Life at Oakbrook
United by our Purpose to 'simplify and personalise borrowing', celebrating our differences and achieving our life’s best work - that’s life at Oakbrook
At Oakbrook we’re a diverse bunch of people and whether you work as part of our consumer lending business or work in our technology and analytics company, O6k, you’ll find we’re all united by our Purpose of 'Simplifying and personalising borrowing' and our Vision of 'changing lending for the better'.
We believe that our innovation in technology, our expertise in advanced analytics and data and the products we develop can have a positive impact on people’s financial wellbeing and, as a team, we share a common ambition to achieve this.
However, we also know that the best way to develop great products and provide great service for our customers is by firstly making Oakbrook a great place to work for our colleagues.
With this in mind everything we do is driven by our dedication and commitment to being a great place to work.
We’re proud to have ranked in the UK’s Best Workplaces™ and that’s just pushed us to be even better in the future.
Knowing that our people are our greatest asset, we ask everyone to bring their true selves to work so that we can benefit from the diversity that brings. We celebrate our differences and leverage the value of our diversity by engaging and co-creating wherever possible.
Together we make great things happen - that’s life at Oakbrook.
Our Values
Our Values are core to our DNA. With the help of everyone at Oakbrook, we bottled up the very best of our culture and created a set of five Company Values that challenge us to deliver our life’s best work and help us achieve our Vision of 'changing lending for the better'.
We’re not afraid to be a little different and you’ll often hear these phases quoted across the business.
Brilliant Simplicity
We work hard to keep things simple
Join Forces
We win by working together
Rock the Boat
We question everything
Step Up
We constantly strive to improve
Swap Shoes
We put ourselves in other’s shoes
Our culture
As a business we’re supportive, caring, and inclusive. We put people ahead of anything else, whether that’s our colleagues or our customers. We celebrate our differences because we recognise the value that diversity brings. Our work is fast paced, agile, collaborative and fun in an environment that embraces success and failure in equal measure. At Oakbrook we fail fast and learn quickly.
it’s our people who define our culture and make it what it is today. We all have a real say and an opportunity to contribute to the things that matter to us. Our Purpose, Vision and Values were all co-created so it’s no coincidence that they’re wholeheartedly embraced across the business.
Flexible ways of working
When we say we want to create an environment that allows you to achieve your life’s best work we really mean it.
We understand that maintaining a good work-life balance is a huge part of this and for many of our colleagues, flexibility is important in helping them be their best both inside and outside of work.
We’ve now moved to a hybrid working model where you’re able to choose to work from home or in the office when you want to. There’s a couple of courtesy rules that apply - just to make sure that teams can work well together and we continue to build great relationships. But, because we appreciate everyone’s circumstances are different, we don’t prescribe many mandatory schedules for time in the office – we simply ask that colleagues consider business and personal requirements equally and that if your manager asks you to be present for something, there’s probably a good reason why.
And, it’s not all work and no play
We know how to work hard but we know how to play hard as well. At Oakbrook having fun is classed as an essential part of our working lives.
Whether we’re taking part in the office quizzes, learning new skills and using new technology, joining in with the virtual trek to various parts of the world or simply taking the time out to have coffee with a friend, it all forms a vital part of our culture.
Our annual Summer BBQs, where we down tools for the day and spend some quality time with our colleagues, at an amazing venue, have become a bit of an Oakbrook legend, and our company Christmas parties are always a massive hit. It’s at events like these that we forge stronger relationships and friendships with our peers across different areas of the business, so we encourage everyone to take part, but because we know everybody is different, there’s always the option to cheer from the side-lines if full on involvement isn’t your thing.
