Lansons

Sector

Professional Services

Location:

London

Established in

1989

Employees

Website

About us

With offices in London and New York, Lansons is one of the UK’s most respected reputation management and strategic communication consultancies and possibly the only truly employee-owned business in this industry. A third of our people own the agency with no outside shareholders. We were founded 30 years ago by our current chief executive Tony Langham and our current chair Clare Parsons. Our clients encompass brands like Co-op Bank, London Luton Airport and BlackRock. We work for governments such as The Isle of Man. We have helped launch entrepreneurial businesses like Metro Bank and continue to advise them many years on. We also work with less-known businesses to help them achieve their communications goals. We deliver a genuine, fully-integrated ’no silos’ service. This also offers unrivalled opportunities for our people.

We are a distinctive voice helping companies, organisations and governments build reputations and engage with wider society in a human and direct way – and we work that way ourselves.

Our purpose is to do great work for our clients, be a great place to work and to contribute to society in a meaningful way.

Awards

What employees say

The people at Lansons are without doubt the making of it. Whilst there’s quite a mixed bag of skills and personalities, there’s a shared interested in contributing to the culture of Lansons. This is shown through our culture committee, charity committee and Friday Bar, but mostly through the way our client teams work together. Tony and Clare are both very open about their passion projects and this encourages everyone to find their own – in or outside of work. I’ve seen a number of new initiatives set-up at Lansons and have always valued this entrepreneurial spirit. There’s a strong sense of loyalty that you get from senior staff; after three years I wanted to take some time to travel, and when I returned to London, Lansons was very proactive in opening the door for me to come back. I joined a company that had moved on significantly in terms of new clients and new projects but had the same culture at heart.

Corrie Raine

Account manager

94 %

My manager/supervisor treats me with respect.

94 %

When you join the organisation, you are made to feel welcome.

90 %

My manager/supervisor is someone I trust.

89 %

Management is honest and ethical in its business practices.

84 %

This organisation actively promotes mental and physical health among its employees.

84 %

This workplace is working to reduce its environmental impact.

What defines us

We focus on what we know makes the biggest difference to people’s happiness and their engagement with work.

• We run Lansons on clear ethical principles

• We have no gender pay gap

• We are clear about, and involve people in, our agency strategy

• A third of our people share financial ownership of Lansons as partners and this ‘you are part of it’ culture permeates

• We empower people to make a difference with cross-agency involvement in everything from developing our content marketing offering to running our charitable initiatives and choosing carbon neutral offset projects

• We then add a liberal sprinkling of fun and friendship … the famous celebration trolley, two parties a year, celebrating the’ big ones’ abroad, and surprise-and-delight celebrations for our New York acquisition

Our people sum up how it feels to be at Lansons. “Such a collaborative, open and trusting culture.” “There doesn't feel like there's a hierarchy.” “Transparency in board decisions.” “A sense of working to retain staff.” “Environment which fosters strong friendships.” “Wellbeing initiatives, flexible working, celebrations of personal and professional achievements.”

What inspires us

When Lansons was established we committed to donating 1% of our annual profits to charity, and we raise as much as we can on top of this. Anybody can nominate a charity and we all vote. Mental health charity Mind won the vote a few years ago and we used this partnership to build our mental health support programmes. Currently we are supporting Centrepoint with a plethora of fundraising events ranging from sleep outs, to bake offs, our Lansons Lottery and annual Christmas Fair. Everyone gets involved, offering their skills, creativity and sense of adventure. As a founding partner in the BBC 50:50 project, Lansons commits to aiming for equal gender representation at our numerous events and has achieved the goal to date. We partner with social mobility charities for work experience and recruitment into our junior roles.

Our pioneering partnership with HighTide Festival Theatre, a charity dedicated to discovering and producing the work of emerging playwrights sees Lansons providing the charity’s base and we engage our staff in unique and imaginative ways. There’s theatre-based personal development as well play readings, theatre tickets and trips to enjoy HighTide’s festivals in Suffolk and Walthamstow.

With citizenship sitting at the heart of Lansons’ values, social responsibility means a lot to people and our voluntary Green Team reviews our environmental policies and encourages good environmental behaviour across the business. Over ten years ago we became carbon neutral, actively reducing our carbon footprint before voting for off-setting projects.

At a glance

Age of employees

Years with company

Gender ratio

Fulltime / Parttime

Action highlights

We’ve put the wellbeing of our people at the forefront of our current home-working lockdown situation with regular surveys on how people are coping, asking how we can help and do things better. Tony our chief exec leads a weekly all-agency call to keep people informed about everything that’s important as we navigate the unknown. We have never been more transparent about our business and our plans. The management team leads the way in urging people to ‘use their commute’ in ways that help them cope with enforced time at home. There’s weekly wellbeing advice from the wellbeing team with subjects ranging from sleep to exercise to staying connected and managing your mental health. Career managers continue to support their partners by video, and we celebrate as much as ever, with joining anniversaries marked with gifts and virtual cards. Our monthly forum has gone virtual and the Friday Bar Quiz on Zoom means we all see each other keeping to the rules, with a cup of tea or glass of something, before we all say ‘have a great weekend’

Word from the top

Lansons has firm values around consultancy excellence, ethical behaviour and sharing in success. It matters to me that people feel the impact and relevance of this in their working lives. Our leadership team sets out to make our agency strategy relevant and tangible to everybody in the agency and it’s important to us that everybody feels they personally can contribute.

Tony Langham

Chief Executive

Career and jobs

Application tips

It was entrepreneurial spirit that drove the formation of Lansons and we continue to look for entrepreneurs and would-be entrepreneurs to work with us. We like to recruit ‘at the bottom’ and then help our people develop through the agency, so we are always looking for talented people setting out on a comms career. But we also welcome fresh thinking and new perspectives, so let us know if you are working in a communications agency, or have an active in house communications role, and want to be inspired by your next career challenge. But be prepared to work hard and create your own opportunities within the amazing career support structure we offer. It might sound harsh, but we’re not interested in you if you’re not interested in business and what makes companies tick. You need to show us you have views on what drives ‘reputation’. Tell us how, and when, you personally have achieved great results and made a difference in your working life. Tell us, using practical examples (and none of the generic clichés!) why you would be great for Lansons. If you do join us we’ll help you settle in before you’ve even arrived, inviting you to meet peers so there are familiar faces on your first day. From day one there’s a buddy to guide you and we run a comprehensive, often-praised, welcome programme covering all aspects of Lansons life. Every joiner meets our chief executive, and our chairman invites groups of new people to breakfast; a fantastic opportunity to forge a relationship early on with senior management and get to know others joining around the same time.

Our great workplace

Lansons offers amazing career opportunity; over a third of our people at account director level and above started at our most junior levels, including five board directors. Almost half our people have been promoted in the last year. Everybody is paired with a career manager whose role it is to understand the career ambition of their partners and take responsibly for helping them achieve their ambitions. Our Career Guidebook contains all the tools needed and our recently revamped training initiative, Lansons2, is driven by an energetic all-level team of volunteers. A training calendar advertises the myriad of learning and sharing opportunities. Consultants earn L2 points for attending skills and ‘brainfood’ sessions and points mean prizes … like a culture trip or a five-star weekend abroad. Our no-silos structure means people stretch their experience cross-agency in truly integrated teams learning from multiple skillsets. And the ‘extra’ things continue to underpin development. Numerous people have been inspired by visits to agencies abroad, client secondments, pro-bono work, and learning from our partnership with High Tide Theatre. It’s amazing that people make a career at Lansons and we want to say a big thank you when they do. So people receive an extra ten days of paid ‘milestone’ holiday on top of their annual leave every five years to reward and celebrate this fantastic achievement.

Contact

Rebecca Gold

HR Manager

Tel: 07860251455
Email: rebeccag@lansons.com

Media

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