Nigel's Blog
Hi, I'm Nigel the Chief Executive of Retail Trust.
The coming year will be a time of growth and change for Retail Trust. The charity will be working more closely than ever with organisations in the retail sector as we cement ourselves as the charity committed to the well-being of employees in the retail industry.
Part of working more closely with the industry is communication. Technology allows me to communicate with you through this blog – spelling mistakes and all! So please feel free to email me on the Contact page with feedback, ideas, or just to swap stories about our blogs. Enjoy!
You can read my biography on our Trustees and Chief Executive page.
Nigel J L Rothband
Chief Executive
Read Nigel's Blog
31 July 2009 : Bright Sparks at BrightHouse
Had a fantastic meeting at the BrightHouse head office just down the road in Watford. Leo McKee the CEO has been a great supporter or Retail Trust for a long time and it is great to have the whole Brighthouse team now on board. We talked about a number of opportunities to work increasingly in partnership. Along with Leo we met with fellow director Andrew Mills and Head of Marketing Alan Beesley.
Yesterday I had a very interesting lunch at Mosimann's. I was invited by The Prince's Foundation for Integrated Health. It was a lunch for a small group of individuals to have a discussion about the work of the Foundation. It was fascinating and I made a number of suggestions and comments that seemed to strike a chord. As a result I am meeting up with a member of their team to see what help I can give. I'll keep you posted.
Sad to hear the news about Sir Bobby Robson R.I.P.
30 July 2009 : Be sensible Darling
I feel I must join the campaign calling upon the Chancellor Alistair Darling to postpone the VAT rise that is due at the end of the year. He must choose a more sensible date…to have all this work going on New Year's Eve - a key trading time for retailers - is absurd. A decision to delay this VAT increase will be a welcome one for already over-burdened retailers.
29 July 2009 : Charity Starts At Home
I read today that the Brits are the most charitable people in the world, according to a new survey of 10,500 people in 16 countries.
The study, by social enterprise charity UnLtd, took place over three months and aimed to produce a view of international attitudes to global concerns. Amongst the countries that participated were Spain, France, Switzerland, USA, Canada, Germany, and India.
The study focused upon global health, ethical and environmental concerns and dealt with topics such as charitable giving, employment, and global warming. Results showed that, among other things, the US is the most inward-looking and France is the most interested in employment issues.
Some 1,186 members of the British public took part in the study and out of these 83 per cent said they had given to charity in the past year – a higher proportion than any other nation. Canadians were the second most charitable with 77 per cent of adults claiming to have given to charity in the past year.
Whereas Britain is most interested in supporting health causes such as cancer, Switzerland is more concerned about climate change, with 85 per cent of participants stating they were concerned about it. In contrast just 17 per cent of Brits were worried about climate change and only 31 per cent actively recycle.
Just 18 per cent of the 1,503 Americans questioned were interested in developing world debt.
Meanwhile, the Daily Mail last week ran a feature suggesting that if were Britain reduced to a village the size of 100 people, within the past four weeks 56 of the 100 villagers would claim to have given to charity and that overall, the village would donate £17,393 to charity in a year.
So, with 3 million people working in retail.........................................no let's not go there.
28 July 2009 : Busy Times
Its been busy while I've been away.
The Retail Trust Helpline 0808 801 0808 is on track to have another record month. I am delighted we have appointed an individual to fill the new post of EAP Services Development Manager to develop our services and lead the charge into the next phase of our development. Watch this space!
The next three dates have been set for our career cafes. September 3rd. October 1st and November 12th. Click here for more details.
The Times ran an excellent article on Retail Trust Search For A Star, thanks to Kypros and the team at Rymans for their help and support. Dozens more individuals and companies have signed up to take places in the competition. Marks & Spencer confirmed five places for their staff today. Read The Times article.
The developers have given us partial handover of our Leylands Estate. I understand it looks fabulous and I look forward to seeing it when I visit on August 19th
Swine flu doesn't seem to have taken too many prisoners here but we are keeping a close eye on things.
27 July 2009 : Good To Be Back
After three weeks away in the sun, it's good to be back. Isn't it cold?!
With the executive team meeting followed by one to one's plus the hundreds of emails to go through, don't expect me to surface until about Thursday!
01 July 2009 : Hot Hot Hot
It's July 1st. it must be our Board meeting.
Shirt sleeves and no ties was the order of the day as it was about 30 degrees in central London. We have introduced a "spotlight session" for our Board meetings which give the executive team and the Board an opportunity to discuss and debate important issues.
Today was about EAP and our Derby development and we have made some clear decisions and agreed a way forward on both subjects.
A quick dash back to the office for a meeting with Kim Whitfield, Head of HR at Marks and Spencer. Kim has joined our Grants & Services Committee and wanted to see the work of Retail trust at first hand. I am confident that she is going to be a key player in turning our good intentions with M&S into actions.
29 June 2009 : Miles Better
I drove 450 miles today!
A visit to Leicester in the morning was followed by the long drive to Manchester. Dinner at the Hilton Hotel with "leading lights" from the northern retail fraternity was the reason for going. Our Northern Forum has now established itself and there was a great turnout with lots of banter.
Attendees included our Life president J M Barry Gibson, Alistair McGeorge CEO Matalan, Alan White CEO N Brown, Bill Laird MD Nisa Group, Andrew Harrison Commercial Director Manchester Airport and Peter Johnson of Park Foods. Topics of discussion ranged from Michael Jackson to what is the origin of the name Matalan.
It was the perfect opportunity to thank Alistair and his team at Matalan for their amazing support and encourage the others to follow suit.
26 June 2009 : Mum meets Matalan
My Mum has just rung me to say that she has been into Matalan in Wythenshaw and seen a young man wearing a Retail Trust t shirt.
Very excited she was!
She went up to "Stephen" and explained who her son was and told him how delighted I would be to find out he was promoting our charity.
It turns out that, while he is a keen supporter of Retail Trust, the only reason he is wearing the t shirt is because "we all hate the new Matalan uniform".
Matalan are great supporters of Retail Trust and have nominated us as their Charity of the Year.
I hope I haven't got Stephen into too much trouble - Keep wearing the t shirt.
25 June 2009 : Board Stiff
Preparing the Board pack is always an interesting experience. With the Board meeting next week the papers have gone out today.
After the standard stuff in the first part of the meeting we are going to be discussing our employee assistance programme during our "spotlight" session afterwards. We are at a very important stage of our development with over 600,000 employees signed up via their company. I look forward to and welcome the debate.
Met Norman, Jane, Kelly and Sara this afternoon - you know who you are and I hope the answer is yes!
19 June 2009 : Chairman Visit
Dudley Cloake visited Mill Hill today and we spent a good amount of time talking about Board effectiveness. With the Board meeting at the beginning of July we had much to discuss.
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