What matters to us: Our people

22nd August 2021

What matters to us: Our Bookspeed team

Background

Bookspeed was founded in 1986 by Annie Rhodes & Kingsley Dawson. In our 35 years, the team behind Bookspeed has been at the forefront of what matters to us. Our people are key to our success and in this week’s blog we chat about how this value has been an important factor since the beginning and grows ever more important as the business grows.

From the beginning

When we began to pull this blog together, we thought, the first port of call just had to be our founders themselves. Indeed, here is what they both shared:

“It has always been important to find the right people – in our particular case that means quirky, pleasant, offbeat, efficient individuals who will bring something to the team – and are open to learning new things. This could be summed up as fabulous individuals who people outside the company would want to do business with, people they’d look forward to dealing with again and again. We hope all colleagues find the right position within the company, so they reach their potential: a win/win for both individuals and the company.

We obviously needed people with particular skills, but one basic tenet was that we would never ask someone to do work we wouldn’t be prepared to do ourselves; we understood the nature and demands of all roles at Bookspeed because between us we had performed them all at some point.”…Annie & Kinsley, Bookspeed’s Founders.

Bookspeed is quite an unusual outfit in that it houses all business skills & activities under one roof. We have always respected manual and office skills equally. Respect and transparency within the business is as important as beyond it.

Although discrimination in the workplace on the grounds of gender and sexual identity was illegal before we started Bookspeed, it was still very common for many LBGTQ+ people to have to hide their identity because of prejudice and bullying. We have always tried to make sure Bookspeed is a safe workplace for everyone.

Here at Bookspeed HQ, we call ourselves a family and that is something we truly mean. We are a unique bunch of people who all love books and contribute to delivering exceptional service to our customers.

Going above and beyond

Many businesses will say that their teams matter to them. Here at Bookspeed we really live and breathe that. Here are just a few of the amazing stories we have to tell from our Operations Director:

“When I had accepted the role but not started at Bookspeed yet, my wife was in hospital for surgery, as I brought her home there was a big bunch of flowers for her from Bookspeed - it was before I even started that she told me I wasn't allowed to leave and was a clear sign of the team that Bookspeed has/had!” …Dean, Operations Director

Dean added this wonderful story about how we had no qualms about helping our team out!

“Last year when reopening the business, I was called by Lewis and told he needed me to come back off furlough while the business was still closed to prepare to reopen. My wife works for NHS recruitment, and they were rather busy at the time, and my daughter was out of school after they closed. It took about 2 seconds to decide that my daughter would come in with me to work and get her own office (the Blue one, then moved into the showroom).”

“During that time Lewis, Annie and I pretty much shared parenting and keeping her entertained as best we could. I know that a lot of other company owners wouldn't have made this possible ... and certainly wouldn't have taken the time to listen to regular presentations, help with "homework" and have regular chats!”

“But Celeste has form for that, she once did a presentation about Bookspeed, to staff at a Christmas lunch once!”

She was awarded the position of CEO (Chief Entertainment Officer) by Annie and Lewis when she went back to school last year and stopped working in the office too! Lewis had a desk nameplate made specially for her to keep, and printed business cards carrying her new title too. He keeps one on his desk still to this day.

Creating a culture of recognition

We know that we seek fabulous individuals that help to make Bookspeed what we are today. We have a fairly small team, and we know that people move on from time to time. But we always aim to support our colleagues to find their desired role within Bookspeed and we believe that harnessing talent is one of the best ways to help our colleagues feel fulfilled but also allow us to grow and develop our expertise even further.

A key focus from the top down in Bookspeed is transparency. Allowing everyone involved to feel part of the journey and success of the company is so important to us! Every Monday morning, we have a full team meeting where we are very open about how the business is going and is an open forum for each of us to celebrate success, ask questions and discuss anything we want to! Alongside this, we have Microsoft Teams channels to share lovely success stories and great work that individuals and teams within Bookspeed do to help us achieve our success and ultimately our customers success too!

We also try and reward and recognise the amazing effort each of us puts in on an individual level in 1-1 catch ups as well as more business-wide rewards and celebrations such as pizza nights, quiz nights and any other celebrations when we can! Of course, this past year or so has made it a lot more challenging to do these things but we have celebrated however we could throughout this very unique period. We have Bookspeed weekly online yoga, our book club (of course!) and our Bookspeed running club amongst other ideas and work socials.

Out with the constraints of the pandemic though we usually do lots of quiz nights, work nights out to pretty much anything – axe throwing is one!

Now that we are emerging from our socially distant covid-19 hibernation these events are beginning to happen again, and we are delighted!

Employee engagement

Ensuring all Bookspeeders are really aware of where the business is at is so important to us. It provides us with something tangible to show that our hard work is paying off. Not only that we endeavor to ensure that the journey Bookspeed is on is one that we are all engaged in. One of the key responsibilities of all managers and members of the leadership team is that they make sure they are open and approachable by anyone from across the business. This is key to making sure that everyone who works at Bookspeed feels supported and included.

Engagement isn’t only centered around fun things to do though. For many of us, work is a major part of our lives and somewhere we spent a lot of our waking hours. A job is how we earn our income and often how we make new friends. At Bookspeed, we believe that having a job which is fulfilling plays a major factor in promoting good mental health and optimal wellbeing. Good management and good mental health at work form a symbiotic relationship. Bookspeed is always conscious that high levels of Bookspeeder wellbeing results in better productivity, and we believe that it is the responsibility of all employers to ensure that their staff are cared for and supported in this way.

Living Wage employer

Bookspeed was an early adopter of paying the Living Wage set by the Living Wage Foundation. Living Wage Scotland was launched in April 2014, recognising employers for paying their staff the real Living Wage. Living Wage Scotland was kickstarted by The Poverty Alliance, works alongside Living Wage Scotland and funded by the Scottish Government. Bookspeed received our accreditation in 2015.

To find out more click this link: https://www.livingwage.org.uk/what-real-living-wage

What some of us say

We think it’s important to hear from our team too – not just us! Because ultimately, if we are all in this together, we should demonstrate that, right?

“At Bookspeed, how we do things is just as important as what we do. As the business continues to grow it is really important to us that we retain the values upon which the company was conceived. The core of this is a workplace that’s inclusive, respectful and safe for everyone. This means that regardless of gender, sexuality, ethnicity or religious beliefs, everyone is treated the same and allowed to flourish. This consideration of our colleagues extends to physical and mental well-being which we take very seriously. We love getting the right books to the right people and it’s the environment that we create here that really does make all the good stuff happen.” …Andy, Sales Director.