Case study

FirstGroup

Age Positive Champion

Kirkintilloch Herald/Age Positive Awards Company Winner 2004

Stirling News/Age Positive Awards Company Winner 2004

Age has no bearing on the employment opportunities we offer. First recruits solely on the basis of ability and is committed to employing a mixed-age workforce.

Older employees have valuable skills and work and life experience to impart to their younger colleagues. Equally, more mature employees benefit from the fresh perspectives younger people often bring to the job.

Tom Little, Director, Recognition and Reward

OUR AGE POSITIVE GOOD PRACTICE:

We are customer-focused and want to be sure that the composition of our workforce reflects the mix of the communities we serve. Through our ‘Total Rewards’ programme, we are introducing a range of benefits and opportunities that recognise the needs and hopes of all our employees, whether older or younger, male or female, full-time or part-time. A key part of the programme, ‘The First Flexible Decade’, is designed to enhance our ability to attract and retain older employees. Between the ages of 60 and 70, employees will be able to combine flexible working opportunities with pension scheme options, and arrange the hours they work to suit themselves. Also, we operate a ‘Buddy’ system, where experienced, and often older people, act as mentors for new employees during the training process and beyond.

BENEFITS OF OUR GOOD PRACTICE:

Our age-friendly recruitment, training and development processes have yielded tangible benefits for us as an employer, for employment opportunities, and for the customers we serve. Around 40 per cent of our employees who face customers are aged 50 and over. We all benefit from the skills, experience and maturity of these older employees, coupled with the new ideas and enthusiasm of younger colleagues.

On their Open Topper buses in Hampshire, First’s recruitment advertising features one of their employees aged over 50 – sending out a positive message to prospective applicants.

One applicant was Brian Paget. At 61 years old he found that 35 years experience as a computer programmer, analyst and consultant counted for nothing when he was made redundant and searching for another job. Then he saw that First was looking for drivers. Brian felt sure he could transfer his customer care skills and extensive driving experience, so he decided to go for it - and got the job.

"When you employ staff you get the benefit of their life experiences too. The more the years, the more the experiences – it really is commonsense!" says Philip Brown, Recruitment and Training Manager at First in London. "It enhances our business and our public profile."

Brian changes destination - "It's been a new and challenging experience - even at my age !"

At 61 years old, Brian Paget found that 35 years experience as a computer programmer, analyst and consultant counted for nothing when he was made redundant and searching for another job. Then he saw that First, Southampton's principal bus operator, was looking for drivers. Brian felt sure he could transfer his customer care skills and extensive driving experience, so he decided to go for it - and got the job.

Brian says: "I never thought I would change at my age, but it's been an opportunity I wouldn't have missed." He's had training, and is following it with further training towards an NVQ - the Transporting Passengers by Road qualification. "It's been a new and challenging experience - even at my age ! Life's all about people and it's hugely satisfying to know that I am providing a worthwhile and essential service to many people in the city. It's great to be able to build relationships with regular customers."

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