To recognise and reward professional accomplishments in a way that boosts employee morale, engagement, productivity and organisational loyalty.
UST Wellbeing Charter 
Research by the charity Mind reveals that, ‘60% of employees would feel more motivated and more likely to recommend their organisation as a great place to work if their employer took action to support mental wellbeing.’
As a Trust, we are committed to signing the DFE Wellbeing Charter and publicly pledging to actively promote mental health and wellbeing through our policies and practices.
As part of our review process, we will explore the impact of our existing policies and procedures on employees’ mental health to understand what more we can do as a responsible employer.
This might include:
- providing greater clarity on various stages of the process,
- offering more training,
- educating staff on personal wellness responsibility,
- and streamlining HR processes that are time-consuming.
To complement this approach, we will establish a UST Wellbeing Committee with representatives from each of our schools. They will collaborate with staff and HR to focus on initiatives such as:
- Identifying relevant topics for the UST wellbeing awareness sessions
- Conducting an employee wellness survey
- Introducing local initiatives with a wellbeing focus (e.g. walking meetings)
- Reviewing staff benefits
- Boosting staff morale.
Staff Benefits
Employee benefits are an essential part of compensation and convey the message to our staff that we care about their well-being. A strong benefits package also helps attract new recruits and set us apart from other organisations.
We are committed to continuously evolving benefit packages that meet the expectations of the modern workforce while promoting the values of our organisation. (i.e. our focus on improving staff wellbeing.)
In addition to mandatory employee benefits (such as flexible working, annual leave, pension and sick pay), supplementary benefits like private medical insurance, dental and vision coverage, and life insurance are fast becoming the basic standard for many organisations. Feasibility studies will be carried out to determine where this is possible.
We are also keen to explore benefits that support both mental and physical health. Through our staff voice representatives, we will look into benefits that are seen as priorities by our staff, including funded and salary sacrifice schemes.
Peer Recognition
Employee recognition is an important element of a positive organisational culture. It can acknowledge an individual’s efforts, behaviour, or performance, and can be either private or public, informal or part of a formal recognition scheme.
In addition to introducing 360-degree feedback as a performance management tool, we will focus on other forms of recognition throughout the organisation. This includes initiatives such as recognising long service, offering in-the-moment peer feedback, providing regular positive feedback in line management meetings, and acknowledging the personal achievements of staff that contribute to enriching the workplace.
UST is committed to creating a Trust-wide awards programme where staff from across the schools can nominate individuals/teams for recognition across numerous categories linked to the Trust’s values.
