Human Resources
Excellence in Human Resources advice
You’ve built a successful business, and you know your field as well as or better than anyone. You want to find more excellent employees in order to grow, or need to motivate and keep the ones you already employ. But you’re already the CEO, chief engineer and supplies clerk. Human Resources manager is just one hat too many.
We can help with that.
Or yours is a larger, established business and you already have skilled Human Resources people, but need help with specialized tasks beyond the day-to-day scope of your HR department, such as corporate culture assessments ad privacy and records management.
We do that too.
HR Policies and Procedures - Lay the Groundwork
Want your new employees to follow your time-tested procedures or be clear on the rules of behaviour at work? Write them down.
We’ll help you create your HR policies and procedures — or clarify existing practices — and then develop the handbooks, guides, reference materials, applications or forms you can provide to new hires for training in Your Company 101, or give to existing employees for a refresher.
Employees - Find the Good Ones
We advertise job competitions, co-ordinate interview panels and develop the interview questions that
get the answers you need to decide whether a candidate is just the right fit. We will develop the
guides to rate those interview answers, help evaluate and rate candidates post-interview and check
references.
Now that you’ve found the employee you want – what’s next?
We draft employment offer letters and help onboard new hires.
If a candidate challenges your merit-based competition, we can assist with the appeal process.
Restructuring - How to handle your Workplace Reorganization
Sometimes, economic downturns or restructuring means you have to move valued employees into new roles or lay them off. We can help you develop a placement options where you help those valued former employees move into different areas of your business, rehire them when business improves or even find a new job with another company with which you do business.
And sometimes life really happens.
We can help you steer your former employees to post-termination counselling to give them a better chance at finding their next job.
Classification and Compensation — Pay People What They’re Worth
We talk to managers and staff to understand who is responsible for which tasks, what skills and education those roles require, who reports to whom, who makes which decisions and who interacts with clients.
From there, we prepare job descriptions and classifications, and research appropriate salary levels both within your organization and your industry.
Organizational Culture — How to Keep Employees
Do your employees like working for you? Why or why not? Have you ever asked?
We ask those tricky questions, and we help you understand what your employees are telling you.
We develop environmental scans and engagement surveys so you can ask the experts — your employees — what processes need tweaking to increase productivity and improve the workplace culture in your office and on your shop floor.
We evaluate, measure and explain the survey results, and identify the gaps between where your company culture stands and where you and your employees want it to be.
If your employees are telling you they’re not heard, they’re isolated from each other or they don’t think their efforts are recognized, we can recommend ways to improve.
Corporate Ethics and Privacy — Walk Your Own Talk
You’ve got clear policies about ethical conduct in the workplace, but communicating those standards is an ongoing project as staff come and go. We can design and deliver training sessions regarding expectations around bullying, harassment or violence at work.
Better yet, we can train your key people to deliver the sessions to their co-workers, and help you survey and measure if the training is effective.
We can help you develop your onboarding process for new hires to include an introduction to your company’s privacy procedures.
Labour/Employee Relations — If You Can’t Prevent Conflict, Manage It
For unionized workplaces, we can train you in the collective bargaining process, as well as collective bargaining mediation and arbitration.
If conflicts arise in your workplace that you want to work through via mediation or arbitration, we can coach you through that process internally or connect you to outside experts.
When conflicts arise that cannot be resolved with mediation or internal disciplinary procedures, we can support you through the process of terminating an employee’s job and the offboarding process.
Professional/Employee Development — Train Your Talent
Go beyond generic training on the job – find your keeners and give them the support they need to develop their skills.
We help you identify those keeners and teach you how to steer them toward leadership positions and connect them with specific training and mentorship – so they view working for you as a long-term career rather than their current job.
We can help you target internal training programs to close skills gaps in your organization, and teach you how to support and create secondments, mentorships, internships and coaching opportunities that match up your experienced veterans of the field with eager rookies looking to learn.
We can help you sponsor post-academic or professional development programs for your credentialed employees who have annual reporting and continuing education requirements.
Workforce Planning and Reporting — You Can’t Understand What You Can’t See
Your banker wouldn’t give you a loan without thorough numbers and analysis, so how can you make effective staffing plans if you don’t have the numbers?
We will help you develop online self-service analytics to review your recruitment numbers, how many sick days employees are using or your workforce’s background so you can plan diversity initiatives. Learn to track and manage training — mandatory, professional or personal. Use the analytics to take note of which employees are nearing retirement, and plan ahead so succession in key roles is mapped out far enough in advance that retirements do not disrupt your productivity.
Equity, Diversity and Inclusion — Understand all of Your People
Equity at work starts with understanding. We help you develop the training sessions and communications within your organization that highlight why and how the fair, equitable and respectful inclusion of all people — including those historically underrepresented or subject to discrimination — is good for your employees and your business.