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Tate Catering has food and beverage outlets in the Tate Galleries; London Tate Modern, Tate Britain, Liverpool, St Ives and Cambridge. They also provide event catering for corporate hospitality clients at all Tate Galleries, and support a variety of clients at other locations.

The CEO had committed to Investors in People and The Senior Management team, however; it was getting the Line Managers/Heads of Department on board.

At department level, people felt they were already doing a good job. They were concerned that getting ready for assessment would create extra work and they did not have time. They did not see how it would help them in their job as a manager, and how it would help develop them, improving productivity, re–evaluate efficiency and quality of service.

Managers and teams were wary as there had been many changes in the business and managing people’s expectations of how Investors in People could actually help became key.

Senior management and HR were concerned about their credibility going forward. Getting buy in from diverse workforce also proved challenging as many staff on the payroll were passing through and saw it as a job to pay the rent, many different languages were spoken and getting people's real buy initially was difficult.

Tate Catering worked with CQL and a Specialist Adviser, obtaining commitment from the whole of the management team. A series of management and staff briefings were held where the potential benefits and challenges were discussed.

A working management and staff focus group with the help of the adviser analysed their strengths and what could be improved, and a comprehensive action plan was drawn up to support this. The action plan was continually reviewed and updated to ensure achievement.

The Training Manager at Tate Catering then also conducted a further staff and management questionnaire, which provided a clear indication of perception of the business and its objectives and employee satisfaction. A training needs analysis was carried out firstly at organisational level, then department level and individual levels. Where Skills for Life needs were identified, an approved LSC Provider was selected by Tate Catering and facilitated by the Specialist Adviser and working with the brokerage unit. Their brief was to help support and deliver language training (ESOL) to staff and some managers. Where basic skills and industry training were required this again was planned and a programme developed to address skills gap. This has been a success and has been rolled out throughout the business.

Learning and Development is strategically planned, and is measured. The business can see the improvements and departments are now working together.

Senior Managers got involved and in partnership with the Training Manager, planned and consulted staff and actioned development points from the first diagnostic assessment.

Communications amongst teams has improved and staff now feel consulted.

Managers understand what is expected of them and can see the financial returns; Management competencies have been formally set by managers in the business themselves.

Since Tate Modern have become recognised and are opting for an annual review to tie in with their Business Planning, Skills for Life is also a rolling programme, and all managers are supporting this.

Claire Mant, Training Manager for Tate Catering, comments "Skills for Life are an intergral part of our learning and development strategy, and are now aligned to what the business needs and staff. It is of course demand led, and we now have a rolling programme. Our training provider has been great and has fitted into our business. We are seeing hugh improvements, not only have communication skills improved, operations are running more smoothly, with less errors and friction at work, and language ability and confidence has improved as a result. We have also had a number of internal promotions where staff who now have improved language skills are able to progress."

Liverpool and Cambridge are also recognised and now the other sites are onboard and working towards achieving this.

“We are delighted to achieve Investors in People; it has brought the team together. It has helped recognise people that are being dynamic, and ties into values, everyone in the business is really proud to achieve best practice.

We are not resting on our laurels and we are not waiting every 3 years to be reassessed. We are continually looking at improving by talking to our staff and developing our management team. Investors in People has given us structure and ensures we are rigorous at evaluation of learning and development. As a result we are much better at aligning Learning and Development objectives to the business needs."