Our CSR policy

Policy Statement

The Oak Investment Partnership is committed to supporting the Government’s vision for Corporate Social Responsibility in terms of businesses taking account of their economic, social and environmental impacts, specifically:

Encouraging innovative approaches and continuing development and application of best practices

Ensuring best minimum levels of performance in areas such as health and safety, the environment and equal opportunities

Taking an active part in supporting the local community and social causes

The Partnership board reviews their CSR statement annually and sets specific and measurable goals on areas where we can improve and sustain our positive impact and reduce any negative impact. This will be noted in our annual reports from the year ending 31st December 2017.

Business Ethics

Key to the Partnership’s investment philosophy is the policy of aligning our interests with those of our clients – we invest our client’s savings alongside our own so clients can have the utmost confidence that we have their best interests at heart. Our focus is on building long-term relationships with and delivering excellent outcomes to our clients, rather than selling products.

We are transparent with our clients on what investments we select, offering a well-researched portfolio of investments, updating them on their investments through meetings, seminars and literature. We strive to be open, honest and straight talking and make sure we run our independent, employee-owned business ethically. We are also firm believers in the philosophy that if you treat your employees well, look after them and incentivise them then this will lead to better outcomes for our clients.

Employee Relations

The Oak Investment Partnership is majority owned by an Employee Ownership Trust for the benefit of all Partners.

All Partners who have been with the Partnership for a full 12 months are eligible for the Partnership’s profit sharing scheme, and all Partners are encouraged to think and act like the business owners they are.

The Partnership is committed to ensuring Partners work in a motivational, fulfilling and fun environment encouraging them to develop to their full potential. We have a further objective of being in the top 10% of employers in the “Happiness at Work” survey.

Partners also receive a number of benefits including a generous holiday allowance, flexible working, training budgets, a wellbeing agenda and volunteer days (where Partners are able to take a day to volunteer for a charity or event of their choice).

The Partnership is an equal opportunities employer. We actively monitor Partner pay bands to ensure that both men and women are fairly represented across the different levels. In addition, two out of four Partner Council members are women.

Awards include:

2016 Employer of the year (shortlisted) – West Oxfordshire Business Awards

2016 Small Business of the year (shortlisted) – West Oxfordshire Business Awards

Community

The Oak Investment Partnership is actively involved in community initiatives and volunteering opportunities. The Partnerships volunteer programme gives Partners the opportunity to take an additional day of paid leave per annum to volunteer with a charity or organisation of their choice providing that a benefit to that organisation can be derived.

Where possible, we try to source locally and the Partnership actively engages local businesses for business services such as IT support and provision of training courses.

The Partnership also has a £1m charity and community goal over the next decade. Any fundraising and volunteering activity goes towards this goal and we hope to make our first Partnership contribution to this goal in November 2018.

We are also committed to supporting the community by providing students and others with work experience and careers talks. In addition, from September 2016, the Partnership have been supporters of the Young Enterprise Scheme where regular advice, guidance and mentoring is given to students taking part in this initiative.

The Partnership also acts as a corporate sponsor for Chipping Norton theatre, Chipping Norton literature festival, and has raised money in the last year for the Lawrence Home Nursing team and Katharine House Hospice.

Environment

The Partnership has a relatively low impact on the environment – our carbon footprint is minimal, and we do not produce any emissions or pollutants that come under the Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control Regulations issued by DEFRA, the Partnership has identified that its most significant impacts on the environment include:

Disposal and recycling of waste (including paper and electronic equipment)

Use of consumables

Energy and water usage

Transport and car usage

Methods used to minimise the Partnerships environmental impact include:

Maximising the reuse, recycling and sustainable disposal of waste

Analysing energy and water usage and considering how usage can be minimised

Review of energy providers with consideration given to using greener energy providers while remaining commercial.

Encouraging the use of ‘paperless’ working

Support of the ‘ride to work’ scheme

Support of home working

Car sharing

Encourage and plan meetings online where possible to reduce travel. Where travel is necessary explore lowest carbon footprint option.

In addition, the Partnership supports and has invested £20,000 in the local Southill Community energy solar project. We have decided to support this project as it is a local community investment in green energy in line with our values.

Please contact Amy Yelland at amy.yelland@evenlodeinvestment.com for any queries you may have on The Oak Investment Partnership’s CSR policy.