This month we spotlight a partner who is a great reflection of the benefits to be had from engaging with the full ELBA offer. T. Rowe Price have been ELBA corporate partners from 2014 and have since taken part in every programme at ELBA, often engaging teams and individuals and demonstrating commitment to diversifying their workforce. Since joining, 250+ T. Rowe Price volunteers have supported over 1500 beneficiaries!

We caught up with the ELBA leads in each team to find out about some of the great work T. Rowe Price have done with us over the last few years and the highlights from this year.

Education

T. Rowe Price have been an excellent example of how corporate teams can come together to support young people in east London. We have been lucky to have volunteers support on a number of Business Education for Schools and Higher Education events. They recently supported an enterprise day at Little Ilford School which the teachers described as “definitely our best ever!”, saying that T Rowe Price’s volunteers were “so brilliant with the students on the day”. There is definitely an appreciation amongst employees of the needs of the students we work with. Volunteer leads will often invite feedback on resources they have created in order to give the students the best experience possible. For the second year running, they are also supporting Queen Mary University Business students on a mentoring programme. This year’s programme will conclude in April.

Their enthusiastic workforce make engagement with young people an exciting event where volunteers and students alike can learn something from each other.

Challenge: ELBA
T. Rowe Price have already completed 14 team challenges with ELBA since the start of their partnership with us. This has included a Tea Party for the elderly at their offices for the past two years, with food, tea and a game of bingo all organised by the firm, for up to 50 – 60 service users. Other practical events have included working in parks, adventure playgrounds, community gardens and local schools spreading across east London boroughs including Hackney, Tower Hamlets and Newham. The company have supported Portway Primary School in Newham this summer – a team of volunteers did a fantastic job creating an outdoor reading area for children. Team leader Brett Dodge said of the team challenge ‘it allowed the team to work more fully together. We had to navigate tricky challenges and work together in order to overcome them. Some of the tasks were new to many of the members of the team so there was a real sense of achievement when we had finished. It was also really nice to be out of the office and try something new’. They have also previously supported Gwyn Jones Primary School in Leytonstone. In addition, over 30 volunteers completed a recent supermarket sweep for Newham Foodbank where volunteers not only bought food for local residents but did a voluntary collection for other essentials including toiletries and clothing. Read more about it here. Thank you for all your hard work and efforts with our local charities and schools across east London. We look forward to plenty more in 2018/2019.

Connect
T. Rowe Price have collaborated with ELBA’s Connect Team on some fantastic “Professional Business Skills” activities. In July, eight volunteers from the legal team hosted a group of students from east London based college, ELATT. The daylong workshop included a range of different employment themed activities. The volunteers supported students with their CV’s and interview skills, helping to increase their chances of securing employment. The day concluded with one volunteer delivering a fantastic, interactive talk on employment rights. The workshop was of real benefit to the students with every attendee stating that they strongly agreed that the workshop had increased their confidence and that they would recommend it to a friend. A brilliant piece of professional business skills volunteering.

Employment
As a specialist social mobility charity with an award-winning employment programme, ELBA is proud to be the recruiting partner for T. Rowe Price apprenticeships. Now in its fourth year, this scheme has successfully sourced local talent that might have otherwise been overlooked via traditional recruitment approaches. Last month, via a rigorous recruitment process, four candidates were successful in securing apprenticeship positions with T. Rowe Price, beginning their corporate careers at the central London asset management firm. It has been fantastic to witness the impact this opportunity has had on our new and former apprentices. T. Rowe Price has enabled individuals to develop professionally via mentoring and further opportunities i.e. travel, industry recognised qualifications, permanent positions and promotion. The calibre of candidates was particularly high this year, and alongside the successes of our apprentices, we were able to celebrate another successful outcome when one of the candidates who did not get onto the apprenticeship programme secured a role at T. Rowe Price. We caught up with our new starters to hear about how they were able to secure their roles and what they are looking forward to for the future. To read more about their career journey, please click here.

We are all very excited to see how we can continue to work with T. Rowe Price in the future.