Embrace growth, learning and change
We have some pretty great talent at Yewdale, from our expert office team to our equally highly-skilled production teams. Our core values keep us focused on what is important, one of those being ‘embrace growth, learning and change’.
Many values drive us to invest in staff development and growth – let's face it, without our colleagues we wouldn’t be able to deliver the quality products and an exceptional customer experience we are renowned for. We take pride in developing our staff and strongly believe that you never stop learning – learning new skills keeps us fresh in our roles, challenges us and even enhances our work-life balance. Yewdale sees training, personal development and educational opportunities as essential investments in staff and that’s why we provide access to LinkedIn learning and other training courses to enhance skills.
We know the importance of company culture and treating our colleagues right, we had a chat with HR to gain further insight into what makes a company appealing - why would you want to bring your knowledge and skills to Yewdale?
HR’s perspective
To make a company desirable, you need to focus on your staff and provide them with the tools they need for their role and support, praise, open communication, and development opportunities. Here at Yewdale, we have a unique culture, we get a kick out of internal development - it’s one of the things that make us happy and proud (happy staff + happy customers = happy business!). We focus on smart working, embracing growth and working together as a team – we think we’re quite nurturing!
Within Yewdale, there are many opportunities for personal and career development from building skills across our 14 factory departments, promotion to senior operative to promotions within the office. Throughout our factory departments, we use a training matrix to track the skill development of an employee and highlight the potential for future growth. 30% of our office staff began their career manufacturing our products – we appreciate the complexities of our products and if someone has hands-on experience with great product knowledge but not direct customer service or office-based skills, we recognise their product skill set and invest in their personal development.
We’re big on success and we love communicating and celebrating our successes as a team. We send around daily KPI figures, so staff know how we are performing, share internal newsletters with key updates and encourage teams to have daily huddles to filter messages to the full team. With success comes celebration, we often use internal events to thank the staff and celebrate our teamwork.
With that in mind, we’d like to show you some real-life examples of how we are advocates of training and personal development and investing in our staff. Hear from two members of the Yewdale team who started as temp staff and are now senior members within the sales team and purchasing department.
Brian’s story – from nightshift Production Operative temp to Business Development Manager
“In July 2011, I started as a Production Operative temp on the nightshift in Yewdale – specialising in the roller blind department. After three months as a temp, I was offered a permanent contract and a promotion to the Senior Operative of the roller blind department!
After four months, a role became available within the processing team in the office - to process the paperwork for the factory and I was the successful candidate. While working in the production team, I was also the health and safety Senior Operative. On the 1st November 2013, I was promoted to Sales Office Support within the estimating department, this entailed producing quotes and managing customer queries on the phone. In June 2014 I was promoted to Executive Sales Assistant to Jerry (Head of Sales) to help him plan meetings and be the in-house contact for all our customers. In 2015 my role changed to Internal Account Manager which had more focus on direct sales and included more responsibility of growing customers.
Finally, in 2017 I was promoted to Business Development Manager. The role I am in today includes being solely responsible for the growth and sustainability of a group of customers. Within my time at Yewdale, I have been given access to sales seminars, training courses and LinkedIn learning which has helped grow my skill set and personal development”.
Casey’s journey – from Production Operative temp to Senior Buyer
“I started working at Yewdale as a temp in the summer of 2012, I was 17 years old and was the youngest employee at that time I believe. I was working in the roller blind department as an assembler throughout that summer – when we had one cutting table and four assembling stations. After summer was over, I went back to my college studies and re-joined Yewdale for the summer of 2013 and carried on working in the roller blind department and was awarded a full-time contract! At the end of summer, I was moved to the goods-in department and for the next 4-5 years I was a key part of the goods-in team, becoming a qualified FLT (forklift truck) driver and an unofficial 2nd hand man to the senior operative. This is where I was able to gain lots of product knowledge. In November 2018, I applied and obtained a Procurement Assistant position, working closely with Lynette, the Purchasing Manager and goods-in, I hit the ground running and used my experience gained within the goods-in department effectively and was successful in the role.
In July 2019, Lynette left and Kim was appointed as Purchasing Manager, drawing from her many years in purchasing she acknowledged that my day to day tasks were not in line with my job title of Procurement assistant and promoted me to Junior Buyer. Throughout the rest of 2019, myself and Kim formed a good working relationship which helped massively when the coronavirus pandemic hit in 2020 and we were forced to work from home. I passed my Chartered Institute of Purchasing & Supply (CIPS) qualifications in Introducing Procurement and Supply Chain (Level 2) and Procurement and Supply Chain Operations (level 2) and worked hard to keep the supply chain open for the NHS – more specifically our cubicle tracks which paved the way for me to be promoted from Junior Buyer to Buyer.
Now I find myself as Senior Buyer, which I would never have imagined as a forklift driver in 2018. As well as the training, I am very lucky that my colleagues and senior members of Yewdale, without a doubt, have all helped me develop massively along the way”.
Embrace growth, learning and change.
We’re proud of our staff and thrive in their development. If you have what it takes and think the Yewdale way suits you, get in touch – we’d love to hear from you! You can see our latest vacancies on our website here: https://www.yewdale.co.uk/jobs-and-careers
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