Nelson Training and Whitefriars staff collect their National Training Award from athlete Colin Jackson. From left to right: Kevin Tillett, Betty Coltrane, Simon Wright, Colin Jackson, Jon Mortimer, Judith Ryder, Viv Nelson, Rachel Hobbs.

Play video of Simon Wright, Head of HR at Whitefriars Housing talking about the training programme

dramatic fall in absence leads to award

3000% return on training investment

Coventry’s largest social housing landlord, Whitefriars Housing Group, was suffering from so much staff absenteeism, it was costing the not-for-profit organisation £1 million a year.

But training, using professional actors, brought about dramatic improvements... and earned Nelson Training and Whitefriars Housing a West Midlands Regional National Training Award in the regional finals held at the National Motorcycle Museum last week.

Simon Wright, head of Human Resources for Whitefriars said: “In 2005, on average each Whitefriars employee had 14 days sick leave, representing 6 per cent of time lost. An assessment of absences showed that the majority were short term.”

Apart from the cost, which was equivalent to installing 500 heating systems or 180 kitchens and bathrooms, appointments were affected, putting a strain on customer services and reducing tenant satisfaction, and the remaining workforce was increasingly frustrated and under pressure.

“We couldn’t allow this scenario to continue, but equally did not wanrt to take draconian measures that would adversely affect employees,” said Simon.
“The breakthrough came in identifying the need to work with managers, to build procedural awareness and confidence and skills in tackling sickness absences consistently.”

Nelson Training of Malvern, which specialises in combining interactive comedy and drama with relevant sketches, produced a drama based training programme to ensure managers could effectively manage a return-to-work interview.

“We chose drama over one-to-one and other methods as we could validate this delivery through feedback,” said Simon. “We knew employees liked and benefited from this approach. Drama created an environment of enquiry and allowed staff to challenge behaviour without having to role-play for themselves.”

Trained actors carried out poorly managed scenarios. After discussion, each scenario was re-acted and delegates encouraged to interact with the actors – challenging how best to complete interviews.

In total, 109 managers took part, and the absence rate is now under 4.3 per cent. The return on investment in the training is more than 3,000 per cent!

Whitefriars’ Director of Organisational Development, Judith Ryder, said: “As a not-for-profit charity – every penny we spend is critical. There is a keen inte4rest on our business bottom line – and attendance is a key area of scrutiny in this context..”

“We are keen to strike a balance between achieving our attendance target and maintaining our positioning as a good and supportive employer. We are delighted to have achieved this.”

Viv Nelson, Managing Director of Nelson Training said, “We are delighted to have achieved our second success in the National Training Awards for such a worthwhile programme. Whitefriars residents have genuinely benefited from the results and it is fantastic that this has been recognised by the gold standard in training awards in the United Kingdom.”

To find out how Nelson Training can improve your attendance management contact Viv Nelson by emailing viv@nelsontraining.co.uk or ring 01684 311287