Sandra Dowson Email & Phone Number

Plymouth, United Kingdom

Dartford, United Kingdom

Newton Abbot, Devon, United Kingdom

Dartington

Short term agency contract during restructuring.

South West

9 month Fixed Term Contract (ending March 2015 - extended and hours increased to also cover Bournemouth, now ending end of April 2015)General operational HR. Organisational change, TUPE & Transfers, Employment relations case work. HR training delivery, Policy reviews.

This new role was introduced as 6 month fixed term contract to: Develop and embed a revised Staff Appraisal & Performance Management process following a full diagnostic – including training of senior managers in its application to foster a more positive and proactive team and enable an uplift in workforce performance and organisational capability.  Developing the employee engagement culture through the Staff Consultative Committee and related processes & structures – building and nurturing an overall improvement culture enabling change. Providing business planning support to Lopwell Barn to increase uptake and usage linked to income generation and sustainability. Development and launch of the website and bookings administration. Generalist office duties ensuring Corporate Team cover at all times and HR cover as required.

Plymouth

HR Manager at The Zone, a charity looking after staff and volunteers who are actively helping 13-25 year olds with anything from homelessness to sexual health, mental health and promoting business awareness and creating outdoor activities to help develop individuals for more positive development.9 month Fixed Term contract covering maternity leave: Coordinated all aspects of HR incl. absence & leave management, recruitment, contracts, job descriptions, grievances, long term absences, policies and CRB checks. Assisted CEO through extensive change management, contract evolution, consultations & culture shift. Launched internal Staff Consultative Committee to improve employee engagement & communication process. Additionally worked on Project to launch residential activity centre to increase income streams better enabling the charity to reinvest into the infrastructure.

 Impartial and confidential business advisory & diagnostic service, specialist in HR and Skills advice and assistance to SME's across Devon, Cornwall & Somerset. Latterly rolled out the High Growth Skills Service providing a minimum of 12 hours per business of HR related time across businesses in Devon and Somerset holding a case load of up to 30 companies. Covering the full range of needs from legal advice, recruitment and selection, management advice, policy setting, contractual advice, performance management, project management, employee engagement, orgnaisational structure, culture, change management , employee representation to training. Engaging with clients of all sizes, sectors and backgrounds.  Identify effective solutions and identify funding solutions where appropriate utilising full knowledge of the skills agenda.  Built long term relationships with clients to ensure on going support throughout the client journey and helped with development of action plans and working through issues involved with this to ensure their sustainability. Maintained accurate customer records, built excellent partnerships and networking and worked towards stretching targets.

 Successfully leading the implementation of various change management and service improvement projects, proactively liaising with all areas of the business and stakeholders ensuring clear understanding of objectives and acceptance to the change. Conceptualising and developing innovative solutions to problem areas by initiating focus groups and through careful analysis of the results created a strong two-way communication flow that maximised staff and centre performance while still maintaining a high level of customer and employee satisfaction. Interviewing and recruiting staff at all levels, continually reviewing the process. Introducing and managing NVQ qualifications to the Plymouth Contact Centre, resulting in the introduction of the Internal Accreditation Scheme, recognised by the Institute of Customer Service. Proactively increasing awareness of individuals’ actions on the team by communicating with supervisors and staff to focus on raising team morale, resulting in an improvement of both individual and team targets. Managed numerous additional projects simultaneously including redesign of the working office environment and refurbishment; launch of Digital services from Analogue in the South West; introduced Call Distribution Telephone system.

Plymouth

 Initially recruited to set up the Customer Services team, IT & telephone systems, processes and procedures.  Successfully recruited the first team, training and coaching staff, introducing and setting up telephone and computer systems to deal professionally with the first customers, developing the department to deal with the 1.73m customers. Pro-actively undertook a significant amount of inter-departmental liaison, negotiating and persuading in order to create communication flow between departments and compliance with Service Level Agreements.

London, Cambs

Encompassed setting up new offices; office and company expansion; creation and launch of new products; building effective teams, project management, managing strategic and tactical marketing campaigns for leading organisations, management and training.

Degree Level, Project Management, 2:1

Certificate in Professional Development: Project Management, critical analysis, stakeholders, etc.

Associate, Cipd Level 5, Pass

Degree Level, Hr, Quality & Performance; Organisation, Management & Hr, 2:1

Certificate in Professional Development: Transactional and transitional roles of the HR department, business partnering, employee.

Sfedi, Business Advice And Skills, 1St Rate

Government recognised UK Standards Setting Body for Business Support and Business Enterprise: for supporting SME's in Business Advise.

Foundation Degree Level, Advice & Guidance, 2:1

Advice and guidance for SME's, action planning & coaching in: Personnel Business Advice & Partnering, HR and Skills advice, general.

Certificate, Management, 2:1

Bsc Hons Degree, Sociology With Psychology