HR Consultancy Project Work
HR Consultancy Services - Project work
Rather than sign up for one of our retained HR consultancy services some businesses prefer to engage us in specific HR consultancy projects on a ‘pay as you go’ or project fee basis. Given the experience of our HR Consultants both in Northern Ireland and Glasgow, we are able to make a big impact on difficult client HR issues.
Content
- What are TUPE consultations
- What is workplace mediation
- What is an HR Audit
- How to carry out an HR audit
- When do you need HR consultancy services in a business?
- Why do companies hire HR consultants?
- 10 reasons businesses hire HR consultancy services
- HR consultancy services for small business owners
- What does an HR consultant do?
- HR consultant vs HR manager
- Benefits of outsourcing to HR consultancy
Some examples of HR consultancy services we have undertaken include:
-
- Interim onsite HR Management – this involves placing an HR Consultant at a client site for a period of time in order to provide HR Management cover.
- Restructuring and Reorganisation – including assisting businesses to close some of their locations and assisting with collective consultation regarding changing employment contracts and/or redeployment of employees to alternative roles.
- TUPE Consultations – relating to both business acquisitions and service provision changes.
- Preparing tailor-made documentation – including contracts of employment, employee handbooks, and other relevant employment documentation.
- Reviewing and designing performance management systems.
- Workplace mediation
- HR Audits of existing arrangements and providing advice on potential improvements.
If you have an issue and want some help on a pay-as-you-go basis, please give us a call.
What are TUPE consultations
The transfer of undertaking regulations (TUPE) is a legal requirement when businesses are being taken over by another business.
Outgoing employers as part of the process must consult with employees to provide all relevant information.
Businesses can consult with employee representatives however if you have fewer than 10 employees, employers are required to meet and consult with all employees affected, individually. Read more on the TUPE process.
What is workplace mediation?
Mediation is an informal, method for resolving workplace disputes or when personal clashes occur. The process has a clear structure seeking a quick solution to workplace conflict.
This process is fully voluntary for all parties. By using mediation, employers are providing a safe place for employees to communicate and solve any issues. The mediator needs to be a professional in this and we recommend an external individual to carry this out.
The mediator is unable to disclose any aspects of the conversation to any other parties not involved in the meeting.
Our HR consultants are available for mediation.
What is an HR Audit
An HR audit is a review of your company’s HR policies and procedures. The objective of an HR audit is to identify any possible issues, analyse these issues and suggest solutions. Undertaking an HR audit is a proactive way of managing workplace procedures.
HR audits can be completed by an internal employee or an external HR consultancy. The main objective of a HR audit can vary; however, it helps to keep the business compliant with up-to-date legislation
We recommend to business that they complete yearly HR audits.
How to carry out an HR audit
The first step is to understand you’re why for completing an HR audit and how you will measure the results. For example, your retention rates have decreased, and you need to understand why.
Dividing the HR audit into 3 segments, helps you complete the HR audit correctly. These segments include:
- Compliance for employee documentation is completed to the standard of employment laws
- Functions of HR and how they operate, including recruitment, onboarding of employees, training, employee relationships and exit interviews.
- Strategy – Do your HR procedures fit in with the overall company strategy, culture and contributions?
An HR consultancy can carry out an HR audit for your business and provide insights on how to improve HR in your company.
When do you need HR consultancy services in a business?
Hiring an HR consultancy is required when a company feels its workplace policies or procedures are not to the standard needed. HR consultants will improve these.
HR issues can take business owners away from critical aspects of operating and growing a business. HR may cause sleepless nights, especially when managing employee performance. You may feel an HR consultancy is needed to help take the HR burden away allowing you more time to focus on growing your business.
HR consultants may undertake an HR audit to determine specific areas requiring improvements.
When you are recruiting for your first employee, we would recommend hiring an HR consultancy. You may feel you don’t require long-term HR support at the moment but taking advantage of our HR consultancy project services may be beneficial for setting up.
Outsourced HR services are beneficial for businesses that do not have the funding for an internal HR manager or team. Furthermore, if an employee responsible for HR leaves the company, HR consultancy projects may be beneficial in the interim.
Why do companies hire HR consultants?
Human resources are a critical part of any business, no matter how many employees they have. There are multiple reasons why businesses hire an HR consultancy.
By hiring HR consultants, they can provide guidance and assistance on any HR issues or manage various HR projects. An HR consultancy has positive impacts on businesses and their HR processes.
Hiring HR consultants will provide your business with external expertise, helping to identify areas needing improvement relating to employees and people management. HR consultants will review the business’s policies and procedures ensuring they are in line with employment laws. Keeping the business compliant, reducing the risk of claims or tribunal cases.
HR Consultancy services can bring clarity and reassurance to your business.
HR consultants will manage and deal with HR issues promptly and efficiently, helping businesses to be more flexible when issues occur or are raised. Outsourced HR help the business follow the correct procedure from the beginning.
Having HR consultancy services on hand for HR support effectively improves the company’s time management.
Why? HR issues are complex and time-consuming, an HR consultancy can manage these situations for you, reducing the time you spend dealing with the issue.
Outsourcing HR, to a consultant, means the business does not have to invest a large amount of resources into recruiting and training a team of HR professionals.
10 reasons businesses hire HR consultancy services
Improve time management
If your business does not employ a dedicated HR advisor or consultant, then it is more than likely that other employees’ time is being used to fulfil these needs. The efficiency with which this person is able to carry out their own role will be adversely affected by this. Having access to an HR consultant to offer specialist HR support and advice to your company will no doubt save you time and money in the short and long term.
Expert advice
Your business will have access to expert HR advice from HR consultants who are qualified and experienced in providing the correct HR solution to the many issues that HR departments deal with on a daily basis. This can be advice around creating robust job descriptions and making sure that every employee has a contract of employment before they start working for your business.
Reducing overheads
Helping to calculate the workforce cost, not just salary but also the various benefits received, this could be healthcare, premises, holiday pay, sick pay or employee consistency program. Doing a deep dive into these overhead tasks will help to identify which items may be too expensive and open to reduction. Once these have been identified, you can educate or reduce these overhead tasks.
Outsourcing specific duties to a third party can be a very efficient way of reducing overheads.
Compliance with HR
There are many regulatory issues that have been identified with HR-related themes.
-
- Workplace safety
- Cybersecurity
- Paid leave
- Retirement plans
- Tax changes and updates pay equity
- Worker classification
- Privacy
- Improving employee engagement
HR consultants can help with implementing skills and methods to improve employee engagement in your business. They can show how to lead with optimism, create a vibrant, healthy working environment.
They can guide your business to ensure that your employee cultivates meaningful relationships and produce meaningful work that adds value to your business.
Keep focused
If there are HR issues within your business then it will lead to the focus being taken away from the everyday running of your business. Carrying out HR work takes time and plenty of it. Changing the focus in your business to deal with a grievance, a disciplinary or any HR problems takes considerate effort by those involved which will no doubt reduce the focus on your primary aim of growing and maintaining the business.
Don’t let your goals get distracted by having to deal with ongoing employee issues.
Some of these issues can seem impossible to sort out and can waste many hours of your time both, worrying about and trying to resolve them. Passing these issues to HR consultants will help to make your business more efficient.
Better serve employee needs
Having an HR consultant or access to one is giving you a significant advantage over using a current employee; to take on the HR requirement as a side role.
An employee being asked to do this role is not an expert, a HR consultant is!
Therefore, they can meet your requirements more promptly and also more efficiently. Your own employees may also feel more comfortable talking to an HR professional instead of burdening a current employee.
Save money
Hiring an HR consultancy can seem like an expense initially, however, this can become a huge money-saving for your business in the long run. For example, a hospitality like a hotel or a restaurant with 30 people employed can save over 1000 hours a year with the right kind of HR support. Saving time being spent dealing with these issues by your internal employee without the expertise in doing so will lead to financial savings down the line.
Streamline training
Every new hire, that your business costs money, this is why you must have the correct training in place from the beginning of the employee journey. An experienced HR consultant can help you design a training program that will help to get the correct amount of information communicated to your new employee’s quickly and efficiently as possible. This will mean your new employees will have hit the ground running and begin adding value to your business quicker. Another cost saving to the business.
Protect your company
What you don’t know can really harm your business, it can cost thousands of pounds to get over a bad hire. Setting your business plans back months if you have to deal with an employment tribunal. As an HR consultant would know HR compliance and understands it. HR consultants will help you avoid the pitfalls that a transgression may bring to your company
HR Consultancy services for Small Business Owners
Are you an owner of a small business? Not quite sure if you need HR consultancy services?
You may feel you don’t have enough employees to warrant hiring an HR consultancy. However, Google doesn’t provide all the essential information and is hard to digest, due to the various information making it difficult to know what the right direction is to follow.
Even with one employee, hiring an HR consultancy is recommended to ensure you start off with the correct HR processes. Utilising our HR projects can set you up initially with employment documentation and any templates you may need i.e. return to work questionnaire.
Setting standards and procedures right from the start helps to keep the business right side of employment laws.
What does an HR consultant do?
The role of HR consultants varies daily, the aim of outsourcing HR is to provide expert advice to clients. Other elements of an HR consultant’s role are;
-
- Recommending best practices for implementing workplace HR procedures and policies
-
- Providing solutions for HR issues and providing recommendations for improving HR internally
-
- Helping employers/business owners stay compliant with employment laws both in Northern Ireland and Great Britain – check out our resource on the key differences between NI and GB employment laws.
-
- Building working relationships with key contacts within the business
-
- Provision of training for managers and employees, i.e. bullying and harassment in the workplace.
- Communicating through email and phone calls, working alongside employers and managers from the beginning. With our outsourced HR service, you will gain unlimited phone calls and emails for continual guidance.
HR Consultant vs HR manager
Are you weighing up hiring an HR manager or outsourcing HR to HR consultants?
The main role of an outsourced HR consultant is to assist a business with best practices for managing HR in the workplace alongside helping them to stay compliant. For example, during disciplinary investigations. Outsourced HR consultants may be able to carry out similar tasks to an internal HR manager.
An HR manager will take the lead on particular tasks as a full-time employee, i.e., recruitment and retention of employees. The HR manager will communicate with employees, whereas outsourced HR consultants will communicate primarily with employers and managers. HR consultants will attend employee meetings on request, i.e., grievance hearings or appeals.
Outsourced HR consultants and HR managers can work with each other, HR consultants can take on administrative tasks such as employment documentation or drafting letters. This improves time management of a company, allowing the HR manager more time to focus on improving employee retention rates or company culture.
Check out our video on the importance of Employee Documents
Benefits of outsourcing to HR consultancy
-
- Decreases costs of HR departments
- Improves efficiency and flexibility of the HR team
- Provision of HR management software, improving holiday and absence management
- Increased HR expertise within the company
- Extra layer of expertise, safeguarding the company from claims i.e., disability discrimination
- Outsourced HR is easy to incorporate into business processes and strategies
- Response times will increase
Contact HR Consultants
Please fill out your details below and a member of our team will get in touch with you.
