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With a mantra to try and ‘Be Better Every Day’ since we started our business in 2018, it’s super exciting for everyone at team Noble to be shortlisted for the UK Culture Awards, ‘Best Small Agency to Work For.’
Having recently celebrated our first five years in business, to be recognised in this way alongside other incredibly ‘shortlist-worthy’ businesses feels like a real achievement.
There’s no magic wand when it comes to building a happy, healthy culture of course, but from day one, we’ve tried to put people at the heart of our business. From the team that work at Noble and our clients to the wider community within which we operate, we thrive on making meaningful connections.
So, in the spirt of connection and collaboration, we’d like to share some of the things we think have helped us build a positive culture here at Noble…
Shared values – this one’s so important to us, we even picked the UK city we opened in based on its fit with our values! Launched as a standalone business by sister company Noble Studios in Nevada, we chose Bristol as our perfect location as it shared the same US West coast culture. As we hoped as our business grew, this has helped us find super talented people to join us that share our mindset. We now have an 11-strong team committed to ‘Being Better Every Day’ and sharing in our company values to ‘Be Noble’, ‘Make meaningful connections’, ‘Be empowerful’ and last but certainly not least, ‘Grab the Noble by the horns’.
Start as you mean to go on – our commitment to the community and society within which we operate has been at the core of our business since day one. In 2022 we formalised this with our ‘Noble Deeds’ programme, which saw us donate £12,000 of digital marketing services to local charity Heart of BS13. The plan is to increase this amount in line with our turnover increasing year-on-year. In 2023 we were able to fund £18,000 of work with Homeless charity Emmaus Bristol and this year’s programme to help another local charity or not for profit will launch in June. The great thing about Deeds is not only does a vital local charity get support, it’s become a much looked forward to activity by our team. Each year they collaborate to deliver the work and run the competition to choose the annual recipient. This helps build team spirit, expand and develop skillset and at the same time build links with our local community.
Look after people – breaking the £1million turnover last year (2023) was an incredible feeling, having started our business just before the pandemic took hold. However, this rapid growth has been balanced with looking after our team – without whom the great work and financial success we’ve achieved wouldn’t have happened of course. As well as competing with much larger agencies by offering a comprehensive set of benefits including loyalty bonuses, family holiday week and a work from anywhere allowance we take into account external pressures. For example, recently granting all employees a cost-of-living bonus to help with rising costs of energy. We also flew the entire UK team to the US to celebrate our fifth birthday last year!
Every day’s a learning day – we positively encourage our team to develop and explore new skills. Continuous learning is a huge part of our culture – not just due to the fast-paced nature of the sector we work in, but because we recognise the impact it has on people’s self-development and enjoyment of their work. This goes for everyone at every level of the business – no one knows it all or is expected to! As well as gemming up on the tools of our trade at digital marketing conferences and industry events, we invest in leadership and management training which people can benefit from while working with us and in their future careers.
Celebrate brilliance – a simple thank you can go a very long way in building a happy, motivated team. Our culture is built on mutual respect and consideration. Another way we like to show the team how much we value and appreciate them is by entering awards. There’s nothing more powerful than receiving external recognition for the part you’ve played in building a great company or helping a client to achieve amazing results for their business. It can also help client marketing teams get that recognition they deserve internally too.
With a fantastic team in place, we’re pretty excited about the future for Noble Performs, but we’re always open to new ideas and learning from others as we grow and build our culture. With this in mind we’re really looking forward to meeting the other shortlisted businesses at the awards dinner in July and making more meaningful connections!
