The Bid Team management are committed to an active CSR programme that looks after our staff, the community and our environment.
We have policies in place that cover our approach to supporting these initiatives and support the UN Global Compact. This sections provides a summary of our policies, more information can be found by contacting The Bid Team using the form on the right hand side.
Bribery and Corruption
The Bid Team is fully compliant with the Bribery Act 2010. Failure to comply with the Bribery Act has serious consequences for all UK companies, of course. But as a long‑time champion of transparency and business ethics, The Bid Team has warmly welcomed the legislation.
In 2011, we embarked on an extensive programme to analyse for risks related to corruption. We continued to review our policies with internal audits every 3 years. We review our policies and procedures and introduce new policies where we feel they need to be strengthened to comply with the “adequate procedures” required by the Act. As a result, we have taken a number of actions:
- Policy Review: We reviewed a number of our policies and updated them, providing practical guidance for managers on specific points relating to the Act.
- Awareness: We embarked on an awareness campaign to ensure all employees, associates and contractors understand the implications of the Act and our expectations in relation to their behaviour.
- Employee Training: We amended our employee induction programme to include the same business ethics and anti‑corruption training materials.
Data Protection
The Bid Team is dedicated to ensuring that privacy is protected and as such we are registered for the purposes of Data Protection, registration number ZA003796.
The Bid Team collects information about people for the purposes of project management, statistical and marketing analysis/surveys, administration and legal purposes, client references, and to help us in any future dealings with candidates, consultants and companies. The information provide to us will be held in our systems or those of our suppliers.
We do not disclose personal data to other organisations other than as necessary for the purposes for which the information was supplied or to meet legal obligations. However information may be made available to our suppliers which may include companies outside the European Union. In certain circumstances The Bid Team will offer the means to disallow consent to disclosure throughout.
Modern Slavery
The Bid Team is committed to the principles of the Modern Slavery Act 2015 and the board annually reviews the processes and procedures of our business and our supply chain to ensure we are compliant. The revenue of The Bid Team falls below the legal limits for reporting however our modern slavery policy is communicated to employees, contractors, and our supply chain.
Diversity of our People
The Bid Team management team has prepared a Diversity, Equality and Inclusion Policy statement in line with the Equality legislation, following guidance from the Equality and Human Rights Commission, ACAS and the Chartered Institute of Personnel Development. The policy has been drawn up as an acknowledgement of best practice and is compliant with the current legislation.
The Bid Team has a policy to establish safe and healthy conditions in the work environment and to provide health checks and essential treatment to promote the health of all staff. The Bid Team Managing Director, Mark Protheroe, is responsible to ensure that recruitment, selection, training, development and promotion procedures for any assignment, results in no job applicant or employee receiving less favourable treatment. This relates to age, race, faith or belief, nationality, ethnicity, disability, trade union membership or non-membership, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital status or civil partnership or being a part-time worker. Our objective is to ensure that individuals are selected, promoted and otherwise treated solely on the basis of their relevant aptitudes, skills and abilities.
We request that all our candidates voluntarily complete the equality monitoring form, together with any additional information they may wish to provide. This data is retained by us and is not made available to any placement or management staff when undertaking recruitment selection. The information is available to the Director so that we can monitor and ensure that our recruitment processes are fair to all.
Environmental Responsibility
The Bid Team’s environmental policy is achieved through the commitment of management and employees in meeting objectives, targets and continual improvements in our documented environmental systems. The policy, procedures are communicated to all staff at induction and through our intranet.
The Bid Team’s management team recognises the importance to preserve and protect our natural environment for our future generations. We are committed to the sustainable use of natural resources. As a company we endeavour to:
- Support suppliers of product and services who adopt environmental policies and standard.
- Operate facilities and conduct all activities taking into consideration energy conservation, waste minimization and pollution prevention.
- Comply with local environmental legislation and requirements which are relevant to our operations.
The Bid Team’s policy is achieved through the commitment of management and employees in meeting objectives, targets and continual improvements in our documented environmental systems.
Our decisions are based on Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of carbon emission impact. We include the broader environmental impact, e.g. when car use is unavoidable, we take a neutral stance on hybrids compared to conventional, pending authoritative analysis of the environmental impact of making the batteries and disposing of waste which cannot be recycled. We are constantly reviewing the suitability and applicability of industry standards that can be applied to our services. The Bid Team currently promotes the following environmental procedures throughout the company:
- To develop, maintain and promote working procedures which are designed to minimise impact upon the environment.
- To ensure all staff are fully aware of ways in which they can minimise environmental impact, and that appropriate procedures are followed where possible.
- To provide lines of communication to enable the capture and incorporation of new ideas into Company working procedures.
The Bid Team is committed to being a socially responsible organisation and wherever possible to reduce energy consumption and recycle used products. Examples of this commitment are:
- Documents are scanned in and distributed electronically to employees and customers avoiding unnecessary duplication documents and paper wastage.
- Monitors installed are ‘energy saving’ with power-save facility on automatic timing.
- Paper documents no longer required are shredded and the paper recycled.
As a tenant we rarely dictate the build standards of properties. However, in the selection of newly leased offices we verify that the structure is well insulated, including the pipe work, and double glazed. Low energy lighting is required, and motion detector switches are usually available.
We have no company cars. They may be replaced by employee-owned vehicles, but their absence emphasises our policies advocating cycling to work, use of public transport and car sharing. When travelling between home and office is still necessary we encourage environmentally-friendly options. There is a cycle to work initiative, and we advocate the use of public transport between home and office and for business journeys. If a car is the only viable way to get to the office, then we suggest car sharing.
Health and Safety
As one of our core values, we prioritise safety management as well as the health and well-being of our employees. Setting the highest standards for health and safety across our industry helps to keep our colleagues safe and builds loyalty and commitment to The Bid Team from our employees.
Health and safety has always been a top priority for The Bid Team management. Our company-wide health and safety culture begins at the top with the directors. Our approach is to exceed all mandatory standards so that our clients and staff know that their health and safety is paramount at all times.
The Bid Team requires all of our employees to support actions aimed at improving health and safety at work. To this end, The Bid Team expects all staff to contribute towards creating and maintaining working conditions that are as healthy and safe as reasonably practicable.
We have no reportable accidents nor any days lost due to accidents in the last 12 years.
Managing our own Resources
All businesses are dependent on the people that run them and we are committed to ensuring that the people we employ work in a safe environment that meets their aspirations in terms of job satisfaction and career progression. While this can be measured through surveys and interviews the best measure is through staff retention rates. These statistics measured against our sector norms as produced by industry bodies, trade associations and researchers. Our aim is to have retention rates higher than the industry norm and we measure ourselves against these norms.
We are fully supportive of the London Living Wage and do not pay below this amount for any work based in or around London. In general we do not pay below this amount in any part of the country.
Quality Management
Quality is reflected in every part of our business and is maintained by adherence to the processes and procedures in our Quality Management System (QMS). Our QMS ensures that:
- Client focus is maintained by achieving measurable results agreed with the client at the start of the assignment. Our win rate and value won are clear measures of our achievement when supporting clients in their bidding. When consulting on process improvement we measure the return on investment in terms of company bid costs versus value of work won.
- All staff are focused on winning work for our clients or improving their bid process outcomes. Our quality focus is simple to understand, and all staff are trained in the application of the bid process and empowered to participate in its improvement.
- We manage our people and process at every level and ensure that all staff are trained and empowered to make critical decision which lead to positive client outcome. This means that while we have a clear bid process and recommend adherence to it, bid managers and bid writers can tailor our bid process for the specific client activity.
- We adopt a process approach. Our bid process has seven review points and seven gateways. At each stage we review the outcomes and determine the likelihood of success. If the bid success is at risk, we inform our clients and recommend a course of action. All bid outcomes are recorded and are part of the company’s quality assessments..
- We review our success and continually adapt the way we work. While our process is measured and success is monitored, the market is constantly changing and new technology introduced. All our staff are encouraged to propose improvements, this has seen the introduction of a client knowledge management system (Bid Central) and video content for bids.