Central Co-op
About Central Co-op
Central Co-op is a thriving, independent, community-based co-operative owned by its Members. Employing around 7,400 people, it operates over 460 outlets across 21 counties, including Food Retail, Petrol Filling Stations, Funeral Services and property investment. With a heritage dating back almost 180 years, Central Co-op is one of the UK’s largest and most successful co-operatives.
Known as ‘Difference Makers’, Central Co-op’s purpose extends beyond profit, benefiting its Members and local communities. With human sustainability at its core, Central Co-op is dedicated to addressing climate change and aiming for green energy self-sufficiency. It invests 1% of its trading profit in local groups through the Community Dividend Fund and since partnering with Dementia UK in 2017, has raised an impressive £2.3m. Funded by the carrier bag levy, Central Co-op has also created five Sustainable Spaces with Groundwork UK and installed over 300 defibrillators across its regions.
The recruitment brief
Central Co-op has a robust reward strategy for its colleagues. Consequently, in order to further strengthen this, a new position was created within the Reward team. Jennifer Roberts, Senior Reward & Wellbeing Manager and her team sought a candidate with technical HR experience, transferable skills in Reward and a strong drive to understand what ‘reward’ means to colleagues at Central Co-op. They were looking for someone with creative flair, a passion for positive change and the initiative to make a significant impact on Central Co-op’s ongoing Reward journey.
Choosing an agency
Having worked with Distinct for many years, Jennifer was confident Distinct’s deep understanding of the Reward space would mean they’d be able to deliver some great candidates, both in terms of experience and team fit.
Campaign outcome
Central Co-op has successfully appointed the role and is really looking forward to their new Reward Specialist joining the team.
Recommending Distinct
Distinct ensured that they not only understood what we were looking for from a technical capacity, but also took the time to understand the team fit. They went above and beyond in offering initial virtual interview videos for us to review, before we proceeded to face-to-face interviews, whilst proactively supporting both the candidates and I throughout the process. We would absolutely recommend Distinct Recruitment to others.
Jennifer Roberts, Senior Reward & Wellbeing Manager at Central Co-op
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