Apply for a Princess Royal Training Award: a prestigious award that celebrates and royally recognises outstanding training in the hospitality industry
Do you deliver outstanding training, learning and development programmes that are having an impact on your organisation? Why not apply for a Princess Royal Training Award and get the recognition you deserve?
What are the Princess Royal Training Awards?
Free to enter from start to finish, the Princess Royal Training Awards celebrate employers committed to training, learning and skills development who can demonstrate exceptional impact on their business. If you want to showcase your training and join an outstanding Alumni network of 600+ organisations committed to investing in learning and development, then this could be the perfect award for you.
Who can apply?
The Awards are open to any private, public or not-for-profit organisation operating in the UK and Ireland regardless of size or sector. Whether training to tackle skills shortages in the sector, investing in graduates to reduce staff turnover, developing programmes to create a culture of inclusivity or to address gender imbalances in leadership, the Awards are open to all.
Previous Awards recipients include global multinationals such as IBM, GSK and Labcorp, well-known brands including Asda, Barclays, Dermalogica, DVLA, Greene King, JCB and Santander, as well as smaller organisations and charities including Diverse FM and Cox London.
Have any organisations from the hospitality industry been recognised?
A range of hospitality industry organisations large and small have achieved an Award, including Apprenticeship in Hospitality Scotland, Black and White Hospitality, Caffe Nero, Dorchester Collection, Elior UK, Greene King, The Master Innholders, Mitchells and Butlers, Oakman Inns and the Red Carnation Hotel Collection.
Outstanding training programmes have included those of The Dorchester Collection, which set out to respond to challenges in the face of possible staff shortages due to Brexit. It reinvented its staff development processes, creating a framework that is flexible and sophisticated enough to meet individual needs in many different situations and countries. Outcomes included a significant reduction in employee turnover and a near-doubling of recruitment applications in a year.
Other organisations commended for excellence in training include the Red Carnation Hotel Collection for its Graduate Management programme, designed to attract, train and retain exceptional graduate talent. The programme successfully provides a succession pipeline into management roles, resulting in recruitment savings of over £100,000 and lower than industry average staff turnover costs. In addition, Mitchells and Butlers created an industry-leading culinary development programme, Chefs Academy, in response to a chef shortage in the hospitality sector. The apprenticeship has led to an average 70% retention rate, compared to 12% for chefs in the business not undertaking the programme.
What do the Awards offer?
The Princess Royal Training Awards offer something a bit different from other award programmes. Organisations receive royal recognition for their outstanding training programmes, with an award that sets them apart from their competitors and can be displayed on their website, communications and products. As one 2021 recipient explained:
“The Master Innholders applied in 2018 because at that time it was a relatively new award and we felt it would be good to get some external validation for the programme, but it was really to get a quality Kitemark for the whole programme…we applied again in 2021 because we wanted to see how the programme had developed and we didn’t want to lose the award; we wanted to keep it. We would definitely apply again in the future. Having got it, I wouldn’t dare to lose it, I wouldn’t be able to tell the clients that we hadn’t received it again.”
Notably, as the Awards are a standard of excellence, employers don’t have to compete against one another. They simply need to show that they are meeting the Awards’ criteria through their training programmes.
In addition to attendance at a high-profile ceremony where successful organisations are presented with the Award by HRH The Princess Royal, recipients also become part of the alumni network of organisations dedicated to excellence in training, learning and development.
“Now we are part of a community of Princess Royal Training Awards Alumni where we can continue to share best practice and learn from other organisations as we continue to grow”
– 2021 recipient.
Previous Awards recipients have reported numerous additional benefits, including increased investment in training programmes, improved recruitment and retention, and incorporation of HR and Learning and Development into organisational strategy.
How do we get started?
Applying is easy. Register now and you’ll be sent a unique link for your application form, which you can fill in and submit online. The Awards are open until 31 March 2023. Applicants can even submit a draft application before 28th February to receive feedback from Assessors! Previous recipients have found this support invaluable:
“The feedback was so helpful and so constructive and you get a real sense that the Assessors are really trying to help you towards achieving the Award.” – 2022 recipient.
What’s more, there are plenty of other options to ensure that applicants are fully supported throughout the application process. In addition to attending support workshops and ‘tea and chat’ sessions for advice, guidance and tips, applicants can get in touch with the Princess Royal Training Awards team via 1-1 calls, web chat or email support.
For more information or if you have any questions, please contact us at: info@princessroyaltrainingawards.com.