Strategic Human Resource Management

Calling in the Professionalsstarted we didn't even know the names of everyone
When the National Care Standards Commissionwho worked in the region and many of them didn't
(NCSC) was set up in 2002 it called in a number ofhave contracts."
human resource specialists to help. The NCSC is partShe embarked on a major recruitment drive early on:
of the Government's modernisation agenda toone of the first challenges was to hire 20 healthcare
promote and protect the well-being of users ofprofessionals as inspectors - and they don't grow on
regulated services such as residential nursing homes,trees. She also spent many hours managing the
private hospitals and boarding schools. It also coversuncertainty of staff, many of whom came from very
services that weren't previously regulated, includingstructured backgrounds. The balance of her time was
laser clinics and private and voluntary hospitals. In thespent handling adhoc HR issues like maternity,
past these institutions were regulated by different localgrievances, discipline, absence and capability - with no
and health authorities.policies and procedures to guide her. "I drew on my
The NCSC essentially brought together some 1800knowledge and experience and managed every new
staff from 230 employers into one umbrellasituation by adopting best practice," she says. "Not only
organisation. One of these Human Resourcesdid we have to comply with the law, we also had to
specialists was 37-year old Charlotte Grover, a humankeep the unions involved and satisfied that we were
resources professional with a background in blue chipproceeding correctly in the absence of policies and
companies including Unilever, Toyota and Xerox. Inprocedures."
2001 Grover set up her own HR consultancy, wishingOnce the permanent regional HR manager was in
for more job flexibility and to be able to make use ofplace, Grover took on her next challenge: to assist in
the experience gained from working in a range of HRthe development of a new pay structure for NCSC
roles during her 15 years in the profession. The NCSCthat was linked to performance in the job and a
was her first assignment.competency framework. She researched other public
Working to establish the NCSC certainly provided aand private sector organisations, ran focus groups with
substantial challenge, but Grover has never beenstaff and trade unions to understand their expectations
fazed by a blank sheet of paper. She was initially goingand experiences, met regularly with Clare Curran and
to be employed for a six-week interim assignment, buther team, to discuss progress and possible options,
this soon turned into a year-long exercise, with Groverand drafted papers and recommendations.
reporting directly to the East Midlands regional directorAt the end of the three-month process the
Tony Frayer and with a professional reporting lineorganisation decided not to implement the
through to Clare Curran, the HR Director based in therecommendations on the grounds that the NCSC is
head office in Newcastle. For the first six monthsgoing to be replaced by two new organisations in April
Grover was responsible for developing all the HR2004 and it was felt the structural overhaul required to
services within the Trent Region, helping to establish allimplement the proposed new reward structure would
new services covering Northampton, Nottingham,merely add to the sense of uncertainty and confusion.
Leicester and Derby. Once a permanent HR manager"It was a pragmatic solution," says Grover, "but we
was appointed to this post, Grover was asked to takeneeded to do the research to arrive at that decision."
on the exciting challenge of helping to develop a newThe work did importantly highlight the need for a new
reward structure, competency framework, andappraisal and development system, and she and
performance management scheme.Curran spent the next few weeks developing the
Because the NCSC was new, everything was in'Individual Contribution Review Scheme' - or ICR -
start-up mode. There were some draft methodologieswhich sets short-term objectives and assesses
covering, for instance, the way to inspect a residentialindividuals' contribution in the job and identifies their
home, but everything was incomplete: even thetraining and development needs.
Newcastle headquarters had a skeletal staff - and HRIn turn, this work led to the realisation that staff weren't
was the last function to be established. HR supportactually sure what their jobs were, and so Grover
was crucial as many staff had moved across fromspent the next three months - to April this year -
their former local and health authority employers, so atredrafting all the job descriptions too. The ICR and job
a regional level the HR support provided by Groverdescriptions were presented to management for
had to be 'spot on'. She was responsible for supportingconsultation in May this year, and as Grover
seven area managers in the East Midlands region,comments: "Once they are agreed, and people know
each with around 40 professional and administrativewhat their jobs are and how they will be measured,
staff, so she had to set up HR systems based uponthe way they are managed will improve enormously."
national policy. "The critical bit was getting thePreviously published on the Impact Executives website
manpower plan sorted out early on, as that gave us a– read the original article about Strategic Human
framework and structure," she says. "When weResource Management.