Case study

IKEA, Cardiff

Age Positive Champion

We are a Swedish furniture retailer with 12 stores in the UK employing more than 7000 co-workers. We offer a variety of jobs including Sales, Warehousing, Replenishment, Customer Services and Catering.

We needed to recruit around 500 staff for our flagship Cardiff Bay store. We wanted to be sure that we were attracting a truly diverse workforce by reaching everyone in the community, including older people. We held special coffee mornings and the events were publicised by adverts in the local paper, in stores and at jobcentres. The people who attended met similarly-aged workers from IKEA who shared their experiences with them, as well as IKEA management staff. This approach helped us get the balance right.

Gay Gwinnutt, HR Manager, Cardiff

OUR AGE POSITIVE GOOD PRACTICE:

Advertising

All advertisments mention that we seek our co-workers from all backgrounds, students, people returning to work and those on a pension who wish to supplement their earnings or just have time to spare and would like a further interest.

Equal Opportunities Policies

Our equal opportunity policy includes age, and our Human Resource policy states our aims to offer opportuniity and responsibility "regardless of age".

Recruitment

We work closely with Jobcentre Plus to reach as wide a variety of prospective co-workers as possible. We believe that this benefits IKEA as a business and brings a balanced working environment.

Recognising diversity

The broad and varied experience of our older workforce provides a compliment to our co-workers who are just starting their careers. Their interpersonal skills gained through their life experiences help to enhance our relationship with our customers.

PROFILES OF SOME OF OUR MATURE WORKERS:

Howard Clarke, 57. Howard was made redundant from his engineering job in 2002. He was offered full-time work in our recovery department but requested part-time work. Howard now uses his engineering skills to build furniture. His training challenge during the next couple of months is to master the computer system, which is a complete change for him.

Keith James, 57. After a long career in engineering, working in the UK and abroad, Keith was looking for a job that would provide him with an interest but also give him more free time through the day. Keith works part-time on our early morning fill which plays a crucial role in the success of the store. His hours of work are 5am to 10am five days a week. As Keith says, this keeps his interest but gives him plenty of spare time through the day.

Susan Richards, 56. After 15 years as a duputy head teacher, Susan decided she wanted a career break and a change of direction. Susan works for us part-time in our Customer Services Department as a checkout operator and enjoys the interaction with customers and meeting different people.

Robin Manley, 62. Retiring after 35 years with Welsh Water, Robin wanted to continue to work but at something else. Robin works early mornings with us before leaving to take up his second job with a builder. Robin enjoys the variety of having two jobs.

David Morris, 62. David was a school caretaker for 22 years before retiring. He became bored and took a short term position before joining our maintanence team full-time. Having worked mostly on his own before, he now enjoys the company and being part of a team.

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