The InterTalent / Chosen Music Christmas Message from
Prof Jonathan Shalit OBE
Chairman InterTalent / Co-President Chosen Music

While we all, of course, celebrate our own various religious festivals and faiths, we do all come together in taking Christmas off and enjoying a period of holiday, relaxation and fun with family and friends. As we head into the festive season, I want to wish you all individually a very happy and healthy Christmas.

Once again, not always for the best of reasons, this has been a year we will all remember for the rest of our lives. A pandemic was something we never really expected to intrude into our generally comfortable 21st Century lives and, once again, the challenges it produced during 2021 required us to dig deep both as individuals and as a community to get through. As a friend and a colleague, I admire, congratulate, and thank each one of you for the strength and resolve you have shown.

I am not Christian so my Rabbi may just wonder why I am talking about Christianity, but I do think there is a message at Christmas which in a way is central to the DNA of all faiths. Christmas has become a holiday, a time to exchange presents and cards, to see friends and family. Yet Christmas is also a time for reflection, service, and for sharing and caring. In the spirit of the shared values that Christmas reflects and to carry that spirit into 2022 and beyond, I am happy to tell you that InterTalent & Chosen Music is reintroducing its ‘Community Day’.

For those of you unfamiliar with the concept, this is how it will work:

We as a company invite each of you to set aside one day a year to help a good cause, charity, or something beneficial to your community or loved ones. Whatever the endeavour may be is entirely for you to decide. It could be anything from helping an elderly neighbour do something through to running the Marathon. It may be as simple as giving time to a relative that you have always meant to, but never have. Whatever it is you choose to give your time to, that day will be on InterTalent / Chosen time. This means that each of you will be entitled to claim your Community Day as an additional holiday day so that your good work is done in company time rather than eating into your own leisure time.

It doesn't matter whether the cause is big or small. What counts as we each do our bit towards making the world a better and, perhaps a kinder, place is the act of giving our time. For me, my day will be as an NHS Responder. Having had three vaccines and, so far, avoided Covid with my whole family healthy and safe I am eternally grateful to people at the NHS I will never meet.

It would be lovely for us a team to share stories of how we choose to spend our Community Day - although only if you wish.

Merry Christmas everybody and let's carry its spirit of goodwill and giving forward into 2022 both individually and collectively.

Warmest wishes.

Jonathan.