About Actif

Careers with Actif

Actif is Carmarthenshire County Council's Sport and Leisure section. The service comprises of;

• 6 leisure centres; (3 main centres with wet and dryside facilities mix, and 3 smaller sites with either wet or dry facilities)
• Facilities at 2 school sites operated evenings and weekends
• A communities team who work with a range of partners to increase opportunities to be more active through physical activity, community sport and health and wellbeing interventions.
• A health team that manages and delivers health interventions such as the National Exercise Referral Scheme, Falls prevention, etc.

All the above serving a population of 185k, facilitating a diverse, inclusive, impactful suite of activity opportunities that results in around 1.6m attendances per year.

Pre-Covid income levels have grown significantly in recent years thanks largely to significant and continuous growth in fitness and aquatics in our leisure centres. This moves us towards a more sustainable service, both in financial terms but critically with high value to our population in terms of health and wellbeing returns.

Further investment into our centres

We are committed to investing in facilities and infrastructure where sport can happen,

• A half a million-pound refurbishment of Amman Valley Leisure Centre’s changing rooms is now complete, with a fantastic look and feel befitting of its users. Further master planning continues to finalise a scheme for external facilities.
• Carmarthen Leisure Centre’s external upgrades are now complete, with a brand-new world-class AstroTurf surface laid and the new 8-lane athletics track and traffic improvements.
• Works are also well underway in Llandovery, where we are also investing almost half a million pounds to provide the town with brand new health & fitness facilities adjacent to, and complimenting, the swimming pool. Completion expected spring 2021.
• In 2023, Llanelli’s brand-new leisure centre will open following a circa £25m investment, part of the bigger wellness village being developed at Delta Lakes at circa £200m investment.

Our Mission

Improve wellbeing through inspiring our population to be active for life

We’ve made it our mission to ensure all living in Carmarthenshire have the chance to Start Well, Live Well and Age Well through ‘well managed’ and ‘well connected’ facilities and services to maximise capacity and engagement throughout the county.

Our Vision

We will create an active Carmarthenshire and establish ourselves as the most successful and trusted service in the UK.

Our Values

Our actions are built upon a foundation of core values that guide us, these are;

• Customers First – we put the needs of our citizens at the heart of everything that we do
• Listening – we listen to learn, understand and improve now and in the future
• Excellence – we constantly strive for excellence, delivering the highest quality possible every time by being creative, adopting innovative ways of working and taking measured risks
• Integrity – we act with integrity and do the right things at all times
• Taking Responsibility – we all take personal ownership and accountability for our actions

Don’t just take our word for it...

Here at Actif, we strive for excellence and establishing ourselves as sector-leading in everything that we do. Our drive in everything that we do has resulted in us gaining some of the most respected and prestigious awards in the industry...

• Achieving a Gold Leisure Safety Award on first application to RoSPA (Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents), one of the most prestigious and recognised schemes in the world.
• UK Active Awards; Carmarthen Leisure Centre, finalist in the 2019 Club of the Year category; Amman Valley Leisure Centre shortlisted for 2020 Regional and National Club / Centre of the Year category and awaiting result.
• Customer service levels at our leisure centres are amongst the best in the UK and beyond, with benchmarked Net Promoter Scores (NPS) from customers hitting the highest since we introduced the system 5 years ago
• Mystery visits rating us ‘Excellent’ with a score of 75.5% countywide, with Amman Valley Leisure Centre being amongst a handful of facilities in the country to score 100%.
• Investors in people platinum accredited (Carmarthenshire County Council)
• InSport accredited (Bronze)

Benefits of working for us

You are joining a pro-active, high performing council which aims to provide high quality services and make Carmarthenshire a better place to live, work and enjoy. Carmarthenshire is one of the largest unitary authorities in Wales, and the largest local employer with around 8,300 staff.

There are a range of benefits and working arrangements to support employees in their working and personal life, including:

• Comprehensive induction programme
• Development opportunities
• Reward scheme available to all employees that offers a number of discounts and promotions from a range of retailers and service providers locally
• Cycle to work scheme (tax free bikes for your commute to work)
• 26 paid leave days a year (plus 8 statutory days) rising to 31 days (plus 8 statutory days) after 5 years continuous service and up to 34 days (plus 8 statutory days) after 10 years continuous years’ service.
• A range of flexible working arrangements including a flexi-time scheme, special leave arrangements, job sharing, home working (currently being piloted)
• Local Government Pension Scheme – has a range of benefits including secure pension, flexibility to pay more or less in contributions, tax efficient now and in the future, added peace of mind for you and your family.
• A Flexible Retirement Scheme
• An Occupational Health Service offering health and lifestyle screening, counselling, and other support.
• Sick Pay Scheme

Training and Development

Whilst we may ask for certain qualifications and experience for some of our jobs, we are committed to supporting employees to develop their skills. Some of the ways in which we do this are:

• Regular appraisals and personal development plans
• Training courses
• E Learning
• Secondments
• Apprenticeships

We put our people first in everything we do, as we know that it is our people who make a difference and make things happen. We are a caring employer and have achieved the Investors in People standard. We are committed to learning and development to support employees to develop their skills and offer a range of benefits and working arrangements to help people achieve a work/life balance.

We recognise and encourage initiative, excellent work and standards, and are committed to communicating and listening to staff, and to promoting equality and valuing diversity.

What we look for

We are as passionate about our people as we are about encouraging everyone to be physically active and enjoy the health benefits that arise from adopting this lifestyle. We recognise the positive impact that having the right person in the right place at the right time can have on others to represent the Actif brand and support our business ambitions to serve our communities.

We employ people who are as passionate about our mission, vision and values. We aspire to be sector leading and therefore employ staff who have the same drive and expertise to succeed in their role.