Colleague spotlight: meet Jane Grundy, Technical HR Consultant
In the third in our colleague spotlight blog series, we meet Jane Grundy, a Technical HR Consultant, who shares some insight into how our delivery model works.
My original career plan was, believe it or not, inspired by the acclaimed courtroom drama, A Few Good Men. I initially wanted to go into military law, but it turns out you need to complete basic training to do that – and that wasn’t very appealing!
After I got my law degree, and completed my legal practice course, I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do next. While I was working that out, I started working for a distribution company, handling its HR admin. It also had an employee advice line, which I worked on for a while, and quickly found that there was a vocation for me in HR.
That vocation led me to AdviserPlus, where I became an HR Adviser in 2011 before moving into my role as a Technical HR Consultant in 2013.
A collaborative, supportive atmosphere
Technical HR consultancy is a complex role. On any given day I’m working on a whole host of different projects, from being a point of escalation for our advisers or the client, to ensuring our clients’ documentation and services are in line with any policy changes. If legislation is changing in the future, we have to start planning well in advance for how that affects the service we’re delivering.
It’s a lot to cover, but AdviserPlus is hugely collaborative, and I find myself working with a diverse range of people throughout our teams to get the job done. We all work really hard to support each other, and everyone’s pulling for the same goal – ensuring we get the best result for our client.
Obviously, most of my time is spent focusing on my clients’ needs, but I’m also involved in directly supporting and upskilling our frontline advisers. They’re really the lifeblood of the service we deliver, so it’s vital that they have the capability and experience they need to do their jobs well.
That’s because we’re not simply staffing a call centre, and it’s not about how many calls they can handle a day. It’s important that our advisers are autonomous and have the knowledge (and technology) they need to work effectively. In the end, it’s all about the quality of the interactions they’re having and the support they’re giving to our clients.
A multi-layered approach
Of course, every organisation we work with has a different idea of what the perfect outsourced HR management will look like. Some will be looking for a more hands-on approach at every stage in their employee relations. Others just want an extra resource for contentious or complicated cases. We can offer both – and everything in between.
When we put together a team, there are typical roles and structures that we’ll put in place, but the initial discussions we have with any of our clients shape exactly who is in a team, and the scope of their work.
Take my main client, for example. The advice line we provide is made up of two tiers of adviser. Level one advisers handle the more straightforward cases such as absence management and flexible working, while level two advisers deal with more complex issues, such as discipline, grievances – or even dismissals. Because we’ve separated the resource like this, our client has dedicated support for every challenge and outcome, from advisers with exactly the right skills and experience.
Together with the other Technical HR Consultants, we handle the components that underpin the whole service offering, supported by operational teams. Not all clients will want their service set up in the same way, but there’s always the same layers of hard-working, collaborative people on board to make sure they’re getting the best from us.
For more information about how Jane and the wider team can support you and your line managers, read more about our ER managed service.