Edinburgh firm takes staff on exotic bonus holiday

An Edinburgh firm has taken members of staff on a four day holiday to Portugal as a work bonus.

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Directors of Solve HR, which advises other firms on good HR practices, paid £5000 to take their seven-strong team on a four-day trip to the Algarve after they helped steer the firm to its £300,000 turnover target.

Founding director Stephanie Robinson, inspired her team by promising them a sunshine holiday if targets were met.

She said: “My dad catered for major functions and used to tell me about a huge event he was involved with for a big American company in the 1980s.

“The company brought all of its sales staff and their wives to Scotland.

“The idea was they would reward their top performing people by taking them around all of Scotland’s most prestigious venues and give them a money can’t buy experience.

“That would reinforce that their company was a fabulous place to work and to drive growth.

“As they all wanted to be on the trip the following year, it allowed them to retain their best talent.

“With my own business I was determined to reach £300,000 turnover, not least because lots of people in the world of SMEs told me that getting past £250,000 could be a real challenge and I didn’t want to get stuck there.

“So that story from my dad inspired me and I decided to go for it. I told the team that if we could all work together to break £300k, then we’d go away on holiday.

“It seemed to work because towards year end there was a real team effort to drive sales and more and more projects started to come off.”

While each member of the team will have individual bonus opportunities, the company has already promised them another holiday if they reach the next target – breaking through the £400,000 turnover mark.