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Keeping the faith:

We understand the importance of respecting how different individuals practise their faith. For example, Partners at Waitrose Canary Wharf enjoyed an eid meal to celebrate the end of Ramaddan, while in October, Brent Cross and our Waitrose head office held special dinners for Diwali, observed by Hindus and Sikhs. Customers are equally important. In Waitrose, our Kosher assortment, for example, has now been expanded and extended to 37 shops, while 35 shops have year-round Asian products, with special promotions during eid and Diwali.


“Our aim is to be a business where our leaders feel confi dent with, and have a full understanding of, the diversity in their teams, so that they can ensure Partners have a consistent and motivating experience of the Partnership. This goes to the heart of our ultimate purpose and drives business advantage.”

Tracey Killen, Director of Personnel


Embracing diversity

The Partnership is committed to providing equal employment opportunities for all, and developing a working environment in which all Partners have a relevant, consistent and rewarding experience.

We are currently focusing on giving our line managers the support, confidence and understanding required to foster a healthy and respectful relationship between them and their teams. We already do much to celebrate individual differences, and our ‘Fair Treatment’ policy ensures discrimination of any kind is not tolerated. We will continue to focus on supporting good practice through initiatives like our diversity toolkit. This provides Partners with practical advice and information on a range of issues from race and religion to age and gender equality, and gives managers the tools to embrace a diverse workforce.

Part of our vision is to nurture a culture that values the differences of all those who are engaged in the Partnership – not just Partners. embracing diversity will therefore help us to appeal to a wider range of customers, suppliers and neighbours too.

Skills and training

We want our customers to fi nd well-trained Partners who can talk with passion and confi dence. We invest in every Partner’s long-term development, taking a broad approach to their individual needs. By committing to the development of the best skilled and motivated teams on the high street, we believe we can sustain a competitive advantage that drives a cycle of success, wealth creation and investment.

We offer a wide range of in-house training and ensure access to development opportunities is available to all. We recognise that many of our Partners no longer want or expect to have just one job for life, so it’s important the learning and development we offer is transferable, nationally recognised and accredited wherever possible.

In April 2009, Charlie Mayfi eld joined other major retailers in launching the national Skills academy for Retail. The Academy will support better training in the retail industry by developing a national network of walk-in skills shops.

Safety and occupational health

We are committed to ensuring all our Partners and customers can rely on a safe, healthy environment for them to work or shop in. We use an established risk assessment system to identify and prioritise the signifi cant issues associated with our operations and employ effective control measures to minimise the potential for incidents occurring.


14.6%

Proportion of ethnic Partners (at end July 2009)


3.3%

Sick hours as a proportion of contracted hours (at end July 2009)