Our people

Recognising the importance of developing and upskilling both our current and future workforce, since 2022 we have been on a mission to expand the range and availability of apprenticeship opportunities within Grundon.

From only three apprentices in early 2022, we have now seen just under 50, new and existing colleagues commence apprenticeship schemes varying from Sales, Technicians, Business Administration and our highly successful Team Leader Level 3 programme.

That’s 5% of our workforce!

Successful learners in Grundon have not only expanded their knowledge and applied their learning within their current roles; we’re delighted to have recently seen three apprenticeship graduates move into their first managerial roles.

In March 2024, Grundon launched a new corporate volunteering programme with London-based food redistribution charity The Felix Project.

Every month, Grundon employees will have the chance to lend a hand at any one of the charity’s four locations across the capital, building on a relationship that has seen Grundon provide free waste collection services for the last eight years.

Over the past year, thanks to Grundon’s free collections of the charity’s general waste, mixed recycling and food waste, the charity has saved over £9,000 in disposal costs and cut CO2 emissions by more than 47,000kgs, a move that has helped boost its sustainability goals. Well over 50% of the 103 tonnes of waste collected has been sent for recycling.

Our Safety Champions play an important role in keeping everyone safe. Tasked with promoting a strong health and safety culture across the business, they provide a bridge between colleagues, managers and the Safety, Health, Environment and Quality (SHEQ) team, helping ensure concerns can be raised and addressed.

Each Grundon location has at least one Safety Champion (30 in total at the end of 2023), all of whom receive extensive training, including the RoSPA Safety Representatives course and the NEBOSH Award in Health & Safety at Work, as well as training on topics such as risk assessment and manual handling.

Regular activity ranges from conducting site walkabouts to identify any potential hazards, to holding twice-monthly safety chats with colleagues; together with monitoring and participating in incident investigations, and supporting managers with activities such as Tool Box Talks.

When one Safety Champion suggested introducing defibrillators, Grundon embraced the idea and now every one of our sites has a defibrillator installed.

Road Safety Week is an annual campaign run by Brake, the road safety charity. Every year Grundon’s Transport Training Team spends the week visiting local organisations to spread the important message about staying safe at all times, whether that’s as a driver, pedestrian or fellow road user.

In 2022, the Highway Code was revised to include clarity on which road users have priority. With a workforce of over 800 employees, who use various methods of transport in their professional and personal lives, the decision was taken to turn the focus for Road Safety Week 2022 to our people. As such, our expert team of Transport Trainers spent the week visiting numerous Grundon sites, empowering colleagues to learn about the new Highway Code and how it may affect them.

At Grundon, we recognise the vital role of internal communications, which prompted a £25,000 investment in the development of GrunHub, our bespoke internal communications platform, in 2020 amidst the challenges of COVID-19.

The digital platform is specifically crafted to engage and connect our workforce and continues to serve as a centerpiece to building a well-informed and connected Grundon community.

In 2023, in response to colleague feedback on improvement opportunities, we invested a further £10,000 to give the platform a more modern interface and built a dedicated mobile app.

Colleagues enjoy the broadcasting of timely company news, weekly activities, monthly prize draws and the opportunity to support various charities through the platform.