Employer Services
Risk Assessment, Health and Safety Policies Work Trials and Work Experience Workplace Support and Training Employer Advice and SupportSo, what's all this about managing diversity? Well, you may have already seen what we have to say about the business case. In today's labour market employers often have to compete against each other to recruit and retain suitable staff. Employee loyalty is not just about pay - it's about feeling part of a team, being appreciated as an individual. If you had technical equipment worth a million pounds, you'd be sure to service it. You'd allocate staff to ensure this was done adequately. Your staff may be your biggest asset - how do you service their needs? Do you know them? It may be a cliche but research has shown it to be true that a happy and stable workforce is a productive and valuable asset. How are you going to achieve this? We think we can help. Surveys by DuPont have consistently shown that disabled employees are more productive and more reliable. With our support, you could recruit a more diverse workforce representing the community within which you operate. It's not by accident that B&Q have established a system of disability champions within their stores. They think this gives them a competitive advantage over their rivals. If you can meet the needs of disabled employees, then you can more easily meet the needs of your customers - and remember people with disabilities have a purchasing power of £40bn annually. We can discuss your requirements and find employees to meet your needs but it's a two-way process. We'll want to ensure that you have up-to-date safety policies, a healthy workplace and adequate support. We can help you with policies and disability awareness issues - just give us a ring. Risk Assessment, Health and Safety PoliciesOne of our prime concerns is that we place people in safe workplaces. We have a duty to our clients and also to employers to give as much information as is reasonably needed to make judgements on risk and health and safety within the workplace. We complete a Health and Safety proforma with each employer to ensure that they are aware of your duties to safeguard the health of your employees. This looks at insurance, first aid, fire precautions, environmental factors, protective equipment, COSSH and so on. We prepare a risk assessment based on a detailed job analysis and worker profile and we have helped many firms to develop safety policies. Where hazard levels seem high, we can help with devising control measures and can produce individualised risk management strategies. The evidence is that employing people with disabilities can produce benefits for the whole workforce. Disabled workers are no more likely to have accidents or constitute a risk to safety but by examining risk management and current policies you could easily improve arrangements for everyone. If you want more information on any of these issues, please contact us. Work Trials and Work ExperienceWe can arrange work trials to help employers to gauge the suitability of potential workers and to enable potential employees to see if the job is the right one for them. These trials can vary in length from a few days to several weeks depending on the circumstances. Periods of work experience can offer invaluable training opportunities for someone who has not worked for a number of years. It gives the chance to refresh those skills that employers value: teamwork, reliability, communication and competence. These placements may be about training someone up for a forthcoming vacancy or they may be about giving a training opportunity with no commitment to offering a job. We will not pressure employers into offering jobs if they have only agreed to a training placement. We will also make it clear to both employer and client how long the placements will last. We see no value in extending placements for the sake of it. It is possible for clients to try out a number of placements with companies to learn more of what is expected in different types of work. We can support work trials and placements with our trained employment workers. They can offer information, advice and suggestions to develop the placement and can offer training support to clients. The aim of these work trials is to develop the confidence and skills of our clients but they give valuable experience to employers seeking to diversify their workforce. Our support can give employers new skills in managing diversity in the workplace and there may be spin-offs that can be of benefit to the whole workforce. Recruitment Services"Employability without a job is a broken promise!"Our service is all about finding the right job for the right person. We're about matching client skills to employer requirements and enabling both parties to make the most of it. We take care to get a good profile of both the worker and the job. We want to make sure that the workplace is a safe one and that the support will be there for the new employee. We need to know that the culture of the workplace will get the most out of the worker's potential and support their personal and job development. We identify potential employers through a factfinding exercise that asks employers what their needs are. It's only by listening to concerns and worries that an employer will feel able to try something new like employing somone with a disability for the first time. We will carry out a Health & Safety check on the company to ensure that it knows it's responsibilities to its employees. We check insurance details, safety policies etc. to make sure that legal requirements are followed and carry out a risk assessment before the job goes ahead. We like to clarify conditions of service like holiday entitlement and sickness policies as well as checking that wages are acceptable. We try to minimise the paperwork for employers but some of it is inevitable and we like to think that the time spent on this builds a rapport between ourselves and the employer. Finally we check that employee and employer are clear about eachothers role and expectations. We agree levels of training support, quality and productivity requirements etc. We can provide workplace support if required and supplement the training offered by employers. It is quite likely that our staff may spend a day or two learning the job themselves before the client starts work. This means we can train workers using the right techniques from the start. We will provide workplace support as long as necessary and maintain contact for as long as either party requires it. Click here for for two examples of our work. Workplace Support and TrainingThe first few weeks in a job are critical. A recent research showed that 50% of disabled employees lost their jobs within a year. We aim to provide the right levels of support so that the worker retains their job and develops in it. It's important that both employee and employer get off on the right track and our job is to help that happen. Both will have concerns. The employee may well be nervous about starting work for the first time or returning after a long break from work. They may be worried about what others think and may lack confidence. We can provide that reassurance and focus. Employers will have their own concerns. It may be that productivity is lower at the start but this will improve over time. If it desn't then we've got the match wrong and we'll review the situation. We can provide ongoing job coaching in the workplace. We use task analysis and 'Training in Systematic Instruction' techniques to structure training programmes where necessary. Our staff have a wealth of training experience and a unique capacity for lateral thinking that can solve the seemingly impossible. Whether it's colour coding or picture cards, aids or job adaptations, we'll try to make it work to everyone's satisfaction. We keep in regular touch to make sure everything's going OK and can help to refresh skills as needed. As the needs of the job change, we can come back to support the learning of new job duties. And we're always at the end of a phone if either employer or employee needs anything. Job RetentionIf your employee acquired a disability whilst working for you, would you know what to do or how you could help? What would be the implications for your company? Keeping your trained and experienced staff is likely to benefit the company greatly. Prevention is preferable to losing your best staff. You can help your employees to stay healthy by considering their physical and mental health:
The largest causes of long term sickness are stress and back injuries. The biggest cause of stress is not having sufficient control over your work. Despite all your good work, life can be unpredictable. Illness or disability could affect any one of us at any stage of our lives. This could mean worsening eyesight or hearing. It could be around mental health. It could be a progressive physical disability like multiple sclerosis. As the employer, you will be concerned - your employee may be devastated. Not only will they have to adjust to the implications of worsening health, they will be unsure about their future with the company. You will be required to make reasonable adjustments so that they can remain in your employ. Here are a few steps that may ease the process.
Click here for two job retention case studies. |
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This page shows some of the services currently available from Bury EST. Just click on a
link to get further information. Please note that we want to work in partnership with you and
will try our best to tailor our services to meet your needs. If you want more information
please contact us.
