People Plan 2023 - 2025 - Print version

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Introduction

The People Plan outlines activities for the next three years and builds on the foundations now in place, whilst playing a central role in supporting the One Coventry Plan and its priorities.

Our workforce is key to our success, so providing the right ‘tools’ for the job, being clear on purpose, being agile, giving and receiving feedback, working collaboratively, with support and appreciation is the benchmark we are setting ourselves. The five identified ‘people’ priorities reflect the feedback from consultation undertaken with stakeholders as well as the identified organisational needs from the One Coventry Plan.

The Council’s One Coventry Plan sets out our vision and priorities for the city, based on our commitments to the people of Coventry and the things that residents have told us are most important. Responding to this means our People Plan is more focused on the needs and aspirations of our communities than ever before. Our employees are essential to the delivery of those Council priorities, with the People Plan’s central theme being to support a motivated and engaged workforce. Critical to that is having a workforce that is diverse and inclusive, we have developed a separate Workforce Diversity and Inclusion Strategy to help us achieve that aim. We are early adopters of the Race Code and actively support both our employee networks and Trades Union colleagues through partnership working.

As the national and global economic climate remains very challenging, increasing the economic prosperity of the city and the region to ensure the continued financial sustainability of the Council is clearly reflected as a One Coventry priority. We want as part of our plan to develop our talented workforce through effective succession planning, timely and personalised learning opportunities to future-proof the capabilities and skills needed going forward.

The overall aim of the plan is to:

  • Continue to work towards being a more diverse and inclusive employer
  • Support recruitment and retention challenges with a focus on Children’s and Adult Services to address their specific needs
  • Be more effective at workforce planning, and the delivery of people analytics
  • To support evidence-based decision making
  • Take our talent management from strength to strength
  • Have strong employee engagement throughout the Council Continue to improve the mental and physical health of the workforce Support better engagement with health and safety, increasing incident reporting and risk assessment training
  • Grow managers' confidence to become effective people managers Provide learning opportunities for the future including having a digitally-enabled workforce
  • Continue to develop an open and fair culture Effective policies and procedures
  • Reward and recognition

We have five strategic People priorities for the Council for 2023-25

We believe these five broad themes encompass the One Coventry Plan, reflect the consultation undertaken with key stakeholders and feedback from the wider workforce.

  1. Employee wellbeing [https://www.coventry.gov.uk/strategies-plans-policies/people-plan-2023-2025/5]
  2. Workforce diversity & inclusion [http://www.coventry.gov.uk/strategies-plans-policies/people-plan-2023-2025/6]
  3. Employee experience [http://www.coventry.gov.uk/strategies-plans-policies/people-plan-2023-2025/7]
  4. Agile and flexible workforce [http://www.coventry.gov.uk/strategies-plans-policies/people-plan-2023-2025/8]
  5. Digital HR [http://www.coventry.gov.uk/strategies-plans-policies/people-plan-2023-2025/9]

Download a full colour version of the plan [https://www.coventry.gov.uk/downloads/download/7634/people-plan-2023-2025]

Who will enable the delivery of this plan?

Human Resources has four service areas, and several different teams sit within each of those areas as follows:

People and Business

We provide a key function to the organisation, which is to accurately pay employees on a timely basis, and administer the pension scheme.

The service also develops and introduces a wider reward offer which includes an employee assistance programme, a salary sacrifice scheme which gives access to goods and services like cars, computers, saving schemes, charity donations, travel cards etc. These are regularly reviewed for relevance as well as employee preference.

People and Business also manage all the HR systems, data and insight services, including managing the establishment and management of posts. HR operate a range of systems which support managers and employees to work effectively. Our aim is to maximise the benefits, increase use and knowledge, as well to seek to continually improve. Data is a key area of development with all our operational and business reports being recently revised with the next step being to widen local usage and the development of scorecards/KPIs.

People and Culture

Our aim is to ensure there is an organisational culture which is open, fair, inclusive, and engaging, and where employees are motivated, suitability skilled and focused on providing excellent services to our citizens.

A central theme of our work is to ensure that employee engagement is high on our list of people priorities providing employees with a voice so that they can make a difference. Recognising our employees’ achievements through new and innovative recognition programmes such as Cheers from Peers and our Spire Awards creates an organisational culture and ethos which values its employees and recognises Talent, whether that be one our apprentices or one of our aspiring leaders.

As a team our key priorities for the next few years will focus on ensuring that we are able to embed the actions within our Workforce Diversity & Inclusion Strategy, improve the customer experience by ensuring that our recruitment & selection processes align themselves with the principles of inclusive recruitment and create opportunities for our Apprenticeships through effective workforce and succession planning.

Employee Relations

Using a HR Business Partnering Model, the Employee Relations Team focuses on both individual and collective relationships in the workplace.

We work across the Council to develop and embed a positive employee relations culture, through developing modernised policies, procedures, and toolkits.

We provide proactive advice, guidance, and support in all aspects of Employee Relations procedures such as disciplinary, grievance, organisational change, and conflict resolutions. We also support consultation processes working closely with trade union colleagues.

We are aiming for a positive climate of employee relations including enabling employees to speak up, creating high levels of employee involvement. The team's work over the next People Plan reflects this.

Occupational Health, Safety and Wellbeing

Creating and sustaining a safe and secure workplace is essential for a healthy and happy workforce.

To deliver this, the Occupational Health, Safety and Wellbeing Team provide a wide range of services as well as ensuring we meet our legal obligations.

The services include pre-employment clearance, health assessments, counselling support, debriefing, mediation, healthy lifestyle screening and advice, mental wellbeing clinics, training, accident and incident reporting and investigation, audit, inspection and monitoring as well as health and safety advice.

Quarterly formal consultations take place on matters of health, safety, and wellbeing

A monthly Health and Wellbeing Group has been established that develops and supports the wellbeing agenda.

Implementation Timeline

Year 1 2023

  • Embedding agile and flexible working
  • Introducing local and organisational recognition awards
  • Updating recruitment marketing and application process to maintain relevancy in the marketplace
  • New management information and Insight reporting
  • Continuing to improve our mental health support
  • Investing to improve our health and safety support
  • Employee recognition – Spire Awards
  • A full employee survey

Year 2 2024

  • Introduction of our approach to ‘Civility matters'.
  • Completing the review of policies and procedures including supporting materials and training Improvements in keeping well in the workplace
  • Workforce Planning Tools/Support
  • Introduction of Job Families
  • Silver Thrive Award
  • Increasing the uptake of mandatory health and safety training for risk assessment and accident/incident reporting and investigation

Year 3 2025

  • Delivery of the Race Equality Code
  • Conclusion of the Workforce Diversity & Inclusion Strategy
  • Effective retention and talent management through responsive reward and development
  • Continuation of our investment in the systems and processes to improve user experience and efficiency
  • New appraisal and talent management system in place Gold Thrive Award
  • ENEI Gold Award

We will be striving to:

  • Maintain working in partnership with Trade Union colleagues
  • Continually developing our learning opportunities to meet organisational need, maintaining our health and safety standards
  • Sustaining and growing our apprenticeship offer
  • Increasing employee engagement
  • Direct and targeted support to Children’s and Adult Services
  • Maintaining and improving our statutory and mandatory training figures
  • Continue to develop our annual wellbeing offer

What do we want for our colleagues?

We want colleagues to be productive, enjoy what they do, support their health and wellbeing, recognise the contribution they make, and feel valued.

It's important that the Council is a place colleagues want to come to work and would recommend to others because they have a great work experience.

We want to be that employer who is fair, inclusive, encourages development, progression and autonomy, all of which are in line with our organisational values.

Our commitments to and our expectations of our colleagues

The organisation is committed to our people and firmly believes that working together will enable us to deliver the best for the people of Coventry. To do this, we are committed to providing clarity, learning and development opportunities and regular feedback.

Our colleagues:

  • New starters will be clear on what their role is and how they contribute to Council objectives
  • Every colleague will be appraised annually, receive feedback on performance along with objectives every year
  • A healthy and safe workforce
  • A commitment to diversity and inclusion which underpins all that we do
  • Will live our behaviours and values

Our teams:

  • Mandatory training will be completed, and opportunities for development will be available
    Manager induction on joining or being promoted to ensure effective people management
  • A range of opportunities for management and leadership development
  • Access to relevant guidance and support on policies and procedures
  • Promote health and wellbeing

Together we will:

  • Provide quality services for the residents of Coventry
  • Have a ‘One Coventry’ ethos
  • Be a ‘good’ employer
    Be open and transparent
  • Support each other to be healthy and well
  • Actively work in partnership
    Be engaged and inclusive
  • Live and behave in line with our organisational values

Commitments - Employee wellbeing

Our aim is to introduce
Area Outcome – what will this achieve? Who will help us to achieve this?     How will we measure our success? Timescale
Employees with access to a range of information and financial services to support financial wellbeing
  • Improved financial wellbeing
  • Potential access to pay throughout the month
  • Improve engagement, retention, and recruitment
 Payroll and Employee Benefits teams
  • Analytics showing employee take-up
  • Workforce absence data
  • Customer feedback
 July 2023
A maternity support toolkit and advice centre
  • Better and greater support to those taking maternity leave
  • Retention
  • Employee Relations Team
  • Reward & Benefit Lead
  • Increased retention
  • Customer feedback
 May 2024
A Wellbeing Kiosk
  • Earlier signposting and access to health services
  • Improved understanding of health drivers and strategies for better outcomes
  • Improved attendance

Occupational Health, Safety& Wellbeing Service
  • Clinical evaluation
  • Service evaluation
  • Customer feedback
 July 2023
A new incident reporting system
  • Improved reporting and investigation of accidents and incidents
  • Accessibility and reporting improvements
  • Improved D&I data in connection with accidents and incidents at work
 HR Digital Team
  • Occupational Health, Safety& Wellbeing Service
  • Improvement in incident recording, including near misses.
  • Reduction time spent on administering the current system
 March 2024

An enhanced Mental Health Support Programme

  • The development of mental health support clinics
  • Benefits of Buoyancy (BOB)Training
  • Domestic violence workshops
  • Engagement with health partners
  •  Addiction support
  • Earlier signposting and access to services
  • Improved understanding of self and others mental wellbeing
  • Strategies for better outcomes
  • Improved attendance
 Occupational Health, Safety & Wellbeing Service
  • Service evaluation
  • Customer feedback
 December 2024

Our aim is to grow
Area Outcome – what will this achieve? Who will help us to achieve this?    How will we measure success? Timescale
Sickness absence monitoring and review of processes
  • Improved attendance
  • To utilise the data available to support the Enabling Attendance Policy and target areas of concern
  • Digital HR
  • Employee Relations Team
  • Workforce absence data
  • Improved attendance
  • Customer feedback
 June 2023

Delivery of Wellbeing Activities Programme including but not limited to:

  • Wellbeing Wednesday health screening clinics
  • Wellbeing events in line with Public Health and NHS agenda.
  • Supporting wellbeing weeks in 'hotspot' areas
  • Mental Wellbeing Support Clinic
  • ‘U OK’ - wellbeing conversations training
  • Earlier signposting and access to health services
  • Improved understanding of health drivers and strategies for better outcomes
  • Improved attendance
 Occupational Health, Safety & Wellbeing Service
  • Clinical evaluation
  • Service evaluation
  • Customer feedback
 Review July 2023

Our aim is to sustain
Area Outcome – what will this achieve? Who will help us to achieve this?    How will we measure success? Timescale
Health and Safety Audit Inspection and Monitoring Programme
  • The Council and school compliance with health and safety legislation
  • Increased knowledge
  • Effective management of risk
  • Occupational Health, Safety & Wellbeing Service
  • All managers / headteachers

 
  • Local reports and Health & Safety Action Plans
  • Quarterly formal health and safety consultation meetings
 Annual
Monitoring and updating health and safety policies and procedures to reflect changes in legislation
  • The Council and school compliance with health and safety legislation and best practice compliance
  • Occupational Health, Safety & Wellbeing Service
  • Joint Safety Forum
  • Trade Union Colleagues

Effective policies

Quarterly formal health and
safety consultation meetings

 Annual

Wellbeing Champions and Mental Health Responders

  • Increasing the number of volunteers, provide training and support
  • Improved understanding of self and others mental wellbeing
  • Strategies for better outcomes
  • Improved attendance
  • Greater access to support services and increased knowledge
  • Occupational Health, Safety & Wellbeing Service
  • Employees
  • Volunteers
  • Service evaluation
  • Customer feedback
 Over 12 months

Musculoskeletal (MSK) Programme

  • Delivery of the MSK Fast Care and Podiatry clinics
  • The MSK intervention service and ergonomic assessment
  • Earlier interventions to prevent chronic MSK ill health
  • Signposting and access to health services
  • Improved understanding of sell care and strategies for better outcomes
  • Improved attendance
 Occupational Health, Safety & Wellbeing Service
  • Workforce absence data
  • Clinical evaluation
  • Service evaluation
  • Customer feedback
 Review June
2023
Thrive Award status - achieving silver and gold status
  • Public demonstration at the level of wellbeing provided
  • Continue to develop and sustain our wellbeing offer
  • Occupational Health, Safety & Wellbeing Service
  • Employee Relations Team
  • HR Digital Team
  • Secure Silver
  • Secure Gold
  • 2024
  • 2025

 

Commitments - Diversity and inclusion (D&I)

Our aim is to grow
Area Outcome – what will this achieve? Who will help us to achieve this? How will we measure our success? Timescale
Continued delivery of the Workforce Diversity & Inclusion Strategy

Create and maintain a more open,diverse, and inclusive organisation where all employees are welcomed and respected
  • D&I Team
  • All Managers/Leaders
  • Employees
  • Trade Union Colleagues
  • Employee Networks
  • HR Digital Team
  • Employee feedback
  • Employee Network feedback and membership
  • Enhanced Employee Engagement
  • Attendance and contribution at D&I Events
  • One Coventry Leadership Team (OCLT) D&I Objectives
 Conclude 2025
Adoption of the Race Equality Code (REC) The Race Equality Code will provide us with a comprehensive framework to improve racial inequality across the organisation
  • D&I Team
  • Leaders and Managers
  • Trade Union Colleagues
  • Employee Network
 We will see a noticeable improvement across the 4 key principles of the Code; Reporting, Action, Composition and Education. Conclude 2024
The number of corporate apprentice new starters Meeting current and future skills gaps and helping to grow our own in areas that are hard to recruit to.
  • Apprenticeship Team
  • Resourcing Team
 A minimum of 30 new corporate apprentice starts per calendar year Ongoing (reviewed yearly)
Embedding ‘Diversity & Inclusion’ best practice across the Council to ensure consistency in the following areas of resourcing, attraction, selection, and onboarding A recruitment and selection process that demonstrates our commitment to diversity and inclusion attracting the best talent from a range of diverse backgrounds.
  • People & Culture Team
  • Communications Team
  • All Managers/Employees
  • Trade Union Colleagues
  • Employee Networks
  • HR Digital Team
 A year on year percentage increase in the number of applicants (both internal and external) with protected characteristics so that our employees are more representative of our local communities. September 2023
An outstanding compliance service by ensuring that the Council’s
pre-employment checks and ongoing employment requirements are non-discriminatory and in line with current legislation		 To ensure that the Council maintains compliance from onboarding and
throughout the employee lifecycle.
  • Resourcing & Compliance Team
  • Managers/Employees
  • Manager and employee feedback
  • Internal Audit
  • Dip Sampling
 October 2023
Secure ‘Gold’ Employers Network for Diversity and Inclusion Demonstration that diversity and
inclusion in the council has reached the
sustain level
  • People & Culture Team
  • Communications Team
  • All Managers/Employees
  • Trade Union Colleagues
  • Employee Networks
  • HR Digital Team
  • TIDE assessment
 June 2025

Our aim is to sustain
Area Outcome – what will this achieve? Who will help us to achieve this? How will we measure our success? Timescale
Delivery of Positive Action Talent Development programmes to employees identified as being under-represented across the organisation
  • Enhanced employer brand
  • Improved retention
  • Increased engagement
  • Greater representation of these groups within management/leadership position
  • Employee Engagement & Talent Team
  • D&I Team
  • All Managers & Employees
  • Trade Union Colleagues
  • Employee Networks
  • HR Digital Team
  • D&I workforce data
  • Feedback from employees and managers
  • Appraisal submissions
 Ongoing / over 12 months
Gender Pay Gap Reporting

To ensure compliance with Gender Pay Gap reporting as part of our Equality Duty.
  • Management Information Team
  • Payroll Team
  • Employee Relations Lead

Reduction of the gender pay gap issues

 Annually
Monitoring of casework and D&I reporting To identify areas of concern on a continued basis to identify patterns, trends, or concerns
  • Management Information Team
  • Trade Union Colleagues
  • Employee Relations Team
 Address any equality issues from any formal casework Ongoing / over 12 months

Commitment - Employee experience

 

Our aim is to introduce
Area Outcome – what will this achieve? Who will help us to achieve this? How will we measure our success? Timescale
A HR Internal Service Level Agreement which will detail the types of service and the standard to be expected. It will also provide a signpost to the relevant team/ people. Enable the right services to be contacted, be clear on what they do and what can be expected.
  • HR Service
  • Commercialisation Working Group

Monitoring that both Managers and HR teams are meeting the standards set out in the SLA.

 April 2023

Reviewing existing external customers and opportunities for expansion.

Review financial charging model used with external customers.
  • Develop marketing strategy
  • Ensure external customer contracts are commercially viable
  • Increased opportunities for generating income
  • HR Services brand and identity is consistent and known
  • SLA and Commercial Working Group
  • Finance Team
  • Commercialisation Manager
  • Branding is recognised locally with customers and potential customers
  • Full cost recovery tool increased income
 April 2024

A new Employee Recognition scheme:

  • Level 1 - Everyday recognition(Cheers from Peers)
  • Level 2 - Above & beyond recognition (Spire Awards)
  • Level 3 - Best of the best recognition (Spire Awards)
 A fair and consistent approach to how we recognise our employees
  • Employee Engagement & Talent Team
  • Reward & Benefit Lead
  • Managers/Employees
  • One Coventry Leadership Team (OCLT)
  • HR Digital Team
  • Employee stories shared through our One Coventry Newsletter
  • Team recognition events
  • Nominations for Spire Awards
  • Data Analysis
  • Feedback from managers and employees
 From May 2023

Our aim is to grow
Area Outcome – what will this achieve? Who will help us to achieve this? How will we measure our success? Timescale
Our ongoing HR support to Children’s Services to maintain our Ofsted ‘Good’ whilst we progress our rating ‘Outstanding'. A children’s workforce where employees feel supported and where retention is
high.
  • Human Resource Business Partners(HRBPs)
  • Resourcing Team
  • People & Culture Team
 Improved outcomes from the annual Health Check and improved retention of Social Workers and other employees across Children’s Services. Ongoing
A coaching culture within the organisation
  • More effective working relationships, leading to higher customer satisfaction
  • Improved levels of engagement and retention
  • Increased employee perceptions of trust and psychological safety
  • Employee Engagement & Talent Team
  • Employee Relations Team
  • All Managers/Employees
  • Trade Union Colleagues
  • Employee Networks
  • Increased take-up of our coaching offer, including:
    • Coaching Culture online platform
    • West Midlands Coaching and Mentoring Pool (WMCMP)
    • L5 Coaching apprenticeship
  • Appraisal submissions
  • Engagement survey feedback
 Ongoing / over 12 months
Attracting top talent through the targeted use of talent attraction strategies
  • Enhanced employer brand
  • Improved access to high calibre talent
  • A more diverse workforce, which accurately reflects the communities we serve.
  • Employee Engagement & Talent Team
  • Resourcing Team
  • Employee Benefits Team
  • Communications Team
  • Leaders/Senior Managers
  • Recruitment data for job roles
  • Feedback from candidates and hiring managers
  • Public perceptions of the organisation e.g. social media
  • Engagement survey feedback
 Ongoing / over 12 months
Develop, promote, and embed a new digital learning and development offer for the Council, which is accessible to all employee’s learning needs
  • Wider selection of employee benefits available that improve retention, attraction and recruitment.
  • Provide competitive deals for products and services in the schemes
  • Promote greener options
  • Legal & Procurement Services
  • Suppliers of Employee Benefit Schemes
  • Payroll & Employee Benefits Teams
  • HR Digital Team
  • Data showing take-up of schemes
  • Employee feedback
  • Increased take-up of schemes
  • Supportive to Council’s green agenda
 July 2023
Improve and widen the employee benefit offering
  • Wider selection of employee benefits available that improve retention, attraction and recruitment.
  • Provide competitive deals for products and services in the schemes
  • Promote greener options
  • Legal & Procurement Services
  • Suppliers of Employee Benefit Schemes
  • Payroll & Employee Benefits Teams
  • HR Digital Team
  • Data showing take-up of schemes
  • Employee feedback
  • Increased take-up of schemes
  • Supportive to Council’s green agenda
 July 2023
Our set of user-friendly policies and procedures that are accessible to all Clear, transparent, employment processes, increase psychological contract
  • Trade Union Colleagues
  • Managers/Employees
 All policies and procedures In line with the review timetable
Developing the Council’s approach and understanding of a supportive workplace culture
  • A considered way of managing issues relating to performance and conduct.
  • A culture of trust between employees, managers, and trade unions
  • One Coventry Leadership Team (OCLT)
  • People & Culture Team
  • Employee Relations Team
  • A reduction in disciplinary cases
  • A reduction in suspensions and measured outcomes
  • Managers using alternative methods not formal processes all of the time
 July 2023
Develop and introduce effective workforce planning
  • Forecast supply and demand, assess gaps in workforce
  • Determine and target talent
  • Create interventions to support the organisation with right people in the right place at the right time
  • Workforce Planning & Apprenticeship Lead
  • Employee Relations Lead
  • Employee Engagement & Talent Lead
  • A plan which reflects the ongoing need
  • Successful implementation
  • Toolkit for managers
 March 2024
Our partnership working with the NHS Coventry and Warwickshire Integrated Care Board (ICB) to improve services and outcomes for residents and employees in line with the One Coventry Plan and ICB People Strategy Create interventions to support the organisation with right people in the
right place at the right time
  • Workforce Planning & Apprenticeship Lead
  • Employee Relations Lead
  • Employee Engagement & Talent Lead
 Delivery of joint project work March 2025

Our aim is to sustain
Area Outcome – what will this achieve? Who will help us to achieve this? How will we measure our success? Timescale
The Council's Employee Engagement Plan which provides a mechanism for a strong employee voice, which celebrates and embeds our One Coventry Values Embedding of the One Coventry Values,
cultural change which will support the
delivery of the One Coventry Plan
  • Employee Engagement & Talent Team
  • People & Culture Team
 Employee engagement survey feedback Ongoing
Our organisational compliance in Statutory and Mandatory training across the Council To have a workforce that has the right
skills to meet legislative requirements
and challenges of the organisation
  • Corporate Learning & Development Team
  • HR Digital Team
 Achieve 85% compliance Annually
Creating a culture of open and honest communication, to enable a strong employee voice to encourage and drive two-way communication Enhanced communication tools such as the Staff App, monthly employee newsletter, new starter surveys, leaver surveys and employee engagement survey
  • Employee Engagement & Talent Team
  • Communications Team
  • Employee Networks
  • Trade Union colleagues
  • Improved employee survey feedback for leavers, new starters
  • Positive employee engagement survey feedback
 January 2024

Commitment - Agile and flexible workforce

Our aim is to introduce
Area Outcome – what will this achieve? Who will help us to achieve this? How will we measure our success? Timescale
Job families which will group jobs with common features, with each job family containing a number of levels, each reflecting different job outputs, skills, knowledge, and experience Provide greater clarity of career and the pay structure
  • Trade Union Colleagues
  • Managers/Employees
 All roles being identified and
confirmed within a job family.		 April 2024

Our aim is to sustain
Area Outcome – what will this achieve? Who will help us to achieve this? How will we measure our success? Timescale
Agile and flexible working To continue to build on being an agile
and flexible workforce. Working in an
agile way will become the “norm".
  • Managers
  • Communications Team
  • Trade Union Colleagues
 Continued review of our policy / procedure and toolkit – feedback and benchmarking Ongoing

Commitment - Digital HR

Our aim is to introduce
Area Outcome – what will this achieve? Who will help us to achieve this? How will we measure our success? Timescale
An improved appraisal and talent management system
  • A better and integrated method to undertake appraisal and introduce talent management
  • Ability to review the D&I aspects
  • People & Culture Team
  • HR Digital Team
 Improvements made to the
system		 March 2025
An streamlined leavers process for employees and managers
  • Clear and efficient processes for employees and managers
  • Greater consistency across the organisation
  • Reduction in overpayments
  • People and Culture Team
  • Payroll Team
  • Resourcing Team
  • HR Business Partners (HRBPs)
  • ICT and Digital Team
  • HR Digital Team
  • Improved leaver survey feedback
  • Reduction in overpayments
 July 2023
The quality standard ISO 9001 with our payroll service for its processes and procedures Become more efficient, continuously improve and leading to increased customer satisfaction
  • Payroll Team
  • External Accreditation company
 Working to the standards March 2024

Our aim is to grow
Area Outcome – what will this achieve? Who will help us to achieve this? How will we measure our success? Timescale

The new operational tool for all aspects of workforce reporting including diversity into the organisation

Developing HR Data Warehouse to include workforce analytics for Senior Managers and Business Alerts for specific tasks
  • Provide data to enable evidenced based decisions and informed actions.
  • Support strategic decisions in relation to current and future workforce.
  • Enable managers to be alerted to complete specific tasks in relation to their employees.
  • HR Digital Team
  • ICT
  • HR Team Members
  • Service Users / Representatives
 Feedback from users June 2023
The revised e-learning platform for employees and managers The revised e-learning platform for employees and managers Corporate Learning & Development Team Training survey feedback July 2023
Improving and where possible digitalising other HR processes, including but not limited to the probation process Easier streamlined processes that link policy, payroll, and manager responsibilities
  • Trade Union Colleagues
  • Transformation Team / ICT & Digital Team(s)
  • HR Digital Team
  • Implementing and embedding new ways of working
  • Reduction of paper-based activities
 January 2024

Our aim is to sustain
Area Outcome – what will this achieve? Who will help us to achieve this? How will we measure our success? Timescale
Digitisation of the payroll operation through use of technology to enable improved digital processes and procedures
  • Reduce the time taken to administer
    payroll operations for both user and
    payroll
  • Streamline processes
  • HR system supplier
  • HR Digital Team
  • Payroll Team
  • ICT & Digital Team(s)
  • Increase in time efficiency
  • Reduction in errors and manual processes
 March 2024

Key achievements from People Plan 2020-22

We managed to deliver the following, as well as activity supporting the COVID-19 response:

  • Designed and launched our organisational values, co-produced with employees
  • Improved health and wellbeing of employees, including Musculoskeletal (MSK) interventions, podiatry clinic, healthy lifestyle screening and mental health support
  • New - Flexible and Agile Working Toolkit
  • Induction for all New Starters, Managers as well as a Digital Induction
  • Employee recognition in ‘Cheers for Peers’
  • Relaunched and engaged Employee Networks
  • Develop payroll processes including single sign-on
  • Employee health and wellbeing surveys with over 25% employee response
  • Revised management development offer
  • Introduction of the staff app and employee newsletter
  • New Absence Management Policy and related training
  • Introduced the new recruitment system (Tribepad) including anonymised recruitment
  • Launch of Workforce Diversity and Inclusion Strategy
  • Talent development Initiatives including positive action programmes
  • New data reporting tools and HR Data Warehouse
  • Expansion of the employee benefit package
  • Improved and increased health and wellbeing – Thrive bronze award
  • Increased apprenticeship numbers

Our data

In 2022 we had:

  • 663 new starters
  • 783 leavers

Of those who were employed by the Council three years ago:

  • 541 have been promoted or had an increase in their salary grade.
  • 30.13% were male
  • 69.87% were female
  • Gender gap is -2.46%
  • 15.53% defined their ethnicity as being from a minority ethnic background and 5.91% of people had declared their disability to us.

An increased turnover rate of 13.51% compared to 8% in 2020/21. During COVID-19 we had an increase in the number of employees who were on short term or fixed term contracts.

11.26 years is the average length of service (as of 1 January 2023)

Key performance indicators

Metrics

  • Coventry pop. (2021 census): 343,200
  • Working age pop. (mid 2020 estimate): 224,600
  • % of working age population working for Coventry City Council:  2.11%

Metric comparisons
Metrics Coventry City Council English authorities
Sickness absence 13 days per FTE 8.8 dates per FTE
Turnover rate 13.51% 13.40%
Vacancy rate 19.36% 8.00%

Metric targets and trends
Metrics Target Actual Met/Not met Trend
Mandatory training
completions		 85% 81% Not met Upwards
Apprentices in
substantive roles		 2.3% 3.4% Exceeded Upwards
Completion of leadership training 85% 95% Exceeded Upwards
Appraisals completed 90% 96% Exceeded Upwards
Sickness absence reduction Under 10 days 13 Not met Upwards
Reduce stress, anxiety and depression By 5% 33% Not met Downwards

In 2022, what did our HR teams do?

People and Business

Approximately 16,000 paid per annum by Payroll Services.

Employee Relations

Casework (disciplinaries or grievance)

  • 14 disciplinary cases in 2022
  • 10 grievance cases in 2022.

Occupational Health, Safety and Wellbeing

  • 2,019 Occupational Health assessments completed
  • 2,248 Occupational Health referral appointments
  • 146 wellbeing events held in 2022
  • Incidents and near misses reviewed, including LEA schools:
    • 245 accidents
    • 602 incidents
    • 32 near misses

People and Culture

Recruitment

  • 1,284 jobs advertised.
  • 15,441 completed applications in 2022.

Apprenticeships

  • 166 apprentices started
  • 282 apprentices in post as at 31 December 2022

Inductions

  • 366 completed a virtual corporate induction
  • 245 completed a virtual digital induction
  • 55 completed a Manager's induction.

Diversity and inclusion data

View our workforce profiles [https://www.coventry.gov.uk/diversity-inclusion/workforce-profiles]

Comparison with census data

Gender
Gender Council workforce (%) Census 2021 (%)
Male 31% 49.9%
Female 69% 50.1%

Disability status
Disability status Council workforce (%) Census 2021 (%) Census 2011 (%)
Prefer not to say 2% 0% 0%
Unknown 12% 0 0
Not disabled 79% 81.6% 78.8%
Disabled 7% 18.4% 21.2%

Religion
Religion Council workforce (%) Census 2021 (%) Census 2011 (%)
Other 2.38% 0.6% 0.5%
Not stated 4.59% 6.1% 6.4%
Unknown 24.67% 0% 0%
Sikh 4.04% 5% 5%
Muslim 3.2% 10.4% 7.5%
Jewish 0.1% 0.1% 0.1%
Hindu 1.96% 4% 3.5%
Buddhist 0.23% 0.4% 0.3%
Christianity 34% 43.9% 53.7%
No religion 25% 29.6% 23%

Ethnic groups
Ethnic groups Council workforce (%) Census 2021 (%) Census 2011 (%)
Other ethnic groups 0/92 3.7 1.7
Prefer not to say 0.63 0 0
Unknown 9.58 0 0
White 69.6 65.5 73.8
Mixed or multiple ethnic group 3.2 3.4 2.6
Black, Black British, Black Welsh, Caribbean or African 5.62 8.9 5.6
Asian, Asian British or Asian Welsh 10.69 18.5 16.3

Age
Age Council workforce (%) Census 2021 (%)
65+ 4.93 7.5
55-64 27.87 10.4
45-64 26.27 12.1
35-44 21.03 13.3
25-34 16.29 14.5
16-24 3.62 15.3

Sexual orientation
Sexual orientation Council workforce (%) Census 2021 (%)
Other

0.29

 0.47
Prefer not to say 5 0
Unknown 27 8.85
Bisexual 1 1.4
Lesbian / gay 2 1.21
Straight 64 87.99
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