Case study
Rapid Mobilisation - Overhauling a Prestigious Site
A prestigious site which was given to us late one Friday afternoon, for a Monday morning start.
Upon our arrival, we found the site to be in a very lowly state, despite its superficial presentation otherwise, and it quickly became apparent to us that a wholesale reimagination of the Front of House (FOH) operation was required which would take some time. In the first instance, we found that of the four live Receptionist roles in operation, one was designated to serve as an Open Manager, and another as an Open Supervisor – however, neither were requisitely trained to do so, and as a result there was no effective management in place.
Additionally, we found that morale in the team was at an ‘all time low’ having been subjected to heavy-handed, somewhat outdated, inflexible, and personally stifling management protocols, which included there being strict restrictions on permissible hairstyles, a ban on all jewellery, no allowance for tea breaks, and a clean desk policy which precluded staff from having drinking water to hand. (Sadly, we were also informed that staff were spoken too rather poorly by previous management).
We learned too, that previous management were unable to recruit staff despite several attempts to do so, and as a result, vacancies remained unfilled for over six months, during which time holiday / sickness days were insufficiently covered. And finally, we discovered that the reporting / meeting protocols were ill-conceived and inefficient – being held on a monthly basis only, with minimal communication in-between, and that when held, agenda items were extraneous and detracted from the efficient running of the building.
Upon arrival, we committed a senior Contracts Manager to site, to ‘steady the ship’ and plug the management gap until the staff could be assessed and thoroughly re-trained through our MyPathway system. Our assessment resulted in the release of one member of staff, and the re-purposing of another (to a site where that person is now thriving in an autonomous role).
We also successfully recruited an exceptional manager who has comprehensively ‘re-written the playbook’ for the site, creating working manuals covering all procedure and protocols, and colourful ‘how to’ workbooks which have been extremely well-received. We also worked with management to rewrite workplace protocols, all of which have served to significantly improve working conditions and morale – and as a result, staff performance, as has been evidenced by two of the team having since been awarded for outstanding performance.