Action for Children is a leading UK children’s charity dedicated to helping vulnerable children, young people and their families in the UK. With over 7,000 staff and volunteers who operate over 475 services in the UK.
What I valued about working with WBC was their clear, structured, collaborative approach, ability to flex to internal resource constraints and detailed analysis and insight. It was a tightly-run 12 week project which has provided us with a strong foundation on which to build our implementation plan.
Mike Knight, Chief People Officer, Action for Children
Action for Children have an exciting and ambitious growth strategy. Attracting and retaining talent with the right capabilities and qualifications is key to achieving this. But the sector is facing significant recruitment and engagement challenges in a post pandemic, Brexit environment. Mike Knight, Chief People Officer at Action for Children, engaged Wharton Business Consulting to support an innovative project designed to explore the potential for career development to act as a differentiation for the charity in the marketplace.
To support the charity, WhartonBC designed and delivered:
- Data analysis and sector benchmarking
- Deep dive ‘career anchor’ interviews with target employees
- Interactive ‘Design Jam’ workshops with key stakeholders to co-create content
- Expert insights in latest career trends and thinking
Through this approach we supported the charity to:
- Create charity wide Career Principles to support a refreshed ‘Career Deal’ for their people to better attract and retain talent
- Create Career Personas and Pathways for Residential Services that encourages more creative, inclusive and fluid career growth
- Scope a two-year implementation plan to deliver a refreshed career approach
We asked Mike Knight about his experience of working with WhartonBC:
‘An enjoyable experience, working with very engaging people who sought to understand the needs of our charity and made every effort to help us in the creation of career principles, career personas and pathway materials.’
‘I would recommend Wharton Business Consulting as a partner. WhartonBC had a good understanding of our needs based upon workshops and interviews and re-testing assumptions with stakeholders. The team was also flexible in approach when the number of interviews was below the target and found different ways to draw out key conclusions and recommendations.’