Delivering benefits for people, communities and the planet is a key driver in our service delivery. Our contracts include supplying and installing air source heat pumps, providing energy-efficiency retrofits for housing associations and providing heating servicing and maintenance as well as insulation, installing EV charging and disabled adaptation works.
Our collaborative approach empowers our teams to join forces with customers and suppliers to partner across the sector for the benefit of society. We understand the importance of finding ways to operate that prioritise the reuse of materials, promote energy efficiency, and contribute to the restoration and rejuvenation of our planet. Likewise, our goal is to foster community wellbeing and prosperity by advocating for an inclusive economy that offers opportunities to everyone and focuses on positive initiatives for those facing the greatest disadvantages, both in terms of people and communities.
We are working closely with our clients to enhance the impact of our Social Value contributions in line with our sustainability strategy. Being on the ground on behalf of local authorities and housing associations, we understand the importance of our wider responsibility to assist and safeguard the welfare of the residents within the communities and the added value that we can bring.
Delivering meaningful Social Value
Kinovo’s customer base is distinguished by our long-lasting relationships with Local Authorities and Housing Associations servicing the social and affordable housing sector. It also includes public buildings and education, as well as the commercial and private sector. Our public and private sector clients rely on Kinovo’s support for more than 600,000 properties and schools, spanning all 33 London Boroughs. The introduction of PPN 06/20 in September 2020 has cemented our focus on Social Value, echoing the Government’s key Social Value themes. As mentioned on page 19, to maximise our outcomes, we identify local suppliers to provide us with the products and services we deliver.
“Creating Social Value is incredibly important to us and is something we have delivered for many years. The economic, practical and emotional impact of Social Value is far-reaching. We help those in need: local food banks, schools and community initiatives within the local areas that we work. We are also encouraging and working with our clients on initiatives that have a direct impact on local people and the wider community.”
Pippa Pang, Social Value and Marketing Manager, Kinovo Group
What is Social Value?
Social Value is the value of an action or a programme that is in addition to its commercial value. For us, Social Value speaks to the additional value that the action or programme contributes to the wellbeing of the community, society and the wider social environment in which it takes place. Social Value can be difficult to measure or describe, yet its presence is clear to those involved. Its impact can make a significant difference to the health and wellbeing of individuals, the community and society as a whole.
Because Social Value is most often viewed as a non-financial benefit or impact, it has traditionally had less sway in significant economic and policy decisions, in favour of more concrete, visible and observable measures. To redress this imbalance, the UK Government has introduced a Social Value component to their tender assessment process, allocating up to 30% of their scoring to the economic, social and environmental wellbeing impact of the contract.
We calculate Social Value using Thrive, an online software platform specifically designed to help organisations track, audit and report on all of their social value and broader ESG activities Thrive is a cloud based software platform, and the Impact Evaluation Standard is the brand name for a series of robust metrics and proxy values used to track, and benchmark social value. The two are separate, but the Impact Evaluation Standard is ‘built-In’ to the Thrive software platform and is fully aligned with UK Government’s Social Value Model (PPN 06/20) and follows guidance from HM Treasury.
These metrics are all aligned to the UK government’s Social Value Model guidance for PPN06/20 and each fall within 5 broad themes, of which we are measuring against the 4 below:
1
Tackling Economic Inequality
A comprehensive range of metrics addressing 2 Policy Outcomes in the Social Value Model focusing on the creation of new business, new jobs and new skills as well as increasing supply chain resilience and capacity.
2
Fighting Climate Change
The metrics in this theme help quantify reduction in consumption (CO2 emissions, water and waste), creation of green spaces and the time spent by our workforce on environmental initiatives.
3
Equal Opportunity
This theme provides the opportunity to record and show how we diversify our workforce, create equal opportunity and reduce inequality – both through our own organisation and our supply chain.
4
Wellbeing
This theme addresses the Policy Outcomes to improve health and wellbeing — that of our workforce and supply chain – and community integration – looking at our external investments of cash, volunteering and education.
The metrics directly correlate to the 52 Reporting Metrics stipulated in the Social Value Model, but also extend these to give additional depth by adding other aspects noted in the Social Value Model documentation and/or other commonly used metrics in social value reporting.
We believe we support all of these as evidenced by this Report. To put a monetary value on these actions (where appropriate) we use the proxy values specified in the Thrive Social Value platform to track our activities, metrics and calculate the Social Value outcome.
Health and safety
Compliance and Health & Safety (H&S) are integral elements in the day-to-day operations of the business and complement each other with policies, systems of work and procedures. As an ISO 45001 employer, our employees’ health and safety (H&S) is at the forefront of how we look after our staff. Our robust health and safety policies and programmes aim to have all staff perform their duties as safely as possible.
We provide frequent training in the form of written communication; training courses and toolbox talks to ensure our staff are as aware of their safety as we are. The H&S team conducts rigorous monitoring and reporting of health and safety, carrying out site inspections site inspection schedule and investigation of hazards, near misses and continual improvement. Compliance is fundamental to ensuring our accreditations are monitored, reviewed and maintained. Key accreditations include: ISO9001, 14001, 45001, NICEIC, Gas Safe and CHAS. Health & Safety sits at the forefront of any job that is carried out.
The primary function of our H&S team is to secure the health, safety and welfare of our people and protect them and others from risks whilst carrying out activities at work. Frequent training via written communication, training courses and toolbox talks ensures our staff are as aware of their safety as we are.
Mental health and wellbeing
We believe a happy and healthy workforce will always deliver a better outcome. It is also the right thing to do.
The key to mental wellbeing is to have the right people in the right roles with the right helping hand. We take a holistic view of our employees’ welfare by ensuring we look after both their mental and physical wellbeing. We are also sympathetic to the fact that challenges at home can impact a person’s work.
As this financial year drew to a close in March 2023, we were finalising our Employee Assistance Programme (EAP) scheme which gives access to a wellbeing app, up to six telephone counselling mental health sessions (with qualified Counsellors), as well as access to financial and legal advice, and wellbeing initiatives such as healthy eating plans and exercise. We also have four mental health workplace responders who can help spot signs of stress and can intervene, annual health surveillance checks for all staff and a “Cycle to Work” scheme.
Nurturing our talent
Every year, we analyse training needs to identify skill gaps amongst our people. We issue individual training plans to help advance their career paths. Leadership training is also provided to senior staff to make sure they have the skills needed to manage teams.
Our centralised HR system manages individual and groupwide recruitment, onboarding and training requirements to ensure we tick the right boxes to help our employees thrive. We are a National Living Wage Foundation Accredited Employer. We also pay our apprentices above the National Minimum Wage to attract the best talent; we recognise that salaries provide security and stability.
Having reviewed our pay and benefits over the previous year, we have introduced a Buy / Sell Holiday Scheme, enabling staff to buy or sell up to four days’ leave during the year.
Recruiting local talent
We actively encourage submissions from people living and working in the local communities, even if they do not necessarily have all the skills required. We do this because we know we can offer excellent assistance, training and development to allow them to grow into their responsibilities.
- 17% of our 235 employees live and work in their local communities
- 10% of our staff were previously unemployed or had barriers to employment
In the last year, we began to reach out to some of our larger clients to become involved in their own Social Value activities and have also introduced Social Value information from all new suppliers as part of the procurement process. We actively seek to help those in need: local food banks, schools and community initiatives within the local areas that we work.
It is deeply important that that we keep supporting and building prosperity within the communities we serve.
Enhancing workforce equality
Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion (E,D&I) is key to what we stand for: equal opportunities are given to all those we seek to employ, along with assistance for those who may be at a disadvantage. Our employees come from wide ethnic, religious and cultural backgrounds and this diversity is representative of the clients we serve, as well as our suppliers and communities.
Equal opportunities for all within Kinovo’s sphere are non-negotiable. Accordingly, we have amended our vacancy advertising to welcome applicants from people with neurodivergent conditions. Plus, appropriate, and reasonable adjustments have been made to the interview process, including work trials.
We are also proud to be a Disability Confident employer, a government scheme to encourage employers to think differently about disability and take action to improve how they recruit, retain and develop disabled people. Our 235 employees come from every corner of the globe and this diversity helps us relate to our wide range of clients, suppliers and communities.
We also offer jobs to those who may otherwise struggle to find employment based on their personal circumstances. This could be down to an individual’s age, disability or a lack of training. We aim to overcome whatever barrier there is and then once within our fold at Kinovo, their on-the-job experience is supplemented by internal and external training. We continue to encourage applications for job opportunities from women and other under-represented groups.
- Current vacancies can be found on our website and QR codes are applied to vans to this page
- We recruit talent in the communities where we work
- Candidates are welcome to join our talent pool for an appropriate vacancy
We recognise that we can do more in partnership, and that is why we have joined influential associations to maximise our positive impact, including Women in Social Housing (WISH) and the Chartered Institute of Housing. In the coming year, we will join the Armed Forces Covenant and Forces Families Jobs. This helps us gain a better understanding of industry concerns, changes and how Kinovo can address future challenges.
