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Council Leader and Chairman recieve trophy from world cup winning rubgy captain Martin Johnson
Warwick District Council walked away with two awards at the Midlands Excellence Awards Ceremony held at the International Convention Centre in Birmingham. Taking the coveted top prize of Public Sector Award and the award for Corporate Social Responsibility, the judges felt Warwick District Council was a worthy winner.
Although it’s the first time the council has entered the Midlands Excellence Awards, we have been working with them to improve our services since 2000. Our previous assessment scores show a steady improvement; In 2000 – 175 points, 2002 – 225 points, 2007 - 475 points.
The awards were presented before 1,350 guests by Midlands Excellence chairman Alan Jones and England’s world cup winning rugby captain Martin Johnson, who was the evening’s guest speaker.
Midlands Excellence assessors were particularly impressed with the council’s long-standing commitment to continuous improvement. They praised leaders for driving a culture of excellence which has been embraced by staff.
Leader of the Council, Councillor Michael Coker said: "This is an amazing, outstanding achievement. It’s one thing to have demonstrated our excellent work amongst our peers, but quite another to rate so highly against the likes of multinational companies and national financial institutions. The role of our elected members in steering the Council’s decision making process has contributed greatly to these awards, but the major congratulations go to our wonderful staff."
Chief Executive, Chris Elliott said: "I’m on top of the world. This represents a hat trick of awards from Midlands Excellence having already received their ‘Investors in Excellence award’. Building on our ‘Excellent’ rating from the Audit Commission, these awards clearly demonstrate our progress towards achieving a truly world class organisation.
I would like to take this opportunity to praise and thank our fantastic staff, without whose dedication none of this would have been possible. I would also like to pay tribute to my predecessor, Janie Barrett, who laid the foundations for this over many years."
Midlands Excellence are the regional body overseeing use of the European Framework for Quality Management, which we use as a key model for helping us to improve the way we work.
As an internationally recognised model, it provides a sound framework for looking at what we do well and where we can improve. In particular we have been proactive in using the feedback from our earlier reports to continue to improve. We have analysed these carefully, looking closely at what independent assessors are saying about us as an organisation. We have identified and implemented a number of key actions based on these reports. This in turn has had a significant impact on our scores, but more importantly means that we can demonstrate we are now a better, more focused, more efficient organisation proving better quality services to local citizens and businesses.
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