The Training Foundation has achieved the Queen's Award for Enterprise for its Trainer Assessment Programme (TAP).

TAP has been adopted by trainers from more than 1,000 organisations since its launch in 1998.

The Innovation Award recognises the creation and continuous development of TAP and is the first time the business accolade has been awarded to a training skills qualification.

Nick Mitchell, founder and Chief Executive of The Training Foundation, said: "It goes without saying that everyone is really thrilled by this accolade; it's not often that training gets into the limelight!"

According to The Training Foundation, more than 60 of the FTSE 100 companies now employ TAP certified trainers. Its own surveys have found that 96% of trainers said that the qualification had made a significant difference to how they worked and 87% said they received better feedback from delegates at the end of the course.

Mitchell said that around 10,000 trainers had been achieved the qualification since its launch seven years ago.

"If we extrapolate the number of individuals that are now receiving better quality training from those 10,000 trainers, we can see that several million people in the UK are now benefiting directly or indirectly each year from the TAP programme," he said. "This is fantastically rewarding for us and is why we feel we are on a mission. But there's still a long way to go. We have only scratched the surface. The next 10 years should be exciting!"

Organisations who win the award - there were 137 announced today, 41 of which were for innovation - are entitled to use the Queen's Award Emblem on goods, packaging and marketing materials for five years. They are also invited to attend a reception at Buckingham Palace and receive an award presentation at their own premises by a representative of The Queen.