The Inspire Justice Awards: Celebrating Excellence Across Public Services
- Matthew East
- Nov 10, 2023
- 3 min read
Updated: Dec 4, 2024
Work completed on behalf of the agency Perfect Storm.
Client
Skills for Justice, a UK-based non-profit, supports workforce development in critical sectors like justice, healthcare, and community safety.
They aim to maintain high standards and provide training to ensure essential skills are met across these areas.
Challenge: Branding of the Inspire Justice Awards
Skills for Justice wanted to launch an annual awards ceremony—The Inspire Justice Awards—to honour dedicated individuals in sectors such as police, fire and rescue, paramedics, and prisons.
The awards aimed to boost the Skills for Justice brand image and build community recognition.
They needed everything from a fitting name and key messaging to branding and event collateral that would resonate with a diverse audience. The biggest challenge was to design a brand identity that felt relevant to each represented sector while maintaining cohesiveness.
Solution
Research
Target Audience Research
We reviewed messaging across the justice, healthcare, and fire and rescue sectors, studying language that captured their core missions.
This gave us an understanding of values that resonated most deeply.
Competitor Research
By examining 12 similar awards ceremonies, we identified common naming and messaging conventions and studied how existing events appealed to their audiences.
This helped clarify where Skills for Justice could position themselves as a unique, inclusive brand celebrating values like justice, equality, and service.
Copywriting & Branding
Naming
From the research insights, we compiled and tested various name options, aiming for something original, clear, and reflective of the ceremony’s purpose.
"The Inspire Justice Awards," shortened to “The Justies,” emerged as a distinctive choice. It communicated both aspiration and recognition, resonating with the sector's mission and giving it a friendly nickname for brand growth.
Top-Level Messaging
We presented three potential tones of voice: succinct, chatty, and concise-yet-friendly.
The client chose a concise and approachable tone, which we developed further, crafting a landing page that conveyed the award’s purpose in an engaging way for the Skills for Justice site.
Design Branding
Visual Metaphors
We brainstormed symbols representing justice, service, and protection. By sketching combined visuals, we explored icons that honoured each sector.
J: ‘J’ For Justice is a quick reference to the awards themselves. A ‘J’ also looks a lot like a shield and an award itself, so it will work well as a visual device.
Shield: A shield is a clear metaphor for protection. It is one of the rare icons that work well across all the services from medical to army, police to fire. It also looks like 2 J’s, so it will work well as a reference to the name.
Cup: A cup or trophy is an obvious reference to awards and service and, again, has a similar shape to a ‘J’.
Humanity: It would be nice to reference the human and caring element of the justice service. Therefore, hands or a physical form is a great way to do this.
Chevrons: These are a visual device that is used in many elements of the justice department, particularly the uniforms of the Police and the armed forces, and therefore could work as another visual metaphor.
Star: A Star represents brilliance, achievement, inspiration, and optimism, so they are a great visual metaphor for the awards and the people receiving them.
Logo Design
Using Skills for Justice’s existing brand colours and fonts, we refined several logo concepts that maintained unity with their brand identity while representing the diverse sectors equally.
Logo Layout Options
After selecting the final logo, we designed variations for layout and colour, mock-ups for event collateral, and created an awards toolkit. This flexibility ensured consistent branding across all event assets.
Result
The Inspire Justice Awards launched successfully across the UK, with event branding and assets showcased on Skills for Justice’s website and across digital channels.
This positioning allowed Skills for Justice to partner with major organisations, including Unison, NHS Trusts, and HM Courts & Tribunal Services.
Coverage from media like Tech UK, Policing Insight, and Emergency Services Times demonstrated the awards' broad appeal and alignment with Skills for Justice’s mission of community support and recognition.
