JULIE WILSON - Overall winner and Incredible Colleague of the Year award: For overall winner Julie Wilson, her award was proof positive that enjoying your job can bring rich rewards.

Julie works as event co-ordinator for Northumbrian Water, a demanding job which offers the kind of variety which she loves and on which she thrives.

Her role, which she has performed since 1996, is a wide-ranging one which involves her in many aspects of the company's operations.

Duties include involvement in everything from the annual boat race between Durham and Newcastle universities, staged on the River Tyne, to school visits to sites and charity fund-raising events.

She also plays a central role in the company's work to promote wider community use and appreciation of the region's waterways, through programmes which encourage sport and social activities.

Julie is also a key person in the successful charity WaterAid, which raises money to help people in the Third World have access to clean drinking water.

According to her nomination for the award, colleagues within Northumbrian Water admire her dedication and commitment to completing jobs which she has started, as well as her ability to go out of her way to help people.

Julie said: "I love what I do. No two days can ever be the same. My approach is to be positive and I think you have to do that, otherwise you are not good at it and you are not happy in what you do."

For all her positive approach to life, she did not believe she could win an award, let alone two.

She said: "I was amazed to win and I am still in shock.

"My award was the ninth of the night and I had just returned to my table and was talking to the people there about winning when I heard the guy say 'Northumbrian Water', and that I had won the overall prize as well."