Gloucester Businesses first to gain an innovative new award

13th June 2010

Gloucester Cathedral, Bowden Hall and English Holiday Crusies pick up their awards

Three Gloucester businesses have been awarded the internationally recognised
"Committed to Excellence" standard from the EFQM.

Gloucester Cathedral, Ramada Bowden Hall and English Holiday Cruises have all picked up the award and the cathedral also won a special award for innovation and the scope of its improvement projects.

They all took part in the business development programme alongside thirty-two other tourism businesses in the South West. The programme was an innovative pilot scheme run by the Tourism Skills Network South West.

The Excellence model is designed to help businesses develop a clear vision and gain skills for future development. The programme also enabled the delegates to hear from some inspirational leaders, including Baroness Eliza Manningham-Buller, former head of MI5.

Bairbre Lloyd, Operations & Marketing Manager at the Cathedral commented
"we were delighted to receive this additional recognition of our work. The Committed to Excellence programme was a challenging process, but very worthwhile."

The Tourism Skills Network South West in partnership with British Quality Foundation (BQF) and the European Foundation for Quality Management (EFQM), offered the Tourism Business Excellence Programme for a pilot year. This was the first time the EFQM model has been provided
in this way for tourism businesses in the UK.

The programme was made up of a number of different elements designed to support the businesses to achieve the 'Committed to Excellence' EFQM standard, which is internationally recognised. The different elements included three Tourism Business Excellence workshops, four half-day Lightbulb Masterclasses, an organisational self-assessment, and three business improvement projects amongst others.

Mark Bell, Levels of Excellence Manager at the British Quality Foundation commented "I am delighted that businesses from tourism within the South West have made a commitment to improving performance by completing the Committed to Excellence (C2E) standard. They are the
first tourism businesses in the country to take part in this way. What was most pleasing to see was their clear commitment to improving their businesses and involving all levels of staff in the process. The three projects completed by the businesses will help deliver long term benefits in terms of what they are achieving. I wish them all well as their Excellence journeys continue."

Wendy Samuel, Skills Director at the Tourism Skills Network South West, said "We are thrilled with the achievement of the businesses who have taken part. This was the pilot year of using the EFQM model to build an improvement programme for businesses, and we have combined workshops,
masterclasses and one-to-one support in this unique programme. We will run a similar programme this year, and hope to encourage other regions across the UK to use the model".