Middlesex FA Employee of the Quarter
Middlesex FA have recently introduced a new in-house award to recognise some of the excellent work that our staff do during their day to day work. We started this award thanks to our staff Health & Wellbeing group, who identified it as a way to award some of the fantastic work that goes on behind the scenes to make the life of our volunteers as easy as we can.
The inaugural winner of Employee of the Quarter is our much-loved Receptionist, Jacqueline Luckhurst. Those of you who visit Rectory Park regularly and are met by our talkative front of house supremo would be surprised to know that she is actually very shy and would much rather others have the limelight.
Since joining Middlesex FA in the summer Jacqueline has transformed our reception area. Her ability to create the perfect working environment has been instrumental in making our front of house team perform to their best. This is something that has not gone unnoticed with both staff and customers remarking about the difference she has made.
Along with this transformed environment we found at reception we also had the perfect person to help us improve our relationships with our customers. Jacqueline is a happy, smiley, welcoming and helpful presence, which is perfect for the person who is the first point of contact for Middlesex FA and Rectory Park.
Jacqueline lives our core values both in the workplace and in her spare time. She has shown her commitment to Middlesex FA by going above and beyond to make everyone’s lives easier and just that little bit more fun. Jacqueline managed to scare our Chief Executive one Sunday morning when he popped in to pick something up. There she was, in the Middlesex FA office making use of her incomparable craft skills. Jacqueline had come in to the office on her day off to decorate the centre and the staff office ahead of Halloween. We came in Monday morning to find decorative bunting, a box of “spare body parts” made of Sellotape and much, much more!
She connects with our public who are the reason we do what we do and that is important to us. She is a welcoming face who engages with people and enjoys doing so. The thing that stood out to Jacqueline when she was applying for our vacant Receptionist post was that the advert said, “Be the face of Rectory Park”. This along with our community roots was what impressed her the most. Jacqueline is nothing short of devoted to community work.
She recently joined several other members of staff to volunteer time to help plant a community orchard on Rectory Park as part of the regeneration work that is ongoing. Outside of work Jacqueline spends most of her time do things for her community. She currently volunteers at The Parish Church of St Edmund of Canterbury in Hayes, here her creativity has made a huge difference. Jacqueline looks after the clothing and household items that they offer as part of their community food bank. Since the humble beginnings of this work she has transformed this department from 2 boxes of clothes to 2 rails and 8 boxes of clothes. Along with this she has begun to build up stock of household items and toy as she rightly says, “people use food banks because they can’t afford food, if they can’t afford food, how can they afford clothes? How can they afford toys for their kids? Or cleaning products and other household items? These people aren’t just homeless, or out of work they just need a little help to get them through.
On being named Employee of the Quarter, Jacqueline said, “It is lovely to hear all the good things that people had to say. I worry that what I do can sometimes be too much and people are just too polite to challenge me. But this award endorses the things I do and gives me the confidence to do more. I would be quite happy for someone to just say ‘that’s nice’ and that would be enough for me.”
Jacqueline also said, “My aim is to make life easier for others, I may not be able to give you money, but what I can give you is time. If you can make work life better for others, why wouldn’t you?”
Outside of her volunteering Jacqueline is a craft wizard, whether that is with paint, paper, card, wire, wool, tape or a sewing needle, you name it, she does it. A lot of the work that Jaqueline does is free of charge often creating cards, dolls and dresses before donating to charities, especially those that she has a personal connection to, allowing them to sell on her work to fundraise for their own work. This creativity and care has not gone unnoticed at Rectory Park where Jacqueline has already made a huge impact on people. Whenever it is someone’s birthday you can be sure you can find Jacqueline create a pop up card for the birthday boy or girl.
The list of little things Jacqueline has introduced at Rectory Park to make the lives of those who visit and those who work there just a little bit better is almost without an end, and that alone is testament to Jacqueline as a person. The little Christmas gifts she has hidden around the office have become a game that everyone wants to win, her impromptu advent draw is just another item that has been added to the list.
George Wells and Andy Perren, who interviewed Jacqueline for the role and lead the team at Rectory Park said, “As soon as we completed our interview with Jacqueline we knew we had found ‘the face of Rectory Park’. We were looking for someone kind, outgoing and someone who had a passion for customer service. This shone through at the interview and we are pleased to say she has continued to show these qualities every day since then.”
Why not pop in to Rectory Park and see our fantastic facility where you will be greeted by Jacqueline you could play on one of our great pitches, hire a room or simply pop in for a coffee or some food from The Clubhouse, whatever you do, we guarantee Jacqueline will brighten your day.