Projects

IES is providing consultancy and research support to the Northern Ireland government, to develop a new employment support offer for disabled people and those with health conditions. Coverage topics include: employment policy research, equality and diversity, disability and employment, health, work and wellbeing, mental health and stress, wellbeing in employment, unemployment and welfare, inactivity and welfare reform and unemployment and the active labour market. IES methodology includes: labour market analysis and forecasting, provision of expertise and advice, developing tools resources and guidance, evidence and literature reviews and international research and analysis.

This project will provide consultancy support and the role of critical friend for a place-based approach to implementing health coaching. IES will guide local change champions, using an action research methodology, during the Berkley Vale Cluster Better Conversations ‘test and learn’ pilot. The aim of this pilot is to create the critical mass of practice change required across professions and organisations in a discrete geographical area. IES will also write a learning report, drawing on data collected during the period of the pilot.

IES is providing consultancy support on career planning and coaching aspects, to assist in the development of, and tailoring of the content delivered by, a Virtual Life Coach. The ‘virtual coach’ is in testing phase for a UK Government Department and aims to provide short and long-term personal, employment and career support throughout a user’s whole employment, maximising motivation, satisfaction and wellbeing, and minimising stress and absence through a blend of automated and human support

IES is partnering with the CIPD, the professional body for HR and people development, to investigate the state of strategic human resource management in UK organisations. Thirty years after the concept of strategic HRM arrived in the UK from across the Atlantic, the project will analyse the key issues on organisations’ HR agendas. It will consider how and how well people management activities are integrated with business strategy, and HR’s contribution to innovation and change. Importantly, the project will compare and contrast both the recent academic research and real-life practice in this area, and how research and practice could and should evolve in the future. Do organisations still have HR strategies in these fast-moving times? What do they call them? Most importantly, how do they land and deliver them and ensure that HR policies really are having an impact on employee engagement and wellbeing and organisation performance? The project will comprise a review of the academic literature on strategic HRM, alongside a quantitative survey of HR directors and detailed case-study research in a range of employers. Assessing the realities of strategic HRM, this project will identify the extent to which HR is contributing to business strategy and performance, and how this fits with calls for HR’s future role to be as the guardian of culture and values and the ‘moral compass’ of an organisation. What do HR directors think about increasing government intervention through employment legislation and how are they balancing the demands of their different stakeholders: leadership, employees and wider society? Business strategies and workplaces are very different to the norm 30 years ago and so we need to document how the concept and practice of strategic HRM has evolved and needs to change now. Intelligent HR software and changing workforce expectations could be the gateway to the birth of a new-look, evidence-based and values-driven HR function. HR policies could contribute to addressing the corporate and national skills crisis, achieving genuinely agile and diverse organisations, increasing employee engagement and involvement and social inclusion, and responding to the present and future challenges of job automation. But just how and can HR functions build that positive future? For more details of the project and to take part as a case study, please contact Duncan Brown. IES head of HR consultancy: [email protected]

We conducted four case studies with NHS Trusts in North-East England, selected from volunteer trusts by NHS Employers. The focus of the case studies was on the relationship between human resource management interventions, staff satisfaction and patient satisfaction. The method will be mainly interviews with senior people, particularly HR directors, although evidence will also be sought from other sources such as staff and patient surveys and key performance indicators.

NHS Employers asked IES to produce a paper for line managers about employee engagement, based on our experience of running events for line managers in NHS trusts. The paper aimed to focus on engaging managerial behaviours and ways of building resilience within the team.

IES was commissioned by The Bar Council to conduct the third survey in the Working Lives series. In partnership with Employment Research Limited, the questions explored a range of aspects of barristers’ working lives and make comparisons with earlier surveys where appropriate. This work adds to IES’ wealth of experience in conducting surveys for professional or membership bodies, for clients such as the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons and the Royal College of Nursing. These surveys ensure that professions remain attractive, securing a supply of workers for the future whilst also helping to shape working conditions for those currently working in the roles in question.

IES research will establish the need and high-level design requirements for a director-level leadership development programme across the health and care landscape. This includes identifying potential barriers to participation and reflecting on effective marketing and channels for recruitment. The Institute’s approach includes a market scoping exercise, an online survey and interviews with directors and HR/CEO gatekeepers.

Andrea Broughton from IES was commissioned by IRShare, Paris, to help coordinate two days of training for the Eurotunnel European Works Council in Folkestone. The aim of the training was to help Eurotunnel European works council members from the UK and France to understand more about how employment is regulated in each other’s countries, and to promote mutual understanding and joint working between representatives from the two countries. IES’ contribution consisted of giving a presentation on employment relations systems around Europe, chairing question and answer sessions and participating in a case study role play exercise. The training was conducted in English and French.

In 2017, IES was commissioned by the Office of Manpower Economics (OME) to carry out research into the use and effectiveness of market pay supplements and Recruitment and Retention Payments (RRPs) across the pay review bodies and the wider public sector. The research considered both the macro-, policy-level situation and the micro-, practice-level use of these supplements. It involved a literature review and policy stakeholder interviews, looking at the macro-level situation, whilst case study examples from the Armed Forces, NHS and local authorities made up with micro-level analysis.