Yearly: 2011

Islands Insurance shortlised for Healthspan Best Large Business

What can we say!!  2011 has been a terrific year for Islands Insurance.  Not only have we gone through a huge re-development of our offices at Lancaster Court, numerous major business targets have been achieved and we have also been short listed for the Best Large Business in this year’s Guernsey Achievements Awards!!!  This is the icing on the cake for us.

We now find ourselves up against the great and the good, but whatever the outcome for all of the companies it is a fantastic achievement to get as far as the short list. All of us at Islands are really looking forward to the evening and we wish the other companies all the very best and look forward to meeting everyone at the event.

We have always considered the Achievement Awards as Guernsey’s most prestigious event and we are absolutely delighted that this year we will have our name on the big screen.  It was definitely worthwhile spending the many hours going over and over our presentation and asking ourselves many questions about our company.  The main thing was to make sure that we answered exactly what the question asked.  Now that the first big challenge is behind us; we now need to prepare ourselves for the main interview in February, very daunting indeed, a limited time to tell our story.

Director, Peter Rowe, known for his under-statement said “Hmmm 2011 has been quite a good year”.

BDO short-listed for Healthspan Best Large Business 2011

Richard Searle, Managing Director, BDO Limited

Our first Awards blog, hmmm, what to write? This should be easy but, of course, accountants don’t “do blogs”!  Accountants are supposed to be boring and certainly aren’t supposed to get excited, are they? Good job we’re not just a boring firm of accountants then isn’t it?  Contrary to Monty Python’s preaching, accountants can get excited so when we learned that we have been shortlisted for the Best Large Business award, we had just the excuse we needed. I would love to match Rob Jones’ recounting his O-level experiences but that would require creative imagery and, as we know, accountants don’t “do creative”, do they?

Joking aside, everyone here at BDO is delighted that our efforts have been recognised by the shortlisting – efforts not only in the submission but also in our on-going efforts to ensure that we continue to be first choice for our staff and clients. Our submission was a genuine team effort involving staff across all teams and from all levels, from first-year trainees to directors. For me personally, I loved hearing the passion with which our team brainstormed our submission. This made the job of drafting the wording much easier with so much good material. However, it also made it difficult to cut down the submission to the required number of words – hyphens and abbreviations work wonders!

It was all worth it.  Of course the race is not over and we still have a long way to go with many excellent firms being shortlisted in all categories. We are proud and delighted to be associated with all of the businesses that have been shortlisted and look forward to the challenge ahead.

Congratulations to all our fellow nominees – let the excitement and creativity commence!  Now, where did I leave my calculator…….?

Jones Watts short-listed for NatWest Best Small Business Award 2011

Joanna Watts, Managing Director, Jones Watts

Wow!!!  We are just so excited to be recognised in a competition which celebrates the commercial success of Guernsey.  After spending countless hours scrutinising our business model and many drafts and redrafts, the team rose to the challenge and we finally got our submission down to the obligatory number of words and submitted our application in the vain hope that, if nothing else, it had proved a useful exercise in helping us become a better, more rounded company.

But now, having been told we have made it to the final, with a shortlist including some of the Island’s best, the task before us has only just hit home.  With such a broad representation of businesses from such diverse sectors, we can’t begin to think what a difficult job the judges will have selecting the final candidates.  With presentations, film clips and press interviews all in the making, there is certainly a tall order ahead!

But, in spite of the challenge and the fear and trepidation of being involved in such a high profile award, we are just delighted to have been acknowledged as worthy enough to get this far. 

And I can tell you one thing for sure – with such a glamorous evening to come – us girls in the office certainly have a good excuse for buying a new dress!!

Aztec Group short-listed for BWCI Medium Business Award 2011

Rob Jones, Guernsey Managing Director, Aztec Group

Having received a reasonably generic email from C and E, saying “thank you for your application; the attachment confirms your status”, I was instantly transported back 20 (something) years back in time to that very moment when, as an excitable 16 year old, I held that dreaded O-level envelope in my shaking hands.

Would I get 9, 5, 0? All the hard work, all turning on the outcome of one three hour exam- none of that course-led work in my day!

Fast-forward 20 years and there I am, sitting at my desk with a finger poised to click on the PDF, experiencing the same puerile emotions.  Had we put enough in?  Had I answered the judges’ questions properly?  I knew I’d gone over the 200 words on some sections, but would they really be counting?

Click..

Yes!  We’d done it, goal scored, exam passed, vigorous Bruce Forsythesque gesticulating and then, down to earth.  To be short-listed for the awards is an incredible feeling and our entry was down to a lot of teamwork and top to bottom analysis of what our business is about.

Now the hard work starts; no point in resting on the laurels. All three short-listed companies will be keen to come out on top on 9 February and I’m sure we’ll all be concentrating now on the final presentations which bring everyone back on to the same playing field.

I wandered up to the OGH for the information morning a couple of months ago, not really understanding or appreciating what the Awards were about, but I was truly inspired by the former winners, the presenters and the judges.

We look forward to that final test!

And then there were nine…Best Business Awards shortlists announced


Nine local companies now have a chance of being crowned Guernsey Business of the Year after making it through the first round of the Guernsey Awards for Achievement’s judging process.

The NatWest Best Small Business Award will be contested by surveying practice Jones Watts Limited, jewellers Ray & Scott and design studio Two Degrees North Limited.

Two companies from the finance industry, Aztec Group, and Clydesdale Bank International, will compete against CCD Architects for the honour of lifting the BWCI Best Medium Award trophy.

And the Healthspan Best Large Business Award will be won by either BDO Limited, Cable & Wireless Communications or Islands Insurance.

One of the winners of the above three awards will then be the proud recipient of the overall Commerce & Employment Business of the Year Award.

Chairman of the judging panel, Deputy Robert Sillars, said the nominations were once again of a strong calibre and demonstrated the strength of Guernsey’s business environment.  ‘Judging the nominations for the business awards is always a challenge, not least because every company demonstrates strengths in very different areas. We work independently to an agreed set of criteria and the combined scores of all the judges give us our final three in each business category.’

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Internationally renowned architect to speak at 2011 Awards for Achievement

AN ARCHITECT who has lectured across the world will be the keynote speaker at the 2011 Guernsey Awards for Achievement.

Robert Adam is being brought to the island to talk about his 34-year career in architecture by the Garenne Group, which has secured a number of high profile speakers for the event in recent years.

‘Garenne chairman Stuart Falla had the pleasure of hearing Robert speak earlier this year and thought he would make an ideal speaker for the Award for Achievement,’ said Garenne chief executive Andy Hall.

‘We have had some exceptional speakers from Lord Coe and Lord Falconer to Tim Smit and Mel Young and all have brought something unique to this celebration of what makes Guernsey the successful place it is. Garenne Group is once again delighted to be involved with the Awards for Achievement.’

Mr Adam, 63, has practised in Winchester since 1977 and co-founded Winchester Design in 1986, which subsequently became Robert Adam Architects in 2000 and then ADAM Architecture in 2010. During his career, he has worked on a diverse range of projects including major private houses, extensions to historic buildings and public and commercial buildings.

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