The ER Blueprint: Trust, Talk, Thrive

In Summer 2024, we were contacted by the Head of HR of a world-famous football club with c400 employees.  They needed some external support to upskill their managers around the day to day HR stuff like   probations, absence management, performance management, handling grievances and conduct issues.

Their lack of confidence and knowledge meant that a small HR team were doing the lion’s share of managing the people within the business and they were struggling with the volume of work they were dealing with.

There were also several managers who were keen to develop their skills in this area but without guidance on how to start.

Solution

We were asked to develop some half-day workshops to:

• Upskill the existing managers to be able to handle low level queries shifting the burden away from HR

• Remind managers of the existing policies and procedures outlined in their company handbook which governed the employment relationship

• Ensure that the HR team had the tools and knowledge to handle more complex Employee Relations cases

• Roll out these workshops to c90 managers over a 6-week period

Approach

As with all our work our first action was to understand their people, their working culture and what approach would be the best fit for them,

We engaged with key stakeholders, including the HR team and department heads, to gather insights and tailor the training to address the needs of managers who had no prior management training.

We also ensured the solution was tailored to the business by carefully reviewing the employee handbook and consulting the HR team about workplace practices and processes.

The training we created was a blend of learning and participant interaction allowing time for conversation and sharing experiences and approaches.  

Implementation

We worked with the Head of HR to curate an accurate list of the managers and mixed the groups up so that managers were not alongside other managers from the same team.

We piloted the workshop with a half-day session with the HR team so we could fine tune the slides and content with a supportive group who could give us direct feedback, whilst ensuring that they had up to date legislation knowledge and tools to support them with their case load.

Results

Feedback from the workshops indicated that:

Ø  90% of attendees felt the workshop was relevant to their needs

Ø  95% of attendees felt the workshop was useful and valuable

Ø  85% of attendees felt committed to make an immediate change in how they managed their people

Ø  The HR team feel better supported now with less time spent on low level HR support like  probation management, giving feedback and managing performance through Performance Improvement Plans.

The client has continued to invest in training and offers it to all new manager cohorts that join the business – a testament to our lasting impact. 

Feedback on workshop from HR team member

“The facilitators had a really lovely style and approach. Engaging and also, welcome to feedback. I think you captured and understood the brief.”