Corporate Plan 2023-26
Our Story:
Golding owns and manages over 8,500 properties and provides a home for more than 20,000 people. Our operating centre is Maidstone, and we employ over 300 colleagues to serve our communities. We pride ourselves on being a local, visible and listening landlord who makes a real difference.
Over the course of our last corporate plan, we delivered real and lasting progress for our customers, communities and colleagues. We’ve invested significantly in our existing homes, while continuing to develop much-needed affordable housing and advancing our major regeneration scheme. Alongside this, we’ve strengthened the way we understand and respond to our customers, listening more closely, building richer insight into their needs and preferences, and embedding their voice at the heart of our decision making.
Our services have improved, with greater satisfaction and more tailored support for customers. This progress was recognised through our 2026 inspection by the Regulator of Social Housing, where we successfully achieved C1, G1, and V2 gradings, providing assurance that we’re a well-governed, financially resilient organisation, delivering effective services with customers at the heart of our decision making.
We’ve developed this four-year corporate plan in consultation with our customers, our colleagues and our partners. We remain committed to being local, visible, and always listening, with our customers firmly at the heart of everything we do. By building on our achievements, working in partnership with our stakeholders and addressing the areas where we must do more, we’ll continue to build trust and ensure that the homes, services and support we provide make a real difference to the lives of those we serve.
Our vision is to be local and listening, visible and trusted, efficient in everything we do.
Our Values:
Our values guide our behaviours. In 2026, we introduced a fourth value as part of this corporate plan. We own it, focuses on empowering our people to take ownership and deliver consistently for our customers.
We Care: We put people first, showing empathy and respect in every interaction. We listen deeply to our customers, colleagues, and partners.
We Welcome New Ideas: We embrace innovation and challenge ourselves to improve. We learn from feedback and adapt to changing needs.
We Take Pride: We deliver quality in everything we do, from homes to services. We celebrate achievements and take responsibility for results.
We Own It: We act with accountability and integrity, always following through on our promises. We empower each other to make decisions and drive positive change.
Our operating context
Our corporate plan 2026-30 is shaped by a challenging and fast-changing external environment. National, political uncertainty and policy shifts are influencing housing priorities, while landlords continue to face stronger regulation around safety, compliance, and customer standards.
The wider economic climate adds further pressure. Cost-of-living challenges are affecting affordability for customers, increasing arrears risk and demand for support, while rising costs of labour, materials, and borrowing constrain our ability to maintain and develop homes. Local Government and devolution reforms could bring change with accompanying opportunity and risk to our partner relationships.
Social and demographic shifts are also shaping demand. More residents are living with complex needs and vulnerabilities, requiring joined-up housing and support. Growing pressures in the private rental market are driving increased demand for affordable housing, while expectations for digital, personalised and responsive services continue to rise.
We now have opportunities with fast moving AI advancements to use technology to make service efficiencies. We’re committed to keeping the human touch, ensuring fair access to our services, while delivering value for money.
Our own finances are restricted. We benefit from a stable revenue stream but suffer from economic pressures on our operating and borrowing costs. We’re focussing resources to invest in improving existing homes, modernising the business through use of technology - continuing the work started under our previous plan. We’ll improve our financial performance in relation to our peers over the life of this plan.
Our operating context
Our previous three-year plan delivered significant improvements across the organisation. By focusing on getting the basics right, we raised customer satisfaction from below average to near median levels and ensured we were well-prepared for new regulatory requirements. We’ve laid the foundations for our journey to low-cost high performance.
Our Tenant Satisfaction Measures (TSM) showed clear improvement across every area of service, reflecting the changes we’ve made by listening carefully to customer feedback and acting on what matters most.
Our satisfaction scores have improved with overall satisfaction for TSMs rising from 59.7% (2023/24) to 74.2% (2025/26). We’ve delivered meaningful improvements to our repairs service, customers tell us communication is better and repairs are completed properly and quickly. We’ve continued to prioritise safe homes, maintaining landlord compliance, reducing damp and mould cases and implementing Awaab’s Law.
A core part of our last plan was to address historic under investment in our existing homes. We’re now in the final year of a three-year asset strategy which will invest £64.5m into our existing homes by April 2027, positively impacting over 4000 homes.
Our new neighbourhood model is helping us to be local, visible and listening in our communities and provide the services customers told us they needed. While new technology has enhanced our customer experience with improvements in telephony, and our online portal.
Over the last three years we’ve delivered 479 new homes, playing our part in combatting the housing crisis in Maidstone, with safe, quality homes for over 1800 people in housing need. We’ve also progressed our major regeneration scheme. Fielding Park in Shepway will deliver 236 new energy efficient affordable homes and transform the local community with a thriving modern shopping area, improved landscaping and community facilities.
We’re proud of our recent inspection result, where the Regulator for Social Housing awarded us the top C1 rating for consumer regulations and praised our meaningful customer engagement model. We maintained our G1 for governance and V2 for financial viability. Our new corporate plan is built on this solid foundation and listening to our customers.
Delivering our Corporate Plan
Our 2026-30 strategy sets our long-term direction, where we’re heading as an organisation and what matters most over the next four years. We’ve consulted with colleagues, partners and customers to inform the priorities of this plan.
Our plan will keep customers at the heart of our organisation, prioritise safe, quality homes and being smart, efficient and future ready. We’re intensifying our focus on value for money and working together with strong partners to best deliver for our communities.
We’ll build on our solid foundations to deliver great customer experiences, strong finances and an inclusive culture where colleagues can do their best work. We’ll continue our journey of modernisation – harnessing the power of data, digital innovation, and strong governance. We’ll sustain strong partnerships to anticipate needs, solve problems proactively, and create fair access for every customer. Our focus is on investing where it matters most: improving existing homes, supporting resilient communities, and empowering our people with future-ready skills. Financial resilience and value for money will be at our core, ensuring every pound delivers greater impact.
Together, we’re building a future where every customer feels safe, heard, and at home.
This plan reflects what customers have told us and sets out how we’ll respond with real, practical improvement.
Our three corporate plan objectives are:
· Customers at the heart
· Safe, quality homes
· Smart, efficient, future ready
Each priority will be measured with targets set in each area to deliver improvements. More detail on each objective is in the next section of this plan or you can read the full Corporate Plan.
Customers at the heart
We’re committed to delivering great customer service, consistently. That means getting things right first time, improving how we communicate, and ensuring customers shape our decisions. By offering clear, tailored services, using the right channels, and moving from reactive to proactive, we’ll create fair access and deliver a customer experience that drives satisfaction and builds trust.
Strong partnerships are essential to delivering the best outcomes for customers and communities. We’ll work collaboratively to align shared goals and create social value where it matters most. By partnering effectively, we’ll ensure fair access, enhance our customer offer, and confidently hand over responsibilities to the right partners when they can deliver better outcomes.
What’s included in this? (This corporate plan objective covers two key areas.)
Great customer service, every time:
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Clearly defined customer offer – developed with customers
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Improved customer engagement framework, deepening our understanding of customer needs
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Customer Service approach to resolve more queries faster
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Repairs service that improves year on year – with a focus on speed, quality, first-time resolution and learning from customer feedback
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A neighbourhood management approach that puts safety first - with customer-centred responses to ASB, domestic abuse, and damp and mould
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Right channel, right experience
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Deliver a more personalised service experience, and fair access for all - leveraging data and technology to flexibly meet individual customer needs and preferences
Collaborative partnerships, connected communities:
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Building and strengthening partnerships – to enhance our customer offer and deliver better outcomes using partnerships to remove barriers and ensure inclusive services
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Responding to local government reorganisation, positioning Golding as a partner of choice
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Introducing a new social value approach, delivering measurable outcomes that directly support our strategic goals and community priorities
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Successfully deliver community-led regeneration projects, creating vibrant, sustainable neighbourhoods
Key measures:
- Overall customer satisfaction
- Customer satisfaction with repairs
- Satisfaction that the landlord listens to tenant views and acts upon them
- Agreement that the landlord treats tenants fairly and with respect
- Customers trust us to do what we say we’ll do
- Satisfaction that the landlord makes a positive contribution to neighbourhoods
- Monetary value and impact delivered through social value initiatives
Safe quality homes
We’re committed to ensuring every home meets 100% compliance and high-quality standards. Our primary focus is investing in existing homes and improving estates to create thriving communities. Alongside this, we’ll continue to develop new homes to meet local needs and support growth.
What’s included in this?
- Fully implement our Asset Management Strategy to ensure every home is safe, high-quality, and future-ready
- Future-proofing homes – adapting properties to meet changing customer needs with a clear plan for older people’s homes within our schemes
- Proactive asset management – using data to anticipate issues
- Estate improvements based on clear standards
- Completion of our regeneration scheme at Fielding Park to deliver a thriving new community
- Continue delivering new homes – meeting local needs
- Roll out a neighbourhood-focused estate improvement programme, raising standards and improving quality of life for residents
- Embed a robust sustainability strategy, maintaining SHIFT Gold and delivering tangible environmental and business benefits for customers
- Embed our response to next phases of Awaab’s Law
Key measures:
- Landlord compliance
- % of homes meeting Decent Homes Standard
- Satisfaction that the home is safe
- % of Homes EPC C and above
- New homes delivered
- Maintain SHIFT Gold
Smart, efficient, future ready
Our goal is to move to high performance at low cost. We’re focused on building financial resilience and delivering exceptional value for money. By embedding our new operating model, driving efficiency, and understanding our cost drivers, we’ll make informed decisions based on return on investment.
Our people and culture are the foundation of our success. We’re building a learning organisation and performance driven culture where decisions are driven by data, evidence, and customer insight. We’ll equip colleagues with future-ready skills and a culture that empowers people to deliver exceptional outcomes.
We’re building smart, secure systems that make life easier for customers and colleagues. Our goal is a joined-up, single view of the customer, powered by data-led insights and automation to enable high performance. We’ll move from reactive to proactive and predictive, delivering digital services so good, people want to use them. We’ll use data and customer insight to make smarter decisions, be proactive, innovate and continuously improve the services and homes we provide. Insight will underpin everything we do, driving value for money, stronger performance, and better outcomes for customers.
What's included in this? (This corporate plan objective covers four key areas.)
Strong finances, smarter spending:
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Deliver a comprehensive value for money framework, including a cost-to-serve model, clear ROI methodology, value for money plan and efficiency programme
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Embedding our new target operating model – realising benefits and driving efficiency
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Develop our insourcing strategy and the business case to invest in depot infrastructure– reducing costs and improving quality and control
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Commercial portfolio review – ensuring value for money and delivery of sustainable outcomes
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Smarter procurement – maximising opportunities and leveraging buying power
- Explore options to restructure funding to meet long-term finance needs
Inclusive culture, empowering people:
- Living our values — ownership and accountability in everything we do
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A learning, performance driven culture – decisions driven by data, evidence, and customer insight
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An enhanced colleague offer, with a comprehensive wellbeing and mental health programme
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Championing and embedding our approach to Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion
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Launching a Talent Development Academy
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Embed “iCARE” Customer Service framework, ensuring every colleague delivers consistently excellent service
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Future-ready skills – equipping colleagues with the capabilities needed for tomorrow
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Achieve Health and safety ISO45001 accreditation
- Strong governance and risk management
Smart systems, digital solutions
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Smarter, more efficient ways of working – driving productivity through automation and streamlined processes
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Embed new asset management and customer relationship management systems, transforming processes, data management and customer journeys
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Enable mobile working for customer-facing colleagues, ensuring seamless service delivery anywhere
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Collaborating effectively – integrating systems and working with partners for joined-up solutions
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Harnessing innovation safely – embracing AI and emerging technologies ethically and securely. Build AI into our IT roadmap, to anticipate customer needs and enhance service delivery
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Cyber resilience – robust systems and protection to keep data and services safe
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Outstanding digital services and experience – modern website, portal, and communications that make it easy for customers to engage
Data-led, acting on insight
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Embedding our data strategy – ensuring clear ownership, effective management and retention of data
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Understanding trends, needs and equity – analysing patterns to ensure fair access, identify gaps, and tailor services to different customer groups
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Sharing insight with partners where it benefits our customers and strengthens neighbourhood and community resilience
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Proactive, data led action – anticipating issues and acting early to reduce harm, improve experiences and manage costs effectively. Delivery of predictive analytics capability into agreed processes
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Enhance our business intelligence function to enable predictive, data-driven decision-making
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Overlaying data to shape neighbourhood plans – integrating asset, customer and community insight to design more proactive, place-based interventions
Key measures:
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Total Operating Margin
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Social Operating Margin
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Social housing cost per unit
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Interest cover
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Colleague engagement score
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Colleague wellbeing score
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Colleague development survey score
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% Voluntary staff turnover
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Increased digital transactions
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Reduction in avoidable contact and increase in first contact resolution
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% of customer-facing roles equipped and actively using mobile solutions
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Year on year improvement on data quality index
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Year on year improvement on cyber security risk