A colleague development programme at Halton Housing has been described as ‘life changing’ by some of the delegates.

Launched last year, Thrive is Halton Housing’s internal development programme designed to help colleagues develop their skills, knowledge and behaviours for their future careers.

Topics covered during the programme include self-awareness and reflection, overcoming impostor syndrome, resilience and understanding personal brand. Delegates also heard from each member of Halton Housing’s Leadership Team about current and future plans for the organisation as well as their own career journeys.

They have also gained an understanding of project management by designing their own business improvement project brief, receiving sign-off from their sponsors and then managing the project from start to finish.

Benefits of some of the projects include the development of a back-up tool which has increased end-user self-sufficiency and reduced the number of calls to our IT Service Desk to zero and standardisation of the customer tenancy sign-up process which has received positive colleague feedback.

The first cohort of 10 colleagues have now completed their time on the programme and three have already progressed into new roles.

Feedback has been overwhelmingly positive with delegates reporting that the programme has changed how they view themselves and increased their confidence in trying new things and going for opportunities that arise. Additionally, they are building their networking skills across the organisation and learning how it operates to better understand the challenges and how decisions are made.

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They are also implementing their new-found knowledge and skills to continue to drive innovation and transformation. Examples include bringing a coaching approach to conversations which is expanding people’s approach to problem solving, looking at things from different perspectives and uncovering ‘blind spots’ to challenge how we do things and drive improvements.

Halton Housing’s Organisational Development Officer, Kathryn Davies said: “The programme has absolutely surpassed what we initially set out for it to do, and we couldn’t be prouder of the delegates and their hard work and dedication to invest in themselves. Each one of them went on their own transformational journey whether their aim was to progress, pivot to a different area/role or just perform in their current one with improved knowledge and skills. We want our colleagues to ‘Thrive’ and programmes like this show the investment Halton Housing makes in our workforce and their careers and skills.”

Liz Owens, Income Assistant in Finance and Thrive delegate, commented on the programme: “Thrive has changed my life. It has been an amazing programme to be part of, I feel very lucky to have experienced it. I am much more self-confident and have a greater understanding of my future.”

Following the success of the first cohort, Halton Housing will be recruiting for the second during the summer, ready to start in September.

Halton Housing was recently awarded the Investors in People Gold Accreditation, an internationally recognised standard for people management reflecting the latest workplace trends, essential skills and effective structures required to be a truly top-performing business.