An Autumn evening - The Royal Lancaster Hotel in London. Executives from Britain's leading Logistics and Distribution companies gather for the annual Supply Chain Excellence Award ceremony, amongst them senior managers from CRL - Cooperative Retail Logistics, the distribution and warehousing arm of The Cooperative Group, Food Retail.

Six years ago CRL (or ACC as they where then known), were struggling. With serious problems recruiting and retaining staff, they had a poor reputation within the industry. “Management tended to rule through command and control rather than motivation” is often quoted by CRL Managers to describe the old ways.

Faced with a huge programme of network change and organizational restructure, CRL approached the C:Change Partnership to help develop a holistic and culture-changing programme of People Engagement. Using the focus of the tangible goal of IIP (Investors in People) accreditation, a business wide People Strategy was designed to help deliver the changes that CRL were undertaking.

Over three years C:Change helped embed a wide range of new initiatives. From the local - visiting all 17 distribution centres nationwide, talking to staff at all levels - to the strategic - working with CRL Managers to develop and implement a company wide programme, ensuring staff involvement played an integral role in the day to day logistics operation.

Along the way C:Change coordinated the production of DVDs, national site based engagement action plans and training materials to help keep staff informed and leave management better able to motivate their teams during times of complex change and network restructuring. This potent mix delivered striking successes.

The result: increased productivity, much higher levels of staff retention and above Level 1 IIP accreditation - extremely impressive for a business whose employees are predominantly involved with manual labour, ever-changing shift patterns and working conditions

Back at the Royal Lancaster Hotel, CRL Head of Distribution, Trevor Ashworth steps up to accept the Annual Award for Supply Chain Excellence - the industry equivalent of the Oscars!

The judges said
'They (CRL) overhauled their entire supply chain putting people at the very heart of its strategy and cascading it down to every level of the organisation. They achieved impressive results, including improved availability, greater flexibility and ensured their stores get the best service.’