Your network has been named Supplier of the Year
Social value now carries between 10 and 40 per cent of the score in public contracts, set alongside quality and price, so it increasingly decides who wins. The harder part has always been proving it: closing the gap between social value written to win a bid and social value that is actually delivered once the contract starts.
A paragraph scores well, the contract is awarded, and years later nobody can say what changed for the people it was meant to help.
That is the gap Social Recruitment Advocacy Group members work in every day, and last month it was recognised by the people who buy public services. The GO Awards named PeoplePlus Supplier of the Year, judged by senior public sector procurement leaders, with a further shortlisting for Excellence in Social Value.
Closing that gap is what the SRAG is built around, and what you are part of. Every contract PeoplePlus holds is designed to do more than deliver the service. We reinvest the knowledge, skills and expertise from every programme through partnerships with employers, providers, charities, the VCSE sector and, wherever possible, national and local government, so the value doesn't stop at the contract boundary.
It is how the model works, and it is the work the award recognised. That recognition reflects what is being done across the network, including yours. The proof is in what members achieve.
More than 200 organisations are now in the network, from Sodexo and Mitie to Currys, IKEA and Lidl, using the Charter Mark framework to embed responsible, inclusive recruitment in how they operate. Many draw on bid support that turns commitments into evidence, as M Group Highways did in scoring 100 per cent on the social value element of a critical bid.
Others use the Social Recruitment Framework to ringfence roles for people overcoming barriers to employment and bring them into work, as OMNI Facilities Management, Smart Solutions and others have done.
An increasing number partner with PeoplePlus to manage their social value delivery on complex contracts, such as G4S at Sizewell C, a contract we support, where the team's social value work recently won the Corporate Social Responsibility award at the British Security Awards, recognising over 2,500 hours of volunteering and support for nearly 3,000 local people.
The tools behind all of this are already yours. If you have Charter Mark progress within reach, or a bid where our support would sharpen your social value score, now is the time to use it. Buyers are rewarding proof, and proof is built long before the bid.
You are already building it, alongside a network of more than 200 organisations doing the same.
Pictured above, left to right: Jonny Boyden, Liz Squire, Laura Savage, Emma Grigson and Rachel Richards, from the PeoplePlus Social Value Solutions team.
