Their challenge
As a growing charity with aspirations to double its income to 15M within 5 years, CCUK found that the existing grade structure had created a gap between the Directors and senior managers. The charity wanted to be more aligned to market and provide opportunities to progress pay for staff, mindful of affordability and ensuring that funds were used appropriately as per the charitable objectives.Our solution
Using Evaluate language to describe the levels within the charity enabled them to understand they were missing the Translate level – the head of department that translated strategic direction from the Executives to Senior managers. Bridging this gap not only helped break down functional silos and encourage cross business collaboration, it also freed up the Executive team to focus on strategic direction. A full benchmarking exercise was undertaken, to ensure all roles were compared to the appropriate market lens, and pay ranges were aligned to the market to enable the charity to compete effectively. Having workshopped ideas for pay progression, it was determined that a competency based route would be best, enabling employees to grow their pay as they evidenced significant competency development. Modelling was undertaken to ensure the new structure and framework was future proofed and commercially viable. A cross-business process of developing competencies collaboratively ensured buy in from managers and employees.The outcome
The framework has enabled employees to clearly understand why they are in the job level they are, be confident that they are paid competitively and that they have clear opportunities to develop their career and pay as they increase in competence. Expectations around speed of pay movement were clearly established at the launch and managers are refreshed with training to ensure that they confident to review competency levels. A cross charity validation process ensures fairness in approach and Trustee input provides governance of the whole structure. Employee engagement levels have increased significantly since the introduction of the new framework and turnover, particularly for those at 2-3 years’ service, has reduced.
