We help small businesses to align their teams behind their goals. We combine blue-chip HR experience with coaching and the principles of organisational psychology to enable SME leaders and their teams to thrive. We know how to use an organisation's culture to power its growth and fuel highest performance and retention. Our shared experience in financial and professional services defines our standards.
We are driven by two things; getting the best out of individuals, and maximising their positive contribution to their teams and their organisations.
This holds true whether a business is flying, or is facing a more challenging period. Whatever the issue, we can help businesses to move forward with their people.
How do we focus on succession planning and growth in the current economic situation?
There has been a tension between generations for as long as there have been human beings on the earth! However, we are currently seeing high levels of misunderstanding, particularly between baby boomers/Gen Xers, and our Gen Z. This is being driven by factors external to the workplace, but regardless of cause, we are confident that small alterations can bring the generations back together.
Can we reduce levels of stress in the organisation while driving up productivity?
To survive and thrive in the current UK economy, most SMEs are having to work extremely hard. Even when the work is exciting, the expenditure of excess energy can cause unhelpful levels of stress. Stress leads, eventually, to decreased productivity and reduced engagement. We have a wealth of experience in delivering programmes to reduce stress and maintain healthy engagement levels, even under the cosh.
Can our current leadership team thrive?
In economic downturns, it can be a genuine challenge for leadership teams to work together productively. Furthermore, a gap can so often appear between the leadership team and their staff.
Starting with the leadership team, we have some great programmes for enhancing team coherence, reducing tension and driving up productive dissent.
What is "organisational culture" and what can you do with it?
Every organisation containing more than one person has a culture. That culture can be identified, represented, celebrated and then put to work.
Over time, authentic organisational cultures can be enriched or "nudged" into a declaration of a way of working and thriving that drives forward the success of any growing organisation.
We drive up growth, productivity and performance through coaching, training and team building.
We achieve great success when we introduce two tools into organisations.
We "grew up" in professional and financial services. This gives us an additional area of expertise that combines our earlier professional lives with our current skills.
1
Transition Coaching
We both "grew up" in Partnerships and we understand the challenges faced when Partners retire. For the Partner, they have given a career to one or two Firms and they have spent many years in the same culture. While needing to continue their relationships and preserve their legacy, they need time and space to consider their next steps, time and space that they often don't have. Timely coaching can enable a smooth transition.
2
Partnership Reformation
When Partners are thinking about what they will do next when they retire from the Partnership, the remaining Partners need to decide what they are going to do to fill the gap created. This is a great opportunity to look at your Strengths and to decide on how to fill the gap. Rather than spend a lot of time thinking about it, team coaching at this point will accelerate the planning and enable a smooth transition.
3
Menopause Coaching
We have both seen a number of female Partners leave their partnerships at the time the menopause arrives. Sorry to say this, chaps, but the menopause is absolutely no picnic! We obviously cannot solve any medical issues, but we believe we can coach women through the initial problems thrown up by this change in their wellbeing. If women move on at this point, it should be through choice and not necessity.
We began our journeys in blue chip professional services firms and we know how to achieve those standards in smaller, less formal settings.
Heather is an experienced coach and organisational psychologist. In her eyes, organisational success comes from the accelerated growth and development of its employees. Businesses best thrive where each team member is on a path of growth, and a lot can be done to enable development. She has developed solid tools for capturing an organisation's culture and for aligning culture to organisational objectives. She creatively uses everything in her tool box to get teams working together, always with organisational goals at the forefront. As a long-established remote worker herself, she is passionate about making the Hybrid Model work and knows how to get the very best from people, combining old and new best practices. Heather has an MSc in Organisational Behaviour from Birkbeck College and is an accredited MBTI and CliftonStrengths coach.
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Jenefer is an experienced coach and HR leader. She has a gift for communication and for uniting organisations behind shared goals. She has a wealth of experience when it comes to enabling change by bringing everyone along the journey, always with her eye on the needs of the organisation. She is a great listener and excels at helping people to see alternative viewpoints and accept new ways of working. As a trainer, she has an infectious energy that she brings to even the driest of subjects, however many times she trains people in that area. Her experience is extremely “blue chip”, but she has spent the last few years successfully bringing those standards into the SME world. Jen is a member of the Deloitte University, frequently returning to Deloitte to run training programmes. She too is an accredited MBTI and CliftonStrengths coach.
We have enjoyed working together for the last four years. We are very different people with very different career paths, so when you work with us you get a blended perspective on how your challenges are best tackled. The bottom line is that we share a genuine enthusiasm for getting the best out of people, creatively and effectively, and we know how to lean on each other's strengths.
We tailor our work to your team and to your goals, and also to your culture.
When it comes to optimising performance, engagement and growth, we have some staple tools we use, in which we believe. In our tool chest we have coaching, MBTI, CliftonStrengths, training and organisational change initiatives. We also have a technical understanding of organisational cultures. We combine these tools in a way that is specific to each organisational setting.
We promise that we will always describe in exact detail not only the intervention/s we propose, and we'll outline the reasons behind our chosen proposal. We will explain how change will occur and why we believe they will succeed. Organisational change flourishes when clarity of method, purpose and impact is in place, it is aligned to business goals, and change is framed accurately within an organisation's culture.
We set up projects to achieve long-term success.
The way in which we work has a big impact on your organisation, so we won't do anything without meeting you face to face, seeing your premises and getting an understanding of your organisation. We tailor everything we do to our audience and can only do this with knowledge and understanding.
We work face to face and remotely.
Heather is in Norfolk and Jen lives outside Bristol and we are very happy to travel. However, having supported an international team for some years, we also know how to create the same level of impact face-to-face and online. We won't run up travel expenses unnecessarily, but will work with you to strike the right balance for your team.
We will give you a clear plan with key deliverables.
Everything we do has a structure, a time expectation and key deliverables. We are clear on how long our work will take, the commitment required from your team (in terms of attending coaching/training, as an example) and we will describe how you can measure the impact of our work. Our pricing is upfront and simple.
Impact is created through participation.
Perhaps it's because we're coaches, but we drive up learning by creating coaching and training programmes in which participants are engaged. We know that the more people can participate, the more they will learn. We know some audiences are tough, but we have tips and tricks to ensure no one wastes their time with us.
If you’d like more information about how we work, and how we can help you to get the best from your team, get in touch today.