Training Award

PF Whitehead Ltd

PF Whitehead is totally committed to training and developing its 100 strong team in line with the changing needs of the business. The company dedicates 250 man days a year to training its drivers, warehouse , customer service and traffic teams.

A new training plan designed to cover the needs of every individual member of staff has brought impressive results and the company has introduced an apprenticeship scheme which has already borne fruit – two young apprentices have been given full time positions within the company and achieved NVQ level 2 qualifications.

Wincanton – Defence Business Unit

In April 2010 Wincanton won a contract to manage the production stores of AugustaWestland – the helicopter manufacturer. The contract involved the TUPE transfer of 137 staff from AW to Wincanton and all the transferred staff had to be properly trained in the systems that Wincanton uses across all of its UK sites. As well as the standard training requirements found in any warehouse, the staff needed to be instructed in the use of specialist measuring equipment, how to handle dangerous goods and working with defence equipment. Thanks to the dedication of the Wincanton staff and the commitment of the transferred team, the transition was very straightforward and the contract has been running successfully since.

DHL Supply Chain

As part of its contract with Jaguar Land Rover, DHL were challenged with resourcing staff for a second shift to support production volumes at JLR’s Halewood plant. 600 additional employees were required with a 10 month window for recruitment and training.

An internal training centre was identified which allowed DHL to train candidates. A relationship was developed with Action 4 Employment to train the long term unemployed within the training centre and, so far, 22 formerly long term unemployed people have secured full time employment.

In addition to new starters, existing staff were retrained to minimise any skills gaps. The programme has been a great success and a recent survey highlighted the fact that staff feel that DHL provide them ‘with an opportunity for learning and development’.