What are companies doing with regards to 'My Manager'

What effect will focus on the 'My Manager' factor have?

My Manager - How employees feel about and communicate with their direct manager

The quality of direct line management really impacts engagement, after all the latest stats suggest that 7 out of 10 people leave their manager and not their organisation.

Great managers should be selling the direction and vision of the organisation, helping others see how their role impacts the bigger picture, ultimately influencing the factor
My Company. Good Managers recognise the importance of growing and developing their people, which means the My Manager factor also has a significant impact on the factor Personal Growth.

When it comes to
My Team, great managers build great teams, but world class managers also focus on connecting teams throughout the organisation. Managers can heavily influence the Wellbeing factor by helping to positively restore a work/life balance, managing employee workload and recognising that employees have a life outside of work

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Southpaw Communications Limited

At Southpaw personal development is at the heart of the agency and in April 2016 the company won their industry body's gold standard in all things related to personal development. Southpaw take a unique approach to performance management by tailoring training to individual needs rather than a one size fits all method. They see inspiration as critical to people's development and as such run internal inspiration sessions alongside a platform where people can share thoughts, ideas or stuff they have found inspirational. Southpaw also encourage learning to be shared across the agency, as everyone has a talent or knowledge that can be shared to help develop others. Everyone commits to at least 24 hours of development per year, which can be learning something new themselves or helping to develop other people.

Part of the Southpaw culture is to be open and honest with every member of staff. As part of this ideology the company hold a quarterly company meeting that welcomes new joiners to the agency, celebrates the best strategic and creative work, rewards individuals who have represented their BOB values most consistently and also explains how the business is performing commercially. Southpaw celebrate the highs and lows together in order to stay united as a pack and to progress forward. They are very transparent on gross income generated, performance against budget, profit generated to date and forecasted profit. They feel this transparency gives their talent a real sense of ownership and empowers them to make a significant difference to their commercial, creative and cultural development. All employees are also given laptops, which allows them to work collaboratively and to not be tied to a specific spot within the building, which really helps promote team interaction for effective working and relationship building.

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Southdown Housing Association Ltd

In addition to the support that Southdown provide to thousands of local vulnerable people, they also make additional and discretionary contributions. The organisation are accredited as a Disability Confident Employer and provide advice to other employers in promoting opportunities and providing support for employees who have a disability or other long-term health conditions. 21% of employees have a declared disability or a long-term health condition. Each year staff choose a charity to support together. In 2015 staff raised over £2,400 through a range of activities, including a live music event to support ‘Caring (therapeutic) Pets'. They have also been providing a food bank staff donation point for three years. For 2016 staff chose The Centrepoint Charity Relief Fund and have already donated over £1,000 from their fundraising. In East Sussex Southdown are providing free training to help local people who use mental health services and their carers so they can have their say and actively influence the services being provided. They are passionate about helping vulnerable people to overcome barriers that can prevent them from accessing work opportunities. As a specialist provider of supported employment and vocational advice they support over 1,200 people with mental health challenges each year to secure or retain paid work. Southdown are recognised as one of 14 ‘Centres of Excellence' in the UK by the Centre for Mental Health for delivering Individual Placement and Support employment services. They also provide a dedicated vocational support service for carers. Called Ambitions, the service works with carers to support them to identify and pursue their vocational aspirations.

In addition to the support that Southdown provide to thousands of local vulnerable people, they also make additional and discretionary contributions. The organisation are accredited as a Disability Confident Employer and provide advice to other employers in promoting opportunities and providing support for employees who have a disability or other long-term health conditions. 21% of employees have a declared disability or a long-term health condition. Each year staff choose a charity to support together. In 2015 staff raised over £2,400 through a range of activities, including a live music event to support ‘Caring (therapeutic) Pets'. They have also been providing a food bank staff donation point for three years. For 2016 staff chose The Centrepoint Charity Relief Fund and have already donated over £1,000 from their fundraising. In East Sussex Southdown are providing free training to help local people who use mental health services and their carers so they can have their say and actively influence the services being provided. They are passionate about helping vulnerable people to overcome barriers that can prevent them from accessing work opportunities. As a specialist provider of supported employment and vocational advice they support over 1,200 people with mental health challenges each year to secure or retain paid work. Southdown are recognised as one of 14 ‘Centres of Excellence' in the UK by the Centre for Mental Health for delivering Individual Placement and Support employment services. They also provide a dedicated vocational support service for carers. Called Ambitions, the service works with carers to support them to identify and pursue their vocational aspirations.

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Severn Vale Housing

SVHS run a staff recognition scheme called the Lovies (Living our Values), which was created as a fun way to encourage recognition and appreciation of behaviour aligned to the values - caring, creative, purposeful, professional and trustworthy. There are 15 Lovies, three for each value, which are awarded from one colleague to another. Recipients of a Lovie are passed a trophy to display and also a pin badge. Staff will also get recognition of their award on the staff intranet. So far 86 different colleagues have been recognised in varying categories. A total of 135 badges have been handed out. 35 of the 86 colleagues have actually picked up a Lovie for two different values and four colleagues have earned three varying badges. In total 67% of SVHS staff have a Lovie. Separate from the Lovies, staff also use the intranet to recognise and thank staff for going the extra mile. Over the past 12 months these have included helping out at an event, staying late to support colleagues in an event, solving a tricky excel problem and even changing a tyre! SVHS also host an annual awards ceremony allowing staff to nominate one another for awards, together with a CEO special recognition award. Staff are awarded during this special event, attended by all employees and including a three course meal and networking opportunities.

SVHS have 11 trained facilitators across the organisation available to help focus and drive meetings/training sessions to improve communication flow. The company have a number of break-out spaces available to staff who can use the areas to chat to colleagues and have informal meetings. The Creative Room, with bright furniture including a sofa and bean bags, encourages staff to use the space to brain storm, share ideas and be creative in problem solving. SVHS also have large screens in meeting rooms with Apple TV's to allow easy use of video conferencing software, including staff who are unable to physically attend the meeting with team discussions. Earlier in the year SVHS hosted an all staff event called Future Focus. One of the main objectives of the event was to focus staff on understanding the future direction of the organisation; however the event also aimed to ensure staff were aware and understood the new ways of working and also focused on collaboration. The benefits of the event were highlighting the progress of the organisation to date, re-confirming leadership aims and goals for the organisation. The event allowed SVHS to run a number of activities aimed at encouraging cross-organisational collaboration and team building. These included asking each team to produce a ‘team board' in advance, being creative to display team success over the past 12 months and also areas which they felt could be improved.

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Salix Homes

Salix Homes uses a performance management system, which manages all service action plans under the Corporate Plan. Managers are responsible for reporting on their service areas within the system and are required to attend quarterly performance clinics to report their performance to the Executive Team. On an annual basis each service area/team has an externally led audit carried out and the outcome is then reported to the internal audit committee. Once the actions have been agreed at the committee, the Manager is responsible for providing bi-monthly update reports to the committee. Managers are subject to monthly one to one and annual appraisals with their Managers, where both their performance against objectives and the competency framework are measured.

Salix Homes uses a performance management system, which manages all service action plans under the Corporate Plan. Managers are responsible for reporting on their service areas within the system and are required to attend quarterly performance clinics to report their performance to the Executive Team. On an annual basis each service area/team has an externally led audit carried out and the outcome is then reported to the internal audit committee. Once the actions have been agreed at the committee, the Manager is responsible for providing bi-monthly update reports to the committee. Managers are subject to monthly one to one and annual appraisals with their Managers, where both their performance against objectives and the competency framework are measured.

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Rowan Dartington & Co Ltd

RD actively promotes team interaction and working together. Everyone is encouraged to work together both within their own teams and across the organisation. RD has a set of Core Values that they expect staff to demonstrate and these are also to be incorporated within the staff appraisal process. New starters are bought biscuits so they can be used to 'bribe' colleagues to help them out. They feel that this is an innovative way to get new employees to mix with existing ones.

RD actively encourages and supports a wide range of activities under its "Sport and Social Committee", which includes organising regular social activities and also backing the participation in a range of sports including football, cricket, hockey and running. In addition, the company have introduced a "random acts of kindness" budget that allows for Managers to do small things like buy snacks, lunches, flowers and so on to recognise the contributions of their team or lift spirits at times of unusual stress. Staff throughout the group are managed closely and due to the company's size staff related problems and issues can be quickly identified and addressed. RD is always extremely supportive and flexible in its approach to assisting staff. As well as this, Management Development specifically includes time spent looking at staff wellbeing.

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Pulsant Ltd

One to One meetings are frequently held with all the applicable Managers in relation to their development plans, which are put in place as required to help improve weaker areas. Coaching and mentoring is available and some have found this to be of great benefit. Pulsant have had external facilitators leading them through a development programme and are looking to reinforce this again next year. There are various ways of measuring the performance of the company's Managers, for example the output from the internal Pulse Survey. The company's bi-annual appraisals, review, assessment of goals and functional KPI's is another very useful tool when assessing performance. 360 feedback was only introduced this year and is a very useful means when assessing performance and impact on various areas of the business.

As part of the company benefits Pulsant do look to provide helpful ways to support employees in maintaining a well-balanced and health conscious lifestyle. They currently provide fresh fruit and fruit juice, as well as healthy breakfast produce. The company have a Bike to Work Scheme in place. Some employees are entitled to free gym memberships and others can obtain discounts for gym memberships via the ‘My Pulsant Rewards' discount programme. There are additional opportunities to enhance wellbeing as part of the Health Shield cash plan, which gives employees access to an employee assistance programme as well as considerable contributions to health care and wellbeing. The 'Pulsant Plodders' go on regular runs during lunchtime and enter various local challenges. Pulsant have and will continue to refer to their occupational health provider as and when they feel this would be of benefit in order to manage and obtain advice on best practice as required.

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Phoenix Community Housing

Phoenix's Community Chest project sees an annual fund of £100,000 made available to groups and organisations with ideas for projects that will improve the community and life chances for residents. Since 2013, Phoenix has awarded £300,000 worth of funding to projects that have benefited more than 3,000 Phoenix residents and local people and are set to reach even more. Community events include a Phoenix Festival, which attracts more than 3,000 people each year, a Summer Fun programme for children in their area and regular Community Links events where residents can get involved in what's happening in their locality. They supported a small village in Togo via the Dekamile charity through inkind support and also engaged with staff to raise £12,000 to support further essential construction. They offered an opportunity for one Phoenix staff member, along with an employee of the subsidiary Phoenix Repairs Service, to travel to Togo to support the construction project and see first-hand the impact of their contributions. Unemployment in Lewisham, London, is more than twice the national average. Phoenix offer a range of initiatives to support local people to take the necessary steps in or back to work. Their ‘Roots into Work' programme offers a weekly job club, one to one advice and coaching from dedicated careers advisors, plus CV and interview workshops and a broad range of flexible training programmes. In 2015-16 they supported 48 residents into long-term employment. Free training ranges from functional skills in English, Maths and IT to vocational programmes that include work experience/placements. They also offer apprenticeships each year and seek to maximise job and apprentice vacancies within contractors and broader supply chain. Since 2014 a total 33 Lewisham residents have benefited from apprenticeships.

Phoenix worked with staff to develop their new strengths framework, which underpins all of their recruitment and performance development and is understood as a way of achieving the corporate vision. Their strengths framework represents a cumulative understanding of ‘essential behaviours' at Phoenix. They believe that the behaviours are a unique perspective of current and future cultural aspirations and very much about a shared understanding of how to create a workplace that they love. The eight core Phoenix strengths complement and sit alongside their four core principles and values of Community, Customer, Consideration and Collaboration. The four C's, as they are known, are visible and salient throughout the organisation and within their offices. Posters are displayed prominently in resident facing areas and customer service spaces so that they are accountable to customers and partners. They have also used giant whiteboards on the stairwell, allowing staff to write up how their job roles help deliver corporate objectives. This has helped staff understand one another's contributions to the business and sparked further internal talks and working groups. All colleagues received a strengths toolkit, workbook and bespoke journals that reinforce the messages. Their new ‘thank you card' initiative prompts staff to celebrate and acknowledge outstanding examples of customer service and work against these core principles.

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Penna Plc

All employees have access to professional coaching and are assigned a mentor from within the business. Penna's People Manager Group meets quarterly and is led by the MD. This group works together to support people management in the business and to support one another with their people management role and responsibilities. Good leadership is a core tenet of the overall brand, along with the client experience and colleague experience; therefore the company believe it is essential that they maintain the standards of the leadership behaviours they have established. Each Penna Leader is asked to gather personal feedback on how they are performing. They do this by consulting their direct reports and anyone else whom they have led as part of projects they have undertaken in the last 12 months. Managers are then required to attend a one-hour training session where they learn how to give and receive feedback in the best and most respectful way. Managers then attend a feedback session with their own Line Manager, who shares and walks through the feedback to identify and maximise on strengths and also build upon any development areas.

All employees have access to professional coaching and are assigned a mentor from within the business. Penna's People Manager Group meets quarterly and is led by the MD. This group works together to support people management in the business and to support one another with their people management role and responsibilities. Good leadership is a core tenet of the overall brand, along with the client experience and colleague experience; therefore the company believe it is essential that they maintain the standards of the leadership behaviours they have established. Each Penna Leader is asked to gather personal feedback on how they are performing. They do this by consulting their direct reports and anyone else whom they have led as part of projects they have undertaken in the last 12 months. Managers are then required to attend a one-hour training session where they learn how to give and receive feedback in the best and most respectful way. Managers then attend a feedback session with their own Line Manager, who shares and walks through the feedback to identify and maximise on strengths and also build upon any development areas.

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Ombudsman Services

Ombudsman Services employees are invited annually to vote for a local charity and have the opportunity to volunteer to be part of the charity crew with all areas of the business represented. One of the activities for the crew in 2016 was to organise a group to take part in the Yorkshire Three Peaks challenge. Later in the year the crew organised a Christmas fair. Throughout the year they encourage friendly team competition by running desk decorating challenges, with prizes including a meal out for the whole team. Also, Ombudsman Services foster team spirit through initiatives like ‘Women in the Workplace', taking part in Pride and running informal ‘Meet the Exec' sessions. Their employee voice group Novus works across the organisation with business leaders to support the cascade of information and gain consensus on key topics. The group played a pivotal role in the engagement of colleagues with the 2014/15 office move and are now working on consultation about supporting better attendance management and a wellbeing programme. Finally, there is the sports and social team who coordinate activities, including regular football sessions and an annual Halloween quiz.

There is an overall programme to support and develop Ombudsman Services Managers to be at their best. This programme includes refresher training sessions, as prior to mid-year reviews taking place a programme was provided for Managers focusing on the preparation and delivery of the review meeting, including dealing with challenges from employees. Managers also have access to online learning. This contains e-learning modules, guides and checklists around ‘Performance & Development', ‘Coaching & Mentoring' and ‘Managing People'. One to one coaching is provided to Managers using both internal and external coaches. An internal accreditation is awarded to those Managers consistently demonstrating effective coaching and observation is continued on a less regular basis to encourage maintenance of standards. Mentoring is supported within the organisation and a number of Managers have an internal mentor as part of their development. Objectives are set at the beginning of the year and are a basis for gauging progress and performance. Managers have a monthly conversation with their own Manager to discuss progress against their objectives and general wellbeing. Regular observations of one to one's and coaching sessions with team members also take place, with feedback and suggestions for development being provided to all Managers.

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NTT DATA

In addition to NNT Data offering occupational health and the Employee Assistance Programme, the company promotes the sabbatical and flexible working policy and also encourages employees to utilise these benefits. The business also encourages employees to take all annual leave throughout the holiday calendar year. The company recognises that in unfortunate circumstances an employee may need to take up to five days paid leave, which is another benefit used to assist employees with wellness and their return back to work.

NTT Data's Reward and Recognition Programme is designed to recognise and celebrate the valuable contributions of all the company's employees across the UK. This recognition can be for anything, from daily achievements that deliver greater value to clients to the implementation of ground-breaking innovation. To be selected for a Recognition Award, employees must demonstrate outstanding commitment and achievement. For a bronze Award staff receive £250, for silver Award's £500 and for the Gold Award it is £1,000. In addition there is the Team Award Team event, where rewarded individuals and teams are recognised in Town Hall meetings and presented with a glass trophy.

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