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'Living It' - August 2009

August 2009 saw an incredible amount of nomination forms being submitted for the ‘BEST Monthly Living It Awards’ and due to the exceptionally high standard the judging panel decided to award more than one winner in some categories.

There were four outstanding BEST Leaders for August these were; Eunice McCall & Claire Vaughan from Selly Oak Constituency Office, Dave Rose from Selly Oak Constituency Managers Team and Nathalia Perera from the Temporary Accommodation Team all from within the Housing & Constituencies Directorate.

Eunice & Claire were nominated by their manager Chris Jordan Constituency Director for Selly Oak and BEST Sponsor, who was impressed that they had organised a workshop which resulted in a team set on building self esteem, acknowledging and celebrating what they do well and what could be done to improve their services. Their enthusiasm and commitment to ensuring their actions have been met has been excellent for the team’s morale. Eunice and Claire were successful at the BEST Dragons’ Den in July winning funding for their action to have a constituency insight day for older adults to show them what was available to them within the local area and have a talk on local history. They take pride in, and get involved with, their local community and are also planning to go on walkabouts picking up litter, which supports the Council outcome of Staying Safe in a Clean Green City.

Dave Rose was also nominated by his manager Chris Jordan for his innovative way of engaging his team. He embraced the challenge of finding a new way to present his BEST workshop and his approach meant his team were able to relate to BEST and allowed them to use untapped creativity and imagination for the benefit of service users and the council. Dave gave his team the opportunity to rise to the challenge of an ‘Apprentice’ style task. The objective was to create a new brand identity for the beauty salon at Cocks Moors Wood Leisure Centre, mirroring the popular programme the team were split in to two teams to encourage a healthy competitive spirit! Dave also thanks his team and shows recognition where it is due.

Nathalia was nominated by her colleague Andrew Nott. Andrew praised Nathalia for her dedication to the role and for the imagination she has showed. He felt her facilitation skills enabled the team to come up with well thought out improvements to team working and service delivery that will have a real impact on the team and service users, for example new lone working procedures. Even though Nathalia was working with mixed teams from across the service area she showed real trust by ensuring that open and honest dialogue occurred.

Jointly winning the BEST Team of the Month for August were; Sutton Coldfield Constituency Team from Housing & Constituencies Directorate and Residential Rehabilitation Assessment & Aftercare Team from Adults & Communities Directorate.

Sutton Coldfield Constituency Team, led by BEST Leader Helen Millington, were nominated by their manager Gill Taylor Constituency Director for Sutton Coldfield. Gill is immensely proud that the team have demonstrated the kind of motivation and dedication that has enabled them to change lives through BEST. They have gone the extra mile to make sure that the values become part of the working culture of the team. By pushing the boundaries of a BEST workshop they came up with a project based around building a sensory garden at Leonard Cheshire House, a residential and day care facility for adults with disabilities. The project has made a massive difference to the service users and was a great team building exercise.

Also winning the Team of the Month Award for August was Residential Rehabilitation Assessment & Aftercare Team. The team was nominated by one of their colleagues Nikki Mason. Nikki detailed how well the team demonstrate the core values on a daily basis. As a team they are always striving to improve service delivery, working hard to reach and extend beyond set targets. They always support their colleagues at work and in their personal lives as well and have developed a peer support service where colleagues can talk about difficult cases. They demonstrate trust by celebrating service user’s achievements by inviting them to contribute to future service delivery.

August 2009 saw the award for Senior Leader of the Month being handed to Mike Davis, Senior Constituency Manager (Perry Barr Constituency) for the Housing & Constituencies Directorate. Mike was nominated by member of staff Anni Stephens. Anni said one of the things that makes Mike such a great senior manager for BEST is that he always listens to, and acts on, new ideas from staff. He never dismisses an idea without giving it careful thought and suggesting a way forward. His door is always open for staff and he encourages employees to take on new challenges and recognises when a job has been well done and expresses his thanks. Anni says quite simply that Mike is a joy to work for.

Congratulations to all our winners on their success. If you would like to nominate someone or are looking for more information regarding the Monthly “Living It” Awards please contact Lucy L Kenny on 0121 675 1579, email BEST, check out our inline pages or go to the 'Living It' Awards section on this website.