CHAMBER PARTNERS

CHAMBER PARTNERS Winning formula to help make a difference and gain recognition

Cheshire Connect matches the skills and expertise of local businesses and professionals, kindly offered for free, with the requirements of the voluntary and community sector... not merely a box ticking exercise, but to have a direct impact on real people within the local community. Skill donor volunteers have an opportunity to expand their range of skills while they use their business expertise to support a local grass roots charity, which in turn helps your business to attract talent, encourage staff retention, engagement and productivity. It’s a win win – the charity gain expertise, your organisation makes a meaningful contribution to the community, you and your employees gain values-driven experience generating that special ‘feel good factor ’for all! Plus providing your skill donor support experiences could attract more customers. People are more likely to buy from a business with shared values and can demonstrate that they are living by those values and making a tangible difference to their local community.

_ Get in touch with the local Crewe and South Cheshire East Business Connector - Dianne Parrish on 07946 639394 or email: dianneparrish@cheshireconnect.org

Or to find out more about Cheshire Connect, please visit our website www.cheshireconnect.org

Your valuable skill donor support could help your organisation gain recognition at the prestigious South Cheshire Chamber of Commerce Awards 2021.

The entries are now open for all categories, including the ‘Contribution to the Community Award 2021’; if you can demonstrate you have gone beyond the norm over the last 12 months to support your local communities, whether through gifts of money, fundraising, skill share support or developing more sustainable and eco friendly products, processes or procedures, click on the portal weblink to apply.

_ southcheshirechamberbusinessawards.co.uk

Recruitment crisis in the hospitality industry

It has been widely reported in the media that there is a growing crisis within the Hospitality Sector with many businesses struggling to recruit to an ever increasing number of vacancies. Cheshire East is certainly not immune to this. In response to this challenge, Cheshire East Council is working closely with Job Centre Plus to look at developing a ‘Hospitality Based Work Academy’. This will train local unemployed people in the following areas to ensure they can enter the hospitality workplace with a degree of official training behind them. This is in response to the sector in Cheshire East telling us that amongst a number of issues, they struggle to find the time or resource to train new entrants and this is having a detrimental effect on performance and thus on the individual themselves. The training therefore is designed to allow the individual to hit the ground running, assisting the business from day one. The second part lies in catering which we know if causing real issues across the board. A customer service hospitality Sector Work Academy Programme (SWAP) that would include learning in customer service, employability, food safety (allergy), work experience, guaranteed interview. 1. A food preparation SWAP to include level 2 food hygiene certification, customer service employability, guaranteed interview, work experience.

To ensure this works for all we need the hospitality industry across Cheshire East to sign up to the scheme. This will require a commitment to the following: 1. A list of vacancies from each employer. 2. A commitment from the employer that guarantees each successful person who matches the job requirements is granted an interview We are confident that this potential scheme will provide quality candidates for the sector in Cheshire East. I really do hope businesses will get behind this; however before we can commence it would be very helpful if Hospitality businesses in Crewe & Nantwich could let us know if they are willing to be involved.

_ For further information, please contact Richard.milkins@cheshireeast.gov.uk