Our immersive murder mystery engagement activity, The Trials of Mrs Tranter, has reached the finals of this year’s Internal Communication and Engagement (ICE) Awards. The ICE awards celebrate organisations that excel at colleague engagement.
We launched the project in 2025 to engage colleagues on customer centricity and the impact of customer experience. It is now shortlisted in four categories:
• Best Innovation
• Best Engagement of Corporate Purpose
• Best Internal Communications by a Not‑for‑Profit
• Best Use of Storytelling
Modelled on a murder mystery activity – it challenges teams to work through an authentic evidence file based on real customer complaints, work out what went wrong and what could be done to make the customer’s experience better.
Finalists in the 2026 ICE Awards, widely regarded as one of the biggest and best for recognising colleague engagement, include Virgin, Bupa, Barclays and other multi-national brands. The winners will be announced at a ceremony on 8 July.
Steve Hayes, our Director of Corporate Affairs and Communications, said: “The Trials of Mrs Tranter has engaged hundreds of GSA colleagues, and we can see in the feedback we have received that it has helped colleagues to understand in a practical, immersive and engaging way how our work connects to customer outcomes.
“It has been great to see the exercise spark organisation‑wide conversations about ownership, culture and behaviours, and to see it embraced by teams from across the business.
“Since sharing the approach in our sector seven housing associations have either already adopted Mrs Tranter or are now in the process of doing so. This is something I think we should be really proud of.
“While we know we still have much more to do to continue our journey of improving customer service, being recognised nationally for work like this demonstrates we are making real efforts to achieve this, creating innovative ways to embed customer centricity, and helping our peers do the same.
“I would like to say a huge thank you to colleagues who contributed their insight, helped shape the content and embraced the exercise with such enthusiasm. Whatever happens on 8 July we can be proud of the impact this project has had not just at GSA but across our sector.”