Our people
Our Approach
Our people are a valuable asset to Next and we strive to create an environment that enables us to attract and retain the right people to work at every level throughout our business. We are committed to providing a working environment in which our employees can develop to achieve their full potential and have opportunities for both professional and personal development. Our aim is to provide an environment where our employees are supported and respected, treated fairly, listened to and are involved.
Next is an equal opportunities employer, and we continue to ensure we offer careers opportunities for our employees without discrimination. We make adjustments, wherever possible, to improve the working environment and accommodate employees with disabilities. We have developed policies for the recruitment, training and development of employees, as we remain committed to investing time and resource to support, engage and motivate our employees to feel valued, be able to develop rewarding careers and want to stay with Next. As our business continues to develop we understand that by retaining effective and committed employees we can continue to deliver excellent quality products and an excellent service to our customers.
Next, like the majority of retailers, has seen sales decline during the current economic downturn. Our challenge in these tough trading conditions, is to carefully manage all costs in the business, including staffing costs, whilst maintaining and retaining the talent and skills to ensure we are in a positive position to recover quickly and emerge stronger than before. One way we can achieve this is by reviewing all vacancies as they arise and determine whether the role needs to be replaced or if it can be absorbed into other areas of the business. Through this action, and many others, we aim to protect the job security of our employees and help ensure Next is well positioned to move forwards as the economic climate improves.
PROGRESS ON OPPORTUNITIES FROM 2008 REPORT
KEY
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Achieved
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Ongoing/on track
= Not
commenced
| Opportunities identified in 2008 | Status | How we have progressed |
| Deliver an on-line accident reporting system to cover our Head Office, Warehousing and Distribution and Directory operations. System already in operation within Retail | |
Achieved. |
| Develop the Company Safety Programme 2009- 2011. These will be developed at Divisional level and adopted by the Board in November 2008 | |
Achieved. See page 36 for more information about our work in this area. |
| Working with external specialists review our current manual handling training programme in Warehousing, revise, and improve training and establish implementation plan | |
Achieved. |
| Improve our existing programme of Driver Risk Management for all our Company Car drivers by working with Drive and Survive, an external leading provider | |
Achieved. |
| Review our store development procedures to ensure we are adopting good practice throughout our store development programme | |
Achieved. |
| Carry out further safety reviews at our manufacturing facility in Sri Lanka and our call centre in Pune, India | |
Achieved. |
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