Lucy Black

Personal Profile

Experienced HR generalist with a commercially aware approach, focused on supporting the business through people solutions which provide tangible results and a return on investment. Has delivered complex organisational design and contractual changes, along with talent management, succession planning, employee engagement, and performance management. Has worked within different operating contexts, including retail distribution and location independent models.

HR Business Partner Costa Coffee May 2016 – present

Regional role within the UK Equity Retail business, partnering with the Regional Director and supporting a team of Area Managers, driving change management and implementing people strategies to support and drive business performance and results.

Took a leading role within the North Retail management team during a difficult time in the absence of a Regional Director, ensuring that stability, performance momentum, and a focus on our people was maintained.

Established a strong and focussed approach to the development of our Store Manager population. Created a ‘skills development matrix’ – a Regional analysis of the skills required of our Store Managers, and have implemented the resulting development interventions, taking a project- management approach to this. This work was then used as the foundation of a National L&D project on Store Manager skills and development.

Created and implemented an Early in Career strategy, working with schools and other training providers on an innovative approach to Work Experience, offering extended work experience placements to school students, and the positive outcome of genuine employment opportunities, whilst also securing a pipeline of young talent for Costa.

Drove Apprenticeship strategy, securing c100 Apprentices during 2016 for the Scottish Area of North Region alone - a greater number than the rest of the UK combined.

Established partnerships with training for work organisations Remploy and Tennent’s Training Academy to deliver a ‘Costa Ready’ Barista training course, establishing the dual outcome of a route into work for adults with barriers to employment, and a pipeline of recruits for Costa stores.

Implemented a focus on effective performance management, working to establish a performance management culture.

Re-designed and established a cohesive approach to succession planning. Designed, delivered, and trained others on delivery of a Recruitment training course – to

upskill our Store Manager population on recruitment skills. This formed part of a bigger piece of work on managing turnover.

Established a rigorous process around management of high-risk ER cases. Also secured, (and partly designed) an Employment Policy course for Area Managers, the starting point for improving standards in this subject.

Project work included a review of the Area Manager role, to understand the key factors influencing behaviour and performance, as well as limitations and barriers. This resulted in recommended changes, which informed a piece of work on the re-structuring of the Retail Equity business. Managed the resulting ‘at risk’ process within North Region.

HR Business Partner AXA UK Jan 2013 – May 2016

Partner with the Managing Directors for two business areas within AXA Insurance, supporting their strategic business agendas through people strategy and delivery of key initiatives.

Drove a major focus on cultural change, and leadership and management capability within the Personal Lines Intermediary business area. Success was evidenced by an improvement in all areas measured in our 2015 Employee Engagement survey. The overall score improved 10 points to 92, the highest score in the OpCo. The development score increased by a massive 24 points, and the leadership score rose 17 points, providing tangible evidence of the success of our people activities.

Drove an increase in employee uptake of professional qualifications, supporting a key strategic focus for the AXA Business Insurance business area. The volume of employees achieving professional qualifications increased year on year from 22% at March 2013 to 44% as at Dec 2015.

Drove professionalism levels in our Field Sales team to the point where 97% of employees were qualified or studying for a professional sales qualification. The strategic relevance was that this team was the most under scrutiny from the FCA, and most likely to be impacted should a RDR legislation be brought into force within the Insurance industry.

Established a comprehensive Early in Career programme within PLI, which included designing an Apprenticeship Scheme, and implementing a Schools and Community Liaison programme. Also implemented an Apprenticeship scheme within AXA BI. For both business areas, this built the foundations for their overall strategy around recruitment pipelining and career development.

Designed and project managed the creation of an online learning platform to provide a bespoke development pathway for each role within the AXA BI business area. The score for development on our engagement survey increased by 8 points in 2015.

Delivered several high profile and complex pieces of organisational design e.g. a major restructure of PLI under the direction of a new MD, and in AXA BI, the exit of an entire business unit.

Significantly improved communication and engagement within the employee population of AXA BI. Measured feedback from employee communication sessions from Feb to Oct 2013 was remarkable – when asked if the session was ‘enjoyable’, the ‘strongly agree’ indicator increased from 21% to 82%, ‘effective in communicating key messages’ increased from 28% to 62%, and ‘engaging’ improved from 23% to 84%. In addition, the employee engagement score increased from 77 to 84, which was the highest score within the OpCo, and the most significant change for a number of years. This made clear the positive impact of effective and engaging communication, and we created a Internal Communications function to permanently support this within the business.

Key strategic projects for AXA BI included a grade change for the majority of the contact centre employees, a change to operating hours, a sales commission review, and an exit of a Corporate Partner contract.

Key projects for PLI included a review and re-design of their induction programme and the creation of a talent programme for their contact centre employees.

Experienced in union engagement - all of the major strategic pieces have involved working on proposals with the business leaders, presenting them to the Union, and negotiating on key points.

Chosen to be a trained Coach for the senior leaders’ leadership programme, providing feedback on diagnostic questionnaires, and follow up coaching.

Many of the pieces of work I delivered were showcased to the wider HR team as a model of what HR can deliver and where we can add value. Examples include my approach to creating annual strategic people plans for my business areas, and my very successful approach towards the management of consecutive underperformers.

Feedback from the Managing Directors of both business areas is that I am a strong driver for delivering change, that I challenge robustly and appropriately, and that I am regarded as very commercially minded.

HR Business Partner Santander Feb 2010 – Jan 2013

Regional role within the Retail Distribution network, working in partnership with the Divisional Director and Regional Managers, within a strategic HR consultancy framework.

Drove an uplift in business results by implementing Results Orientation training for underperforming Branch Managers. Analysis of metrics over a 3 month period showed increased performance in most targeted areas e.g. savings and investments, sales performance and customer service scores.

Improved succession planning by designing and implementing an Aspiring Branch Manager development programme for North Division. Due to its success, this approach was then rolled out Nationally. Continued this development strategy with the design of an Aspiring Leaders programme, which instigated a Talent & Development work-stream to develop and implement a full suite of National development programmes.

Reduced early leaver turnover and increased employee engagement by designing and embedding New Joiner Forums. This approach was also subsequently rolled out Nationally.

Drove significant improvements in key HR metrics such as absence, turnover, and engagement, as well as taking a high level overview of HR cases such as grievances and disciplinary cases, and driving appropriate action. Reduced initial long term sick caseload from 40 to 8, and maintained this at lower numbers due to tighter governance, education and support of managers, and more immediate supportive action for employees. All key HR metrics trended downwards during 2011 and reached their lowest for at least 18 months.

Applied strict governance to FTE management, ensuring budgets were adhered to at branch level as well as Regionally and Divisionally. Constantly drove and supported Regional Managers towards achieving budget. Created regional resource plans which demonstrated absence cost in terms of opportunity cost of lost business, as well as actual cost, demonstrating the impact to the business bottom line.

Reduced reliance on external recruitment and increased the focus on internal promotions by implementing a central tool to track and link all development work, and using it to identify and increase visibility of internal successors across the network.

Delivered several large and complex organisational changes including the integration of Alliance & Leicester branches into the Santander network, and the subsequent branch closure programme. Within what were perceived to be difficult geographical locations with limited alternative opportunities, we minimised redundancies and successfully redeployed approx 60 employees.

Increased employee engagement survey scores from 77% at year-end 2011 to 82% at mid-year 2012, beating the target of a 3% increase. Had driven a programme of employee engagement activity throughout this period.

BAU work included design and delivery of HR workshops e.g. Performance Management, and Recruit to Retain, supporting Regional Managers with bespoke Regional development initiatives, and participation on National workstreams, on topics such as succession planning, performance management, and talent & development.

HR Advisor (contract) Barclays Partner Finance Oct 09 – Feb 2010

Reviewed and improved the recruitment process, alongside recruitment delivery. This was a contract role after being made redundant.

HR Business Partner AXA UK June 08 – Sep 09

Partnered the MD for AXA Business Insurance, supporting the strategic people agenda. During a period of significant cultural transformation, was responsible for delivering organisational design work, and embedding central HR change projects, such as a new performance management rating scale, a new behavioural framework, and a new performance management system.

Resourcing Partner AXA UK Feb 07 – June 08

Managed recruitment across a range of business areas, working in partnership with the business to implement recruitment strategies and campaigns. Delivered national recruitment campaigns throughout the UK for a wide variety of roles.

Recruitment Consultant (contract) T-Mobile May 06 – Dec 06

Managed the on-site third party suppliers at two contact centres, ensuring that volume targets and quality standards were met.

Recruitment Manager first direct May 01 – Apr 06

Managed the recruitment team and ensured the smooth operation of the recruitment function within a large banking contact centre, recruiting 280 - 350 heads per annum.

Recruitment Consultant June 98 – May 01

Recruitment Consultant with several recruitment agencies. Industry sectors included manufacturing, engineering and electronics, IT, and office support and contact centre.

Education

1992 – 1997 Royal Conservatoire of ScotlandPG Dip in PerformanceBA Hons (2:1) in Musical Studies

Additional Qualifications

2015 CIPD level 7 Advanced Award in Human Resources (Employment Law) 2010 Hayes Evaluation trained on job roles within Santander2002 Level 2 registered to use SHL Personality Questionnaires2001 Level 1 registered to use SHL Aptitude Tests and Interest Inventories2001 Qualified as a SHL Test Administrator

Leisure Interests

I have a small portfolio of rental properties in which I maintain an active interest. I also enjoy fitness activities such as hill-walking, cycling and skiing.