Agenda item

INFORMATION NOTE OF THE HUMAN RESOURCES SERVICES MANAGER

To update the Joint Staff Consultative Committee on the progress made in the last quarter completing HR work and projects and supporting people issues.

The Human Resources Services Manager presented the Information note entitled ‘HR Update’ following which Members asked questions.  

Audio recording – 5 minutes 28 seconds

The HR Services Manager presented the Information Note entitled ‘HR Update’ and advised that:

·                Recruitment data for Q1 and a comparison with the same quarter in the previous two years was shown under paragraph 3.2.

·                85% of vacancies had been filled at the first attempt which met the 75% target.

·                Vacancies in Q1 were double what they were in the same quarter last year.

·                3 vacancies across Governance and Environmental Health had not been filled, however, these positions had been temporarily filled or readvertised since the information note had been published.

·                Over the last year, 22% of vacancies had been filled by internal candidates. 

·                Paragraph 3.3 highlighted staff turnover which was higher than Q1 last year, however, the Local Government Association benchmarking system revealed that their staff turnover was in line with other local authorities.

·                Staff turnover would be monitored as Local Government Reorganisation (LGR) approached.

·                Absences had decreased in recent months due to a reduction in long-term absences as shown in the data at paragraph 3.4.

·                High levels of mental health absences were still present, and the HR Team continued to provide support and raise awareness for this.

·                Nationally, absences had increased significantly to 9.4 days lost in the last year.

·                Paragraph 3.5 detailed the 3.2% pay award that had been agreed in July and paid to staff in August.

·                The apprenticeship mentoring scheme had been refreshed to allow graduates to become mentors and new apprentices would be assigned apprentice buddies to support their induction into the Council and the apprenticeship programme.

·                A new graduate had joined the Council earlier this month and managers across the Council continued to give positive feedback on the impact of graduates.

·                Paragraph 3.8 gave an update on recent learning and development events that were linked to the Staff Survey Action Plan and management development.

·                Employee wellbeing arrangements and recent occasions that had been publicised to all staff were set out in paragraph 3.9.

·                As part of National Inclusion Week in September, the Council provided staff with resources and a webinar focused on becoming an active bystander which was also a topic at the October meeting of the Inclusion Group.

·                Paragraph 3.11 described the first all-staff events that the Council held in September and feedback from these would be used to improve future ones.

The following Members asked questions:

·                Councillor Claire Strong

·                Councillor Ian Albert

·                Councillor Keith Hoskins

·                Councillor Bryony May

·                Councillor Daniel Allen

In response to questions, the HR Services Manager advised that:

·                Staff that left the Council did so at various stages in their careers including retirement but some left earlier into their careers as the Council was a small organisation with a flat structure.

·                The Council was focused on staff development which could help with retention but also work against them if opportunities for staff to progress within the organisation were not available.

·                Approximately 20 staff attended the mental health lunchtime walk and these would be organised more regularly and at different locations in response to staff requests.

·                The Wellbeing Room had been launched recently and advertised to staff through various means. New staff would be made aware of it during inductions and its usage would be monitored along with the feedback received on it.

·                Remote working could be linked to staff feeling isolated, and managers were reminded to undertake regular 1-1s with staff who regularly worked remotely.

·                There were many opportunities for staff to contact others and socialise outside of their teams.

·                It would be difficult to measure the impact that LGR would have on their ability to recruit as variances in recruitment were natural.

·                Approximately 200 staff attended the all-staff events and positive feedback had been received on them, particularly on the transparency that had been provided on LGR despite the lack of information in some areas.

·                The sessions on team building and resilience and the opportunity to meet other teams face-to-face had also been appreciated by staff.

·                The proportion of part-time to full-time staff that attended the events was unknown, but they were held on three different days and times to provide a range of options for staff to attend, and a recording of the events was made available as they recognised that it would not be possible for everyone be at them.

·                No reasons for the failure to fill the vacancies in Governance had been learned from either managers or candidates.

·                New apprentices were allocated longer serving apprentices as buddies.

·                The White Ribbon programme was talked about within the Inclusion Group, and was not currently part of their e-learning but could be investigated.

In response to questions, the Chair advised that:

·                Attendance at all three staff events had been good and they would aim to hold them each year.

·                Apprentices had brought good changes to the Council including improvements to the safeguarding process around licensing, and the Council should be proud of their apprenticeship programme.

The Chair thanked the HR Services Manager for presenting the Information Note to the Committee.