Buying a Company? Transforming a business? Working to get a better contract or avoid a strike? Or just want to remain union free?
Whether you are trying to avoid a strike, improve efficiency in operations through collective agreement or just assess whether and how to structure an acquisition, our experts see things most people miss. The consultants from Yessin & Associates add decades of operational, financial, and human resource management experience to your team.
Why do most mergers or acquisitions fail? Experts now believe that the key to success in you new venture is whether the human resources fit together as well as the financial and physical assets. Our consultants have decades of experience assisting leadership teams with assessments, placement, strategy and communications to help make this process the key to your success, and not the beginning of your problems. Read more…
When you are buying a business, selecting a site or hiring a new workforce, Employment Relations Advisors can help.
Site Selection
If you are opening a new facility, you don’t want surprises. What is the union density in the region. Have their been layoffs nearby? What is the unemployment rate? What collective agreement do other employers have with their unions? Who is organising there – is there anything going on in the industrial estate you are getting ready to move into? What about local industrial action – are those applicants coming through your doors the same people that just put your neighbor out of business?
Using ERA’s data, and local and industry contacts, our consultants can help evaluate your sites, and even provide interviewing and hiring expertise and strategies to maximise you chances of success in your new locations.
Due Diligence Support
Experts measure and evaluate the engineering, pension liability, value of accounts receivable, risks of toxic tort liability…everything it seems but the ability of the workforce and the management team to adapt to the changes that you will need to make your investment a success.
Using tools from electronic surveys to facilitated assessments, our consultants can measure the employment relations climate, the likelihood of acceptance of a better collective agreement or risk of industrial action. We work with other proven professional partners to evaluate the savings needed and identify where those savings can be achieved using industry benchmarks and proven analytical tools. For examples of good deals gone very, very bad for want of such analysis and support, contact us…and avoid the pitfalls that can cost you profits, damage debt ratings and reduce market capitalisation.
Hiring and Selection
Our consultants have hired and screened as many as 1500 people a month to ensure that you get the kind of workforce that will make your venture successful…and to avoid surprises that could cost you millions. We can conduct and run the management assessment centers that select your leaders, or simply design a hiring process to enhance your likelihood of success. Our UK based professional partners can even recruit and place executives and key managers to make your project a success.
Past engagements have included hiring an entire workforce following an asset purchase from hospitality businesses to logistics firms. We have ensured workplace continuity during a strike – from healthcare to transportation to manufacturing. For more information, contact us…
Union Vulnerability Assessments
Electronic surveys or one on one interviews between the consultant and management team are used to identify extent of organising, employee alienation or vulnerability. This process helps allocate resources more efficiently and creates a trip wire so you can address problems before they become issues – and while they can still legally be addressed.
Employee Opinion Surveys
Measure employee alienation, predicts labour problems, and identifies areas of convergence of opinion to help target communications and efforts more effectively and efficiently. Also used to benchmark acceptable levels and measure performance, or to identify outliers for recognition or remedial assistance.
Employment Relations (“Environmental”) Audits
One on one interviews between the consultant and management team to identify employment relations issues, and intensity or energy around those respective issues. Helps identify extent of organising, employee alienation or vulnerability, and can be used in conjunction with electronic tools to drill down beyond the electronic feedback and begin looking for anecdotal examples, solutions and differentiation so that solutions really match problems. This process helps allocate resources more efficiently and creates a trip wire so you can address problems before they become campaign issues – and whilst they can still legally be addressed.
Integrated employment relations and business strategies
What happens in another unit, another division, or another facility does affect what happens in yours. Trade unions coordinate negotiation and organising strategies across industries and international boundaries – you must do the same. Understanding that relationship, and making the linkage work to effect the desired outcome, is the goal of our strategic team. Frequently this involves coordinating employment labour relations, public relations, governmental relations, investor relations and legal resources – understanding the objectives and concerns of each and working together for a common goal calibrated to your bottom line business objectives.
Establishment of effective Works Councils
In coordination with your legal counsel, we can help unlock the creativity, insight and skills of your workforce. Our consultants have increased employee participation in works council elections – and thus the credibility of the organisation. We expect to have 85% - 90% or employees turn out and vote in important workplace elections, and can help ensure that your works council functions as an asset to your business – constructively, not antagonistically. Call us to find out how.
Negotiations support – communicating for success at the bargaining table
Does the old collective agreement work for you? Getting a good collective agreement can be the key to your success. Bargaining never gets any easier, and establishing a good baseline to work from – as well as avoiding the surprise of undocumented “past practices” that cost you time and money -- may be the difference in success or failure of your new business. Ask our clients who failed to assess this and found millions of pounds in poor work practices embedded in unwritten past practices.
Our clients have secured agreements that allowed them to compete by taking their case to the employees. Isn't that illegal? Not if you do it properly. If employees of the old company are unwilling to change to meet the expectations of the new company, you need to know that up front. Our consultants are experienced at getting employees to sign onto the new work culture, and designing exit strategies, or soft landings, for those who prefer to take their talents elsewhere.
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