The lowdown on People practices

Robust people practices across the employment lifecycle are essential to thriving organisations and commercial success. At the heart of things, effective people practices are about providing employees with a positive, engaging experience that enables them to be their best. In return? They drive results.

Let’s unpack this a little further: 

Do you suspect you have a people problem? Do any of these scenarios ring a bell: 

● Sudden resignation of high-value team members 

● Difficulty attracting the right candidates for roles 

● Team engagement surveys with poor scores - or no engagement surveys 

● Negative feedback in exit interviews 

● Increases in absenteeism 

● A culture of complaints, finger pointing and blame 

● Poor collaboration between teams who work in silos 

● Departments at loggerheads 

● Managers struggling to deal with difficult staff 

● Poor performance 

The bad news is these scenarios have a direct impact on performance. The relatively good news is that these scenarios aren’t atypical, but all are a result of people practices, or lack thereof. 

We come across different people practices every day here at People and Growth Consulting. Some are damaging to culture, to put it mildly. Others are fantastic practices, but implemented either at the wrong time in a business’ trajectory, or in the wrong area. Some of them arise from either a lack of HR systems, processes and policies in place, or ineffective HR practices. 

The really good news is they can be addressed, and on the other side of the process is thriving people and organisations. All you need is some solid people practices. 

People practices are the foundational HR requirements for all businesses, regardless of size. While the topic of people practices is far too big for a blog post, at a baseline there are compliance elements to get right, and a raft of somewhat basic measures that resolve problems and create positive cultures where people feel supported, engaged and happier at work. The end result of this is an employee experience that encourages operational efficiency as well as reduced operational and legal risk. 

We work with our clients to help them understand the current state of their organisation’s people and culture. Once we have a baseline of this, we then work with them to prioritise where to invest based on their strategic goals and on their people and culture needs. We adopt a bespoke approach here at People and Growth Consulting, so this looks different for every client. Our guiding principle is understanding both the organisation’s strategic goals as well as the maturity of their people practices, as this determines which are the most strategically important for success. 

For example, many organisations want to dive head first into recruitment. However, in the context of people and culture, is right now the best time to recruit a team? Do you have the capacity to give an incredible candidate experience? Candidates can be the biggest advocates for your business -and on the flipside, greatest detractors- and so people who are unsuccessful for a role need to be nurtured and treated as well as the successful candidates. In the next step of the employment lifecycle, induction, do you have capacity, resources and processes to give new team members the red carpet experience? Are they welcomed to your organisation and supported to learn all about it, about your vision, and where their role fits within that vision? And so on through the employee lifecycle… 

We have our own internal methodology for helping organisations uncover their strengths, weaknesses and issues when it comes to people and culture. Our People and Culture Review gives clarity as well as detailed support in maximising your return on investment in the people practices that will address challenges, resolve issues and capitalise on opportunities. 

The end game? A positive culture where: 

● People feel supported and engaged 

● Teams are structured for greater operational efficiency 

● Managers inspire their teams to become more aligned and productive 

● An employee experience encourages people to stay. 

For more information about our audit process and what’s involved, please contact us. We’d be happy to talk through our methodology and our approach to realigning culture, processes and structures to better support your organisational goals.