Overview

The FiveTen Group is one of the world’s fastest-growing specialist recruitment consultancies. With over 500 recruitment consultants operating across 20 cities in 14 countries, the group focuses on permanent, contract, temporary and interim positions in a number of industry sectors.

There are 5 different brands operating under the Fiveten umbrella - Marks Sattin, Laurence Simons, EMR, Ortus, Greythorn and Antal.

The Need

The Fiveten Group grew quickly through acquisition and was awarded the fastest growing recruitment company of 2010. With John Rose taking over the helm, the focus changed to one of organic growth and for this to be successful, it was essential that the group developed its leadership capability, particularly among the newer managers who are seen as the leaders of tomorrow. Commercial Director, Jonathan Warnock and Chief Executive John Rose wanted a structured development programme that would bring together managers from each of the brands and develop their management skills.

The programme needed to develop self - awareness and help managers adapt their approach to better achieve commercial goals, improve employee engagement, ensure managers were   “driving the right behaviours in their team”, were “tougher in dealing with difficult or conflict situations”, confident in setting clear boundaries in order to manage performance and educated more about business in general.

The Solution

We designed a modular programme that ran over 9 month period. In line with our approach to any development, we placed a huge emphasis on working with the group before and after the programme.

Step one – identifying the need
we held structured conversations with each participant to establish where they were in terms of their performance and what they wanted / needed to improve and develop. We also spoke on a face to face basis with each of their line managers to get their view on what was needed and held a focus group with a mix of direct reports to get a completely rounded picture of the areas to address.
Through talking to John Rose and Jonathan Warnock we also ensured we tied the training back into the company’s values, goals and internal policies.

Step two – tailoring the programme
We designed six one day modules running over 9 months, covering key skills areas. Each session had pre and post course work which participants needed to complete, so we could maximise the time in the sessions. Much of the post course work was linked to current topics and articles in the business press at the time to broaden the participant’s business awareness.

Each session ended with a clear action plan, which everyone then had to report back on at subsequent sessions. This helped the group to see the progress they were making and share best practice.

Step 3 – reinforcing learning
At the midpoint of the programme we spoke to all the participants’ line managers to ensure they were supporting their people and were debriefing on action plans and reinforcing the learning. This internal support from delegate’s line managers can makes a huge difference to how effective the training is.

Step 4 – assessing skills
The final module was a practical workshop where each participant role-played dealing with a staff situation, with John Rose and Adam Nicoll, Head of Marketing EMEA, taking the role of the team member! This gave everyone a chance to put their skills learned over the 9 months into practice and also gave senior managers a chance to see what progress their managers were making.

Step 5 – evaluating learning
4 weeks after the programme we spoke again to each of the participants’ line managers to discuss what difference they could see in their people and identify what they were doing differently as a result of the training. This was then followed up with calls to each delegate to remind them of all their actions and ensure they were still focussing on their new skills.

Denise Cook Head of HR EMEA says “we have seen a marked difference in our managers, particularly in terms of how they deal with performance issues. They now address performance issues earlier and following the correct procedures.”

Jonathan Warnock comments “The approach Focal Point take is to really get to know the business and the participants, so that the managers are engaged from the word go. The support that Focal Point give in between sessions and after the programme has really helped to cement the learning and ensure that techniques and skills are being used to good effect. We have seen some real changes in behaviour and confidence in our managers and are delighted with the progress they have made.”