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Our Derbyshire Awards

The annual Our Derbyshire Awards are a celebration of our people and a chance to formally recognise your achievements.


Our Derbyshire Awards

These awards are an opportunity for you to nominate individuals or teams who have gone above and beyond to support the people of Derbyshire and shown a commitment to our values.

Our Derbyshire Award nominations were open from Monday 29 January to Friday 16 February 2024.

Each nomination will now be carefully considered by our shortlisting panel after which, the finalists for each category will be put forward to our judging panel, made up of our executive directors and managing director, who will choose the winners.

All finalists will be invited to an awards event.

Award categories

Our Derbyshire Awards includes 9 categories with a combination of individual and team awards, each with their own criteria.

The majority of our awards are open to nominations from any colleague or manager, however, the Serving our Communities award is also open to nominations from partners and members of the public, and the Managing Director's Award winner will be selected by the managing director personally.

Rising Star Award

This award is for employees or apprentices at an early stage of their career or profession (or who have started their career or changed profession within the organisation within the last 2 years).

Nominees have:

  • demonstrated high quality work and made a positive impact
  • demonstrated a commitment to our vision and values
  • made great progress in their development and learning

Employee of the Year Award

This category is open to any individual employee who successfully delivers or enables the delivery of a service to either internal or external customers.

Nominees have:

  • delivered excellent care or customer service
  • demonstrated a positive attitude and are supportive
  • been focused on meeting the needs of the customer making best use of our existing resources
  • delivered something unexpected or consistently excellent performance, always in line with our values and commitments
  • been nominated as a result of a specific achievement or exceptional performance within their day-to-day role

Inspiring Leader Award

This award is open to leaders at any level of the organisation, leading any team either on a permanent or temporary basis. Nominees will not necessarily be a manager of a traditional team.

Nominees have:

  • set an example, inspired others and they embody our values
  • proactively encouraged the development and aspirations of others
  • demonstrated that they are sensitive to differing motivations of the person or people they lead
  • a focus on continual improvement within their area of work
  • demonstrated they are open to feedback and actively listen, seeking the views of others
  • aligned their actions with our Council Plan

Lifetime Achievement Award

This category will have 4 winners – one from each of place, corporate services and transformation, children's services and adult social care and health. There will not be any other finalists for this award this year. Nominations can be made for individuals who have worked for us for 25 years or more.

Nominees have:

  • consistently delivered exceptional performance or work in line with our values or ambition
  • had a significant impact on their peers or the people who use our services during their time with us

Vision Derbyshire Award

This award is for an individual or team whose achievements have been in collaboration with our partners, collectively addressing challenges to shape better outcomes for our people or places.

Nominees have:

  • delivered a change or exceptional performance in collaboration with one of our partners or group of partners
  • delivered a change or achieved performance that has shaped better outcomes for local people or places
  • shown effective use of existing resources and these will be integral to the achievement

Enterprising Council Award

This award is for an individual or team whose achievements have delivered innovation or transformation. Nominations will need to show how this exceeded the usual requirements of the job.

Nominees have:

  • delivered a change or achievement that is transformational in the improvement of a service or is an innovative change
  • achieved outstanding results that are focused on ensuring we're prepared for the future
  • shown effective use of existing resources and these will be integral to the achievement

Serving our Communities Award

This award is for an individual or team whose achievements support our people and places to thrive. Members of the public or partners are invited to nominate employees for this award.

Nominees have:

  • collaborated with and across our communities
  • delivered excellent customer care or service
  • made a difference to the lives of people in our communities
  • delivered a positive change for people or places

Nominations for this award can be made by a trade union representative, a colleague from a partner organisation, a member of the public or someone who uses our services.

There is a separate nomination form that can be used by a member of the public, someone who uses our services, a colleague from a partner organisation or a trade union representative. You can help us promote this award by copying and pasting the following line into your email signature when contacting someone who you feel may be interested in nominating someone.

Happy with our service? Please consider making a nomination for our 'Serving our communities' employee award to help recognise individuals and teams for their hard work.

High Performing Team Award

This award is new for 2024 and is for a team that delivers or enables the delivery of a service to either internal or external customers.

Nominees have:

  • delivered a change or exceptional results for the council
  • maximised their individual skills to achieve something better together
  • evidenced good communication, collaboration and a commitment to their shared goals
  • a focus on learning, developing and supporting each other

The Managing Director's Award

This award is for individuals who have made an exceptional contribution, for example, they may have:

  • made a significant strategic contribution
  • overcome challenging circumstances
  • demonstrated exceptional performance
  • delivered significant improvement for the lives of others in our community

Nominations

All nominees have been contacted to make sure they are happy for the nomination to be considered and that they agree to have their details published on our employee website.

If the nominee did not want any publicity, their details have been removed from the list of nominations for shortlisting. However, the details of their nomination will be passed to the relevant executive director to thank them on a one-to-one basis unless otherwise requested by the nominee.

The selection process

All nominations will be reviewed by our shortlisting panel made up of representatives from across the council from a range of roles.

If we receive many nominations, these may undergo additional shortlisting before being reviewed by the shortlisting panel. This shortlisting would be done by department directors and category specialists if required.

The shortlisting panel will select the finalists for each category. These will then be assessed by our judging panel consisting of the executive directors and the managing director.

The identity of our winners will be kept confidential until announced at the award presentation event.

The awards event

Each of our finalists will be invited to our awards event where the category winners will be announced.

Further details about the event itself will be shared when our nomination process closes.