill is a worthy finalist in the Women in Leadership category.

The finals take place in Bolton on the 24th November and we wish Gill the very best of luck.

Our people are what make us special. From saving lives and preventing crime to helping people in need and much more. Our Reward and Recognition scheme is our way of saying thank you to our Colleagues for the amazing work that they do each and every day, often going above and beyond in their role.

Well done to all our winners and everyone who has been nominated for an award this quarter – you are all amazing!

Our 2022 Quarter 2 winners are:

Team of the Quarter

• Castle Quay Team
• Royal Priors Team
• Head Office Operations Team
• Market Place Cleaning Team

Site Manager of the Quarter

• Clint Sayers, Telford Centre

Colleague of the Quarter

• Dianne Gardiner, Riverside Evesham
• Karen Watkinson, QVC Knowsley

Newcomer of the Quarter

• Sharon Miller, Morgan Quarter
• Jack Davenport, Templars Square  

CSR of the Quarter

• Queens Square Team
• Barry Davenport, Market Place

Health & Safety Champion

• Brenda Peacock, Novelis
• Riverside Evesham Team

Outstanding Act

• Asa Abraham, Queens Square
• Tai Adewuji & Wes Harper, Market Place
• Philip Bird & Jamie Barnbrook, Telford Centre
• Inderpal Singh & Jamie Banbrook, Telford Centre
• Marc Brewster, The Meadows
• Shaibu Abu, The Meadows
• Jason Baker, Tony Cairns, Brain Heeney & Jane Gerrard, Spindles Town Square
• Barry Burnham, Templars Square
• Martin wain, Jack Davenport, Mohammad Ali, Templars Square
• Kirsty Kirkland, Alan McCabe, Mark Quinn, St Johns

Service Excellence

• Safeer Khan, Tata Technologies
• Deborah Ogden, Spindles Town Square
• Jane Hassel, DSA
• Waqas and the Operations Team, Tata Technologies
• Craig Wilkinson, Touchwood
• Rebecca Higgins & Roger Smith, Maylord
• Timea Kubikova, Head Office
• Christine Preece, Royston Davies & Jackie Bull, Telford Centre
• Majed Ali, Cornbow
• Melissa Hales, Head Office

Congratulations to all our winning colleagues and to everyone who was nominated.

If you wish to nominate a colleague for a Reward & Recognition award, click here.

To see a list of all our previous winners, click here.

The Westgrove Group has scooped a prestigious national industry award for its outstanding security personnel work.

Organised by the British Security Industry Association (BSIA), the awards showcase the national finals of the security personnel categories and highlight outstanding personnel within the industry who have gone above and beyond the call of duty in their everyday work.

The Security Team at Templars Square Shopping Centre in Oxford have been awarded with the BEST TEAM accolade in this years’ awards, the second time they won in this category over the past 3 years.

The nomination summary read: “The team are being recognised for a myriad of cases which they have managed to successfully resolve, including suicide attempts, muggings, violent theft, fly tipping, stabbings, retrieval of bladed articles and even having to clean up ‘pooffitti’.  They have also given up their own time to improve the green spaces and help to relocate and set up a children’s charity in the centre.”

We are extremely proud of the whole team at Templars Square for everything they have achieved – congratulations to them all!

Well done and congratulations to our other Westgrove finalists;

Mohammed Osman, Queens Square – Security Manager of the Year Regional Winer

Paul Britton, The Galleries – Security Manager of the Yer Regional Winner

St Johns Shopping Centre – Best Team Regional Winner

Cornbow Shopping Centre – Service to the Customer Regional Winner

Ben Jaggers, Telford Centre – Outstanding Act Regional Winner

Our security team at Birchwood Park have ditched their cars for bikes in an effort to become more sustainable.    

Birchwood Park hosts around 6,000 people in over 160 businesses on a 134-acre site in the heart of Cheshire.  The Security team will cover around 45,000 miles per year on their bikes – not only is it better for the environment but the team will work smarter – they will patrol more effectively by getting to places quicker than on foot and to places a car can’t get and there are the positive mental health benefits too.  

Stuart, Security Manager at Birchwood Park said “it creates a practical means of patrolling the business park that won’t impact the environment plus it helps with our mental health, we can talk to our colleagues whilst cycling around and it’s a great way to get fit!”

At Westgrove we recognise that we have a responsibility to help protect the environment and reduce our carbon foot print and we’re proud of the team at Birchwood Park for implementing this initiative.

This week, through our partnership with the Retail Trust, we’re supporting Men’s Health Week.  

This year, the aim is to get more men talking. About their health. Their feelings. Their worries.  Men’s Health Week takes place annually during the week ending on Father’s Day and recognises the importance of the health and wellbeing of boys and men. Father’s Day was chosen as the anchor to make use of the extra attention paid to male family members near that holiday.  Men’s Health Week provides an opportunity to educate about what can be done to improve the state of men’s health.  

The Retail Trust have talked to some of the top experts in male mental health and pulled together their best advice, tips and guidance which we are providing to all our colleagues.  

These resources can be found HERE.

Our colleagues have access to free and confidential advice and support 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year through our partnership with the Retail Trust.  

Our Westgrove colleagues and sites have been busy over the weekend celebrating the Queens Platinum Jubilee. We’ve had everything from street parties, colouring competitions, parades and more!

We are proud to be celebrating #nationalvolunteerweek2022. Volunteer Week is an annual celebration of the contribution millions of people make across the UK through volunteering. As well as helping others, volunteering has been shown to improve the volunteers’ mental and physical wellbeing too.

At The Westgrove Group, we see the importance of giving back and we are pleased to be able to offer our colleagues the opportunity to volunteer for a cause close to their hearts through our ‘Volunteer Days’ scheme.

Lucy from our Marketing Team recently used one of our Volunteer Days to support a local primary school to help them to dig a pond! 

The school wanted to develop an unused area of their outdoor space to create a pond to attract local wildlife to the area. Ponds are a wildlife magnet, providing homes, breeding grounds, bathing spots, food and a watering hole for all manner of creatures including birds, frogs, toads, newts and insects and it will create an ideal live science lesson for the children as well as an array of opportunities to help maintain the pond and learn more about it.

Lucy said: “Spending a day digging a pond with a fantastic bunch of people was a great experience. It was hard graft but I had so much fun and found it very rewarding knowing that my contribution would create so many experiences for all the children to enjoy”.

Colleagues can find out more about Westgrove Volunteer Days by emailing marketing@westgrove.co.uk.