Grow with your people in mind

Managing redundancies

A social enterprise had their funding cut significantly and needed to make some urgent organisational changes across the board.

We were asked to provide online and phone-based support on a project basis for a redundancy process. 

We prepared all communications, consultation scripts, invites and outcome letters and advised leaders on the process including the potential to reduce hours instead.  We produced all the calculations and reviewed existing policy making recommendations.

Many redundancies were mitigated through an effective consultation process where some employees accepted the reduction in hours.  This enabled the charity to continue their work and rebuild their pipeline of funding without losing talented employees. 

Managing contractual and policy changes

A small service business was looking to bolster its employment offering in preparation for a trade sale. 

As part of the brief we reviewed, re-wrote, and re-issued all contracts of employment, conducted discovery meetings with all staff to understand what mattered most to them, prepared a new company handbook in a tone of voice that was much more in-keeping with the desired culture of the business, implemented a new flexible holiday policy that was seen as a benefit to employees at a low-cost to the employer, a new absence management procedure and strengthening of confidentiality, conflicts of interest and intellectual property clauses. 

The implementation included writing all communications, holding a day of face to face individual consultation meetings to explain the changes, securing signatures and training the management team on new procedures. 

Result: the ultimate buyer praised the leadership team on the professionalism and tone of their employment contracts and policies which would support an effective transition. 

Ensuring a dignified exit

A small company needed to exit a senior individual swiftly due to performance,  but wanted to maintain their dignity and also ensure minimal disruption to the team. 

We discussed options for managing the exit and proposed a without prejudice discussion via a settlement agreement.

We provided the agreement template, coached and advised the leader about the type of discussion that was required and produced scripting for the discussion, a reference and wrote a communication to employees.    We also recommended a solicitor from our network that the employee could use for the purposes of reviewing the agreement.

Result: the agreement was signed within the timescale, the employee left with dignity and the employer could move on swiftly to recruit a replacement.

Supporting recruitment activity

A not for profit requested support with a recruitment and selection process for a key management position which they needed to fill quickly. 

We first prepared a project plan so the process could run to time and everyone knew when they needed to be available for what.  We reviewed the job description to ensure any changes and requirements were clearly captured, advised on salary levels in the market for similar level roles, prepared a job advertisement, reviewed applications, prepared relevant and legally-compliant, competency-based questions, coached interviewers, attended final stage interviews as part of the panel and provided feedback.

Result: Time to hire of 6 weeks, no candidates dropped out, the offer was accepted and the new hire started just in time to support a critical part of the performance year.

Organisation Design and Effectiveness

A charity requested support to enable their team to work more effectively and to maximise fundraising outputs.  

We held initial discovery interviews with each team member to understand their role and how it interfaced with others.  We also explored what they felt was working well and what could be improved.

It was evident that there was a lack of clarity of expectations and of role boundaries.  So we undertook a core process review with the leadership team to gain alignment on the key high level activities that add value to the charity's core proposition - in order to build this into their core accountability structure. 

We also highlighted the key challenges and made recommendations to alleviate these in the new organisation design.  Then we prepared a new set of draft job descriptions and coached the Executive Director through the necessary consultation meetings (both formal and informal).

Result:  A fair basis for performance tracking and reward benchmarking and leaner, more efficient processes with clear accountabilities that have facilitated fundraising activity.