What are companies doing with regards to 'My Manager'

Academy Insurance Services offer health insurance to all employees and a cycle to work scheme

The organisation has a number of processes in place that allows colleagues to feedback their ideas and suggestions. Firstly, the organisation makes use of the intranet, Sharepoint and social media, Yammer, as tools for knowledge and idea sharing. All employees have access to these sites. A suggestion facility allows employees to share and feedback any ideas and suggestions they may have on any area of the business. This is a straightforward and effective process to allow all employees to be heard. The organisation also holds regular ‘town hall' meetings, which all employees can attend. In these meetings, a brief executive report is made about the current status of the business. Employees will then have the opportunity to ask any questions they have, discuss any emerging issues, voice their concerns and feedback on any ideas and suggestions they may have. The meeting is usually fairly informal, allowing the employees to take the lead and discuss the topics they feel are necessary. Abellio also aims to gain feedback from employees by conducting yearly engagement surveys. A gap analysis is used to understand areas for development and the feasible measures necessary to close the gap.

The health and wellbeing of 1st Credit staff is extremely important to 1st Credit. They understand that sometimes throughout working life and personal life times can be difficult. Through ample communication with their staff during return to work interviews and one to one meetings they try to establish and eliminate any cause for concern. 1st Credit has established an open and honest ethos which encourages staff to share any concerns to prevent them escalating further. Working alongside a local doctor's surgery they obtain advice on dealing with work related stress in guidance of the HSE (Heath and Safety executive). 1st Credit also offer an Occupational Health service via the surgery; this enables staff to gain professional medical advice and provides further guidance to 1st Credit in making any further adjustments. They provide behavioural workshops at all levels in the company that address stress in the workplace and provide practical solutions on how to avoid and cope with the demands of the job. These courses are essential for teams who deal with sensitive issues faced by their customers such as bereavement, critical illness, and mental health. This level of development is not only about equipping employees with the skills, knowledge and confidence to deal with such issues but it also ensures that their employees are given a degree of resilience.

Wulvern Housing support employee development by their internal coaching development programme - this year they have trained 10 managers to become coaches so they can help and develop staff from across the business. Each coach had to complete a two training course on the basics of coaching, undertake a minimum of 10 hours coaching practice and report on the benefits to the business and the individual of the coaching experience before being added to the coaching bank. The coaching bank are now used to support staff identified by Managers as wanting additional development to progress or where they need performance improvement support. Coaches are now working across the business with staff from all team including Apprentices, Rising Stars and general colleagues needing support. They intend to run their second cohort of coaches training in February to widen the scope of this resource as they want coaching to be a key way that managers support their teams to develop and learn to make decisions and decide actions for themselves. Additionally they run quarterly updates for their coaching bank to give them insights to other methods and style of coaching to give them flexibility and alternatives to the GROW model they learned on the initial two day course. December will see the coaches exploring the Time to Think philosophy and methodology developed by Nancy Kline.

The organisation celebrate Thanks giving, Christmas, Eid and Divali.

This year Updata Infrastructure introduced the Employee Assistance programme which offers a helpline where employees can speak to an experienced counsellor, legal representative or qualified nurse 24 hours per day, 365 days per year. This provides around the clock advice and counselling on matters such as, emotional issues, bereavement, relationships, health concerns, healthy living advice, alcohol/quit smoking advice, debt/money matters and landlord/tenant disputes. Employees also receive access to the Worklife Solutions website where you can gain access to help on a number of topics including: relationships, family, home, bereavement, finances, sickness, disability, retirement, change, workplace conflict, working as an expatriate, work-life balance, stress, nutrition, smoking, drinking, ill health, physical health and healthy heart. The Healthy Living website includes an online health coach, Heath Matters E-Zine and information on an extensive range of health related topics. Employees can set personal fitness goals and track their progress online. Finally, employees can take an online assessment, generating their own ‘Q' score, understanding the impact that their lifestyle is having on their health. There is also an area for line managers providing management tools and advice. In addition to this, the company have launched an income protection scheme, the policy will provide 65% of base salary until the age of 65 should an employee become medically incapable of performing their duties. This takes the stress and worry out of any long term sickness situations for the employee.

Unruly offer spot ‘superhero' bonuses to team members who have gone above and beyond the call of duty. These £1000 bonuses are given each quarter to nominated employees. Managers globally are given the opportunity to nominate Unrulies for a superhero bonus, and these nominations are reviewed by the executive team to ensure senior Unrulies are aware of special contributions team members have made. In addition to monetary rewards, Unruly provide a mentoring programme which partners team members based on skills, this is not about hierarchy, it's about subject matter experts providing support to team members seeking development in this area. If someone has delivered wow in a spectacular fashion they are given a pair of tickets to an exclusive film preview, hosted by the NSPCC in Mayfair. This helps the company to reward Unrulies who have delivered wow and to share the love with the NSPCC. They always try to make sure their most dedicated Unrulies are given lots of high profile networking and speaking opportunities, which have included lunches at #10 Downing Street, appearing on stage at the Barbican theatre, industry leadership dinners and invitations to the opening of the market at the London Stock Exchange.

What works really well at the Ultimate Finance Group is the fact that there appears to be no political agenda by any member of staff. If people identify an opportunity the management will review and regularly support employees allowing them to deliver and drive their own personal development. The company seeks to promote from within allowing personnel to develop without leaving to a competitor or third party.

UKAR is committed to the development of their colleagues. Staff well-being is one of four elements which make up their corporate social responsibility charter, alongside their customers, their communities and the environment. They run numerous health and lifestyle initiatives including a comprehensive employee assistance programme; free financial planning advice; slimming groups; gym discounts; Zumba classes; Boxercise classes; and one aspect of colleague wellbeing they are particularly proud of is their close relationship with Heart Research UK. As a result of their focus upon healthy lifestyles , they were delighted when they were awarded Heart Research UK's bronze and silver award as part of the Healthy Heart Mark Employer programme, which was launched via Health Awareness days and almost 500 colleagues had lifestyle checks. They are proud to have received Gold Award accreditation from Heart Research UK following a recent assessment of their healthy lifestyle policies and initiatives. UKAR colleagues have also chosen Heart Research UK as their corporate charity of the year for 2013.

Trustmarque Solutions combine a corporate and individualised approach to employee development, to focus on both immediate and career-focused needs. They are currently supporting a number of employees through professional qualifications which will enable them to progress in their career path, but will also enable contribution at a higher level in their current role. They have also designed a “Solution Sales Professional” programme for all those in account management, which covers both general sales skills and the specifics of selling their services product set; this combination of product and skills training equips individuals to do their current role, but also enables them to progress through a sales career structure. A similar development plan that mirrors this programme is in place for the Commercial Department, combining Partner and Marketing teams in the organisation and numbering 20 employees. A modular programme of training and accreditations will incorporate generic content together with specialist modules (on topics such as video case studies, content generation and digital marketing) for advanced skills development. This provides a structured, needs-driven programme of training and opportunity for development for the entire team.