Employee Voice – National Lottery Heritage Fund

Project Info

Client National Lottery Heritage Fund
Skills Employee voice to shape culture

Project Description

Taking care of our nations’ treasures – amplifying employee voice to shape values and behaviours

The brief:

A new CEO, a new name and branding, a new corporate strategy, a new set of (still WIP) values, a new office and new performance management in place. Woodreed was asked to work with the Fund to refine the values (in line with the new strategy) and define behaviours that align with them. The aim: to create a high performing and sustainable culture to support the delivery of the corporate strategy and help to create a great place to work for their people. An entirely collaborative, consultative approach was required with their people to achieve consensus and from that, organisational success.

The solution:

Our methodology was grounded in the Four Enablers of Engagement as identified by Engage for Success*, with particular focus on the 3rd enabler – employee voice. Our journey took us to some of the UK’s heritage gems, from the Edinburgh Printmakers to the Penarth Pier pavilion. These acted as the perfect backdrops to conduct our series of interviews and employee consultations.

We began with interviews with the exec, board and culture champions followed by broader employee focus groups. We then ran four co-creation workshops in all four corners of the UK where we explored the values and behaviours. Our aim? To obtain consensus on the values and to establish a set of potential behaviours – that were right for the Fund and owned by employees. Not from a blank sheet of paper but from a range drawn from a vast amount of work and consultation already done. Sensitivity, empathy and genuine collaboration was required for success

Our shortlist of recommendations was approved by the board and unions then shared with the wider employee cohort for voting via our digital employee voice platform.

Once values and behaviours had been agreed we embarked on a series of virtual workshops to begin embedding.

A clear internal communications campaign was run alongside to keep everyone informed and engaged with the process.

The results:

A set of values and associated behaviours to support the delivery of the corporate strategy and help to create a great place to work for their people. Consensus across the board, from the board and exec, to the people of all four nations, to the unions.