Wales’ largest regional law firm will become the first of its kind in Wales to offer a staff a ‘Community Hub’ after securing planning permission to extend its Swansea headquarters in a move which will also secure more than 50 jobs.
JCP Solicitors, which has nine offices throughout South and West Wales, has been given the green light to build an onsite crèche, gym and café by expanding into the building next door to its headquarters at Venture Court in Swansea. The gym and crèche facilities are to be for exclusive use by JCP Solicitors staff and family, with access to the café intended for the firm’s workforce, their family members, and clients.
The firm, which employs 114 people at its Swansea site with another 90 across its other eight regional offices, also intends to create more office space utilising the additional upstairs floor.
The announcement comes months after JCP Solicitors merged with South East based firm, Glamorgan Law, in a move that has created the largest law firm with offices solely in Wales. As the number of staff has grown with its rapid expansion over recent years, staff health and wellbeing continues to be a main focus of JCP Solicitors.
HR Manager at JCP Solicitors, Jenny Jones, said: “Our Community Hub is the first of its kind in Wales and is all about recognising the importance of a healthy work-life balance. With work related stress on the increase, our people are our priority. It is hugely important to put the right solutions in place for our hardworking teams.
“Staff feedback is key, and at the beginning of the process, we issued a questionnaire asking for a “wish list” for new premises. The two main themes that came from this were the need for childcare and convenient health and wellbeing facilities. It helped us to understand the pressures of juggling work, family commitments and maintaining a healthy lifestyle.
“We hope that knowing there is high quality and flexible childcare provision onsite will bring great peace of mind to many of our staff who are returning to work following maternity and paternity leave.
“The onsite gym will make it a lot easier for staff to keep active and healthy, and the café will offer an inviting space to relax, unwind and socialise with colleagues. It will also be available to clients and will offer a versatile space for more informal client meetings.
“Whilst illustrating our commitment to a good work-life balance, the expansion will also enable us to offer a further 50 highly skilled jobs at our Swansea headquarters as it will also provide us with additional office space.”
Work on the crèche, gym and café will start immediately with work expected to be completed early 2018.
Jenny Jones continued: “We are all very excited about this development and the significant benefits it will bring. We would like to thank our planning consultants, Asbri Planning and our surveyor, Phil Cushion, who helped us with the whole planning process and made it a very seamless experience.”