HR Brilliance Awards Winners 2018

Awards
HR Brilliance Awards
HR Brilliance Awards Winners 2018

October 12, 2025

HR Brilliance Awards Winners 2018

2018 HR Brilliance Awards - Winners Announced!

The HR Brilliance Awards champions the vital role that HR plays in the success of any organisation and the winning of an HR Brilliance Award is an affirmation excellence amongst employees, colleagues and industry peers.

We believe that those who enter the awards, and of course those who ultimately win the awards, are role models of excellence that inspire all of us to be the best that we can. Within their entries and out of their success, there are lessons from which we can all learn.

So this report on the BOC HR Brilliance Awards is not only a celebration of outstanding performance, it is also a guidebook for what it takes to be extraordinary. It contains lessons for all of us who are curious enough, and ambitious enough to look for them.

Tom Griffin

Chair of BOC Brilliance Awards

Judging Criteria

To help harness these lessons we put in place a set of judging criteria that together create a model of excellence against which we can judge, reward, learn and share.

The Role Models of Excellence criteria:

Clarity of Purpose– A crystal clear vision of exactly what it is you are going to achieve with the campaign.
Focussed Intent– The clarity of strategic thinking from the outset, and the ability to stay true to that strategy.
Creative Flexibility– Yes the quality of the initial ideas and their execution, but also the responsiveness to emerging opportunities and challenges that inevitably arise along the way.
Resourcefulness– The careful use of allocated budget and the creative harnessing of other resources.
Effectiveness– Did the activity, team or individual achieve its objectives and was the investment of time, money and resources positively beneficial?
Cultural Value- Did the activity, team or individual have a positive impact on the organisation, the target audience and all others it touched?

HR Director of the Year

In this category judges were looking to recognise an individual among the HR community who has demonstrated excellence in their profession during the past 12 months and that exemplified the attributes and qualities within the overall judging criteria. In short they would be role models of excellence in the world of HR.

FINALIST – Cliff Morton

Winner – Jane Walker-Smith

In the face of unprecedented growth at MHA MacIntyre Hudson, Jane Walker-Smith showed both Clarity of Purpose and Creative Flexibility as she built on the firms cultural values to innovate and re-invent the role of HR as a centre of tangible resource centre for staff and clients a like.

In particular judges were impressed with the diverse range of initiatives championed by Jane, having entered a business that was, in the words of their award submission; ‘On a cliff edge’. Initiative like the life coaching and opening up of training to third-party clients were particularly impressive. She is a s one judge put it, “A true role model.”

Brilliance in Innovative Use of Technology

In this category we have two winners.

Judges were looking for organizations that have used technology to move HR forward. It could be via the application of HR software and analytic systems, online recruitment or an e-learning programme. In particular we focussed on those who demonstrated an innovative approach that was symbiotic with corporate strategy. As always, the importance of financial effectiveness was a high priority.

Joint Winners

Winner (Public Sector) – Dubai Police

The trust and reliance on well-defined institutional performance indicators and clear strategic planning made the Dubai Police stand out for the judges. Their Resourcefulness and Creative Flexibility was clearly demonstrated in the way that they use the fully integrated artificial intelligence system Fajwa.

Built in house this system (aligned to the vision, strategy and culture of the Dubai Police) measured employees' competencies (behavioural, technical) and capabilities (education, performance, skills) versus the ideal requirements for given roles.

We were particularly impressed with Fajwa’s is ability to serve over 20,000 employees smoothly and efficiently in the way it mitigates the subjectivity and subconscious human bias.

Winner (Private Sector) – The AA

Courage and Creative Flexibility were at the fore when The AA turned to Microsoft’s Bot Framework, which was still in beta stage at the time. With core code changing ‘under their feet’ during their development phase they manged to create a digital solution that lived up to the brand promise of being ‘Ready for ANYTHING.’

Judges loved the focussed intention of creating not just a chatbot, but rather a ‘brand character’; the ‘cheeky alter ego’ of the corporate brand, as they put it.

The blend of information and inspiration central to the personality of AAbot, and the authenticity of its deliberately awkward un-humanness, undoubtable contributed to a remarkable 266% increase in total job applications.

Brilliance in Recruitment and Retention

Evidence of innovation and bottom line contribution through enhanced recruitment and improved retention were both high in Judges minds in this category. Entries could range from one-off projects in key areas through to the implementation of new policies covering all resourcing activities. There were two winners, one from the Public Sector and one from the Private Sector.

Joint Winners

Winner (Public Sector) – CSHR (Ministry of Justice) Case Work Team

The impressive effectiveness of the CSHR Casework development programme was brought to life for the judges when they managed to attract over 450 applicants for the first four posts it was responsible for. Born out of a strong focus on diversity and inclusion these trainees were located in numerous geographically locations to overcome recruitment limitations enabling the business to provide a better service to our client base. The scheme has expanded as a result of its success and delivers a first-class advisory service by HR professionals with a passion and desire to succeed.

The Judges felt that mentoring and role modelling were central to their success and contributed greatly to the 8-month programme being able to take candidates with limited HR experience or knowledge, on a journey to become a fully competent HR Case Man

ager.

Winner (Private Sector) – AstraZeneca

“In today’s competitive markets, with multiple global and local organisations competing for the same scarce talent and skills, companies need to be much more strategic in their talent acquisition.” In this line from their awards submission AstraZeneca greatly impressed the Judges.

Their ambition to put their people at the front and centre by creating what they called ‘Talent Magnets’, meant that they were able to be on the constant lookout for the best possible people to join the business.

Their belief that ‘A players attract A players’ struck the judges as a particularly fine example of focussed intent, that became a guiding principle driving their success.

They managed to dramatically simply some 50 local referral programmes in to just one global referral programme with one identity, on one easily accessible online platform. And all of this achieved in just 9 months!

Brilliance in Employee Engagement

A willingness of each employee to strive to do their best work on a daily basis, has become the leading indicator of performance and competitiveness across all organizations. This idea was high in the minds of judges in this category.

Judges looked for a well-thought out strategy linking employee engagement to the heart of the business, which could include motivation programmes that have made a significant difference to an organisation's performance.

Winner – Hermes UK Culture Transformation Champion (Judges Choice Award)

Hermes UK won the judges choice award here because they built on initial positive results, to receive the backing of the board to roll-out a new programme with real Clarity of Purpose; rewarding and supporting staff, a new benefits scheme, work/life balance initiatives, leadership and development, and a new intranet solution.

The effectiveness of the programme is evidenced by a 6 point rise in employee engagement from 67% to 73%, with further growth expected by the end of 2018.

The spring board for all of this was HR Director Jill Maples authorising the launch of a company-wide survey that put the focus squarely on the happiness of Hermes workforce in the workplace.

Winner – Etisalat

Etisalat impressed the judges by looking beyond traditional methods of engagement to challenge themselves and what they could achieve in finding new, innovative ways to engage staff. The resourcefulness they showed enabled them to resist prevailing market conditions, and transform their engagement model. The inclusion of the Gallup model of Five Essential Elements of Well-Being – career, social, financial, physical, and community well-being was noted for its estimable values focussed intention.

With 15,000 staff across 91 countries and the deployment of over 100 initiatives, was particularly impressive.

HR Team of the Year

Judges were looking for evidence of both team effort and bottom line contribution through enhanced partnerships with the wider business functions. This award recognises the HR team who have excelled within their function and across the organisation.

Winner – MHA MacIntyre Hudson

Creative Flexibility was to the fore in this worthy winner of HR Team of the Year. In the face of unprecedented growth, a new flexible and innovative HR strategy was put in place that was cost-effective and delivered value-added service to MHA.

The importance of Cultural Value was also recognised by the judges as the MHA HR team used the firm’s own values to reinvent the role of HR. Their Focussed Intent enabled them to successfully challenge the traditional perception of HR as an administrative cost-centre to one of a resource that generates tangible benefits for staff and clients alike.