The Lloyds Small to Medium Sized Business of the Year Award

CRITERIA

With over 5.5m SME’s in the UK, they are truly the backbone of the British economy as drivers of employment, value and impact. Are you proud of what your company has achieved, how you have been successful, and why people choose to work for you and with you in such an intensively competitive market?

Celebrating the economic contribution of Small to Medium-Sized Businesses, this award recognises SMBs that have maintained consistent growth and strong financial performance, understand their customers, have an engaged workforce with effective leadership, and are continually innovating to support future growth.

Open to all organisations with no more than £25 million turnover in their last financial year, this Award will go to the company that best demonstrates the following:

• An established market position
• Excellent growth, expansion or resilience
• Plan for sustained growth
• Innovation in products, services or processes
• Optimisation of technology & communication
• Customer and staff engagement
• Effective leadership and management
• An ethical approach to business
• Strong business results

SCORING AND WEIGHTING

In this category judges will compare the extent to which each candidate has demonstrated excellence in the following areas:

• Employee & Customer Engagement 
• Leadership & Innovation
• Organisational Ethics & Policies
• Financial Performance & Growth

PROPORTION OF OVERALL SCORING

25% Employee, 25% Leadership, 25% Organisational, 25% Financial

ENTRY STATEMENT

In a summary of no more than 350 words, please describe what your business does, the market in which it operates and what differentiates you from your competitors. Please include your key business achievements that are significant for your market sector or industry. (Please note that should you become a finalist the answer to this question will be used in external PR & Communications to explain who you are)

In no more than 1200 words, explain why you should win this award using the bullet points below as a guide:

• Employee & Customer Engagement 25%
  • Evidence of how staff have been attracted, retained, motivated and optimised to deliver growth objectives.#
  • Provide brief case study examples of how effective your recruitment & talent strategy has been.
  • Provide case study examples and top line data to demonstrate how you have increased your customer base or market penetration over the last 18 months.

• Leadership & Innovation 25%
  • Examples of significant innovations implemented within the business and how it has contributed to overall success.
  • How have you used pioneering technology, processes, platforms, data or automation in an innovative way? Demonstrate how have you optimised any of these, or innovated, to increase productivity or measurably improve service.
  • How has management structure and leadership philosophy improved employee performance?

• Organisational Ethics & Policies 25%
  • How are ethical, environmental or social impact policies or initiatives aligned with your growth objectives?
  • How does your approach to diversity, equity and inclusion align with your overall ambition for the business?
  • Explain how your ethical or diversity policy or sustainability strategy has improved employee / customer attraction and retention.

• Financial Performance & Growth 25%
  • Explain your key growth metrics, including financial targets, KPIs, timescales and overall ambitions plus examples of milestones and barriers/challenges that have been overcome. Growth metrics can include adoption, lead generation, client base, NPS scores, etc.
  • How do you benchmark against your peers in terms of sales, profitability or market share?
  • How has your company performed against your growth plan and what will help you to sustain future growth?
  • Show examples and/or case studies of what has supported, or will drive further, commercial success.