Salix Homes

Straightforward have been working with our organisation for over eighteen months, their professional support has been invaluable.  Salix Homes were going through a period of significant change and need to develop our service managers in order to adapt to the ever changing environment that we operate in.

Our HR team had commissioned a well known consultancy to design fit for purpose competencies which would help us to ensure we have employees who have the right attitudes and behaviours in the organisation, however the framework was too cumbersome and difficult to put into practice.  We contacted Straightforward and Charlotte was asked to look at the competencies that we had paid a considerable amount of money to develop, to see how we could develop them further, to ensure that they were competencies that everyone could sign up to and that would help to develop a culture where employees felt empowered to make decisions and resolve problems.  This was not an easy task and sometimes it is easier to start again.  However, Straightforward very quickly got to know our organisation and understood our vision and was able to work with me to ensure that our competencies were right for our organisation.

The second piece of work we commissioned was to work with a relatively new senior management team to get them to operate consistently at a strategic level across the organisation.  With the newly developed competencies, Charlotte and Barbara designed a 360 feedback tool for use with each member of the management team and provided valuable feedback to each team member which included ongoing coaching.

From this Charlotte worked with me to develop a business case to implement an ILM Coaching and Mentoring level 5 programme for the senior management team.  This was seen by some members of the team as the ‘fluffy’ organisational development stuff that was expensive and would die a death.  With Charlotte’s down to earth style she was able to convince even the most sceptical colleagues that this would be the way forward in order to change our culture from a ‘tell and do’ to a coaching culture.

The programme has been successful and all managers have already seen the benefits to them as individuals and to the organisation.  All 35 middle managers will commence an ILM level 3 in coaching and mentoring from September 2013.  We have coachees in the organisation already saying that coaching ‘has changed their life’. It is beginning to create a ‘buzz’ in the organisation and more employees want to know about coaching and how they can get involved.

Charlotte has also been involved in a mediation role with employees who have difficulty resolving disputes and are having a negative impact on the organisation.  She is extremely personable, down to earth with a great insight in relation to what makes people tick.