john-lewis-partnership-plc-annual-report-2015

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John Lewis Partnership plc Annual Report and Accounts 2015
Partnership Services
performance
EFFICIENT AND EFFECTIVE SUPPORT
SERVICES ARE AN INCREASINGLY IMPORTANT
INGREDIENT TO OUR TRADING SUCCESS.
Patrick Lewis
Managing Director, Partnership Services
About Partnership Services
In Partnership Services, our goal is to free
up Partners’ time and save the Partnership
money so that our business can focus on
providing excellent customer service and
driving sales. Partnership Services is responsible
for providing support in IT, Personnel, Finance
and Procurement.
Operational priorities
At the beginning of 2014/15, following a very
challenging Christmas peak period, Partnership
Services set out to fix the basics in its IT
and Personnel operations so as to improve
the user experience. The priority was to
establish excellent operational and professional
personnel systems, and align relationships
with stakeholders.
A significant step forward was the launch of
our Resourcing service in May 2014. This saw
the amalgamation of three divisional teams in
one central location as well as attempting to
streamline numerous processes. Since then, we
have successfully recruited more than 22,000
Partners to the business as well as continuously
striving to improve the process.
As a result of their hard work the Resourcing
team were recognised for the work they do
when awarded The Times Top 100 Graduate
Employer and Targetjobs most Popular
Graduate Employer of choice for Retail and
Sales. New administration and policy services
in Personnel launched last year have also
consistently improved service levels throughout
the year. The Partnership Health Service (PHS)
celebrated its first anniversary with Health
Partners reporting an improved productivity of
20%. For example, PHS helped 3,400 Partners
with physiotherapy cases, giving an estimated
saving of nearly 41,000 absence days. We have
also focussed on improving the resilience
and capacity of our IT systems, particularly
during peak trading. Partnership Services
IT implemented 500 changes, on top
of a significant number of Divisional-led
improvements. This reduced the number of
major incidents caused by our infrastructure,
from 40 at the end of 2013, to one at the
end of 2014.
Awards and recognition
In 2014, Finance continued to improve its
efficiency, and Procurement delivered £37m
of benefits to the Partnership. The John Lewis
Partnership became the first retailer to be
awarded the Quality in Credit Management,
thanks to our Accounts Receivable team.
In addition the Payroll and Expenses team
were also recognised by being awarded an
accreditation for their exemplary procedures,
policies and compliance by the Chartered
Institute of Payroll Professionals (CIPP).
Positive Partner feedback
The successful peak trading period reinforced
the great progress Partnership Services made
in providing reliable and valuable services to our
customers in Waitrose, John Lewis and Group.
Both Paul Coby, John Lewis IT Director and
Cheryl Millington, Waitrose IT Director praised
the support provided by our IT team to ensure
systems ran smoothly over the peak period.
We have continued to focus on the importance
of Partners in the divisions, and have seen
steady improvements in our Partner pulse
score, where Partners are asked if the division
is a great place to work, from 51% to 59%.
This is when Partners are asked if the division is
a great place to work.
Outlook
We will continue to build on the expertise of
our Partners through great Leadership, Line
Managers and Partners. We will focus on
providing excellent customer service and lower
costs to the trading divisions, ensuring we are
exceeding their expectations in everything we
do for them.
Patrick Lewis
Managing Director, Partnership Services