1. What’s the cost, and how does it compare to hiring in-house?

Our Fractional HR Department costs £5,000 per month or £60,000 per year. This is less than the total cost of hiring an experienced HR manager, which can exceed £70,000 when you factor in salary, benefits, and recruitment fees. You can calculate those costs for yourself using our calculator on our Fractional HR Department page.

Even if you find a candidate who is the perfect fit, HR is a broad subject and for a typical budgets its unlikely you will find someone with all of the skills you need to implement your HR processes, run them and tackle HR project work. With us, you get a team of HR professionals covering a wide range of expertise—not just one person—ensuring your HR needs are handled comprehensively and efficiently and for 52 weeks of the year.

2. What does a Fractional HR Department offer that an in-house HR person cannot?

Unlike a single in-house hire, our service gives you access to a full HR team, including HR Directors, People Partners, and administrators. This means you benefit from a broader range of expertise and support.

Not only that we have managed these programmes for many business over the last 10 years, so once we have agreed the project plan, you will quickly see results.

Typically when you hire in house, your new recruit will have a notice period and an induction process to get through. In our experience they also quickly get caught up in managing day-to-day HR issues so projects like building your HR systems and processes get put on the back burner. We structure our team so you have someone managing your day to day HR needs, while other members of our team work on establishing your streamlined systems behind the scenes. This means we can quickly save you and your managers time.

3. How much involvement will I or my team need?

We’ll need your input during the initial onboarding phase to understand your business and priorities, and for some processes we will need to build in some internal sign offs.  But, once these are all approved we will handle the heavy lifting.  That means your involvement in the delivery of your ongoing HR operations and admin will be minimal.  

We do ask that you commit to monthly check-ins to ensure alignment and monitor progress. This helps you to stay informed without being bogged down with details.  We will also keep you informed of employee issues that are important to the business, again the approach to this will be agreed in our onboarding discussions.

4. How do I know your approach will work for my business?

We’ve worked with hundreds of small businesses across various industries, tailoring our approach to meet their unique needs. From high-growth startups to established SMEs, we’ve implemented solutions that save time, improve compliance, and enhance team performance. It isn’t a one size fits all solution so if your business has specific challenges—like high turnover or recruitment issues—we’ll prioritise those areas for maximum impact.

Its also because we have this experience, we know when we aren’t the best fit. if during our initial conversation it becomes clear that we are not the right for your business, we will always try to point you in the direction of an alternative.

5. What guarantees do you offer?

We’re confident in our ability to deliver results. So, if our service isn’t delivering our agreed scope of work within the first three months, we’ll increase resources at no extra cost to ensure we meet your expectations. This is of course on the basis that you have held up your end of our agreement, by signing off key decisions and processes when they are needed.

6. How do you handle sensitive HR issues?

Our team has extensive experience managing complex employment issues, from disputes and terminations to restructures. We take a pragmatic and empathetic approach, ensuring legal compliance and fair treatment for everyone involved - all while working towards the goals of the business. We know its important that these issues are handled consistently so we will also provide your managers with training to handle these situations confidently too.

7. What happens after the 12-month program ends?

At the end of the program, you have three options:

1. Train and Transition: We’ll train someone internally to take over.

2. Recruit your In-House: We can help you hire an in-house HR professional to take over from us in managing your HR function.

3. Extend Our Support: If you’re not ready to transition to your own in house solution, you can continue with our service for as long as needed.

We will usually agree this goal with you at the beginning of the 12 months, so that we can work towards it.  But if things change during the course of our work with you then we will do our best to accommodate it within the 12 months.

8. How will you measure success and impact?

We track key HR metrics to demonstrate the impact of our work, such as:

• Time saved on HR admin.

• Reduction in employee turnover.

• Improved compliance and audit readiness.

• Employee engagement scores.

We will agree the metrics that are most important to you at the beginning of your contract with us and provide you with a monthly report once we have completed your HR system implementation

9. Can I see examples of businesses like mine that you’ve helped?

Absolutely!  You can find our case studies and testimonials on our website.  We’d also be happy to share more success stories and testimonials on request.

10. What HR systems and tools do you implement?

We select and configure HR systems tailored to your business needs and goals for the 12 month programme. At a minimum, we set up systems for employee record-keeping and self-service holiday approvals as this is one of the ways we reduce the time that’s spent on HR admin. As we formalise your other processes, we integrate the available automation to streamline workflows for onboarding, payroll, and performance management. We do have preferred systems we work with so if you are already using something you would like us to adopt, then we will discuss that over a virtual coffee.

11. I prefer to develop skills within the business, rather than using external support.  So, is this the right solution for that approach?

Absolutely. If you have a team member with potential and interest in transitioning to an HR role, our program can help develop them into a skilled HR professional. We provide comprehensive training, mentorship, and the necessary tools to ensure they are equipped to manage your HR function confidently by the end of the program. This approach allows you to access our experience and knowledge in setting up HR processes and promote from within to ensuring a seamless handover of at the end of 12 months.

12. Will your service reduce accountability or leadership skills in my business?

We actually believe that when it’s done correctly this type of outsourcing can empower your team. While we are responsible for the HR work in your business, your managers remain fully accountable for using those processes to manage and develop your teams.  Through manager training, 1:1 coaching, and the implementation of scalable processes, we build leadership skills and ensure accountability remains within your team. Our goal is to leave you self-sustaining and with leaders who feel confident managing people independently when the program ends.

13. What happens if at the end of the 12 months the HR department isn’t ready to be handed over?

We are confident that 12 months is enough time to set up your processes and systems.  However, we understand that every business progresses at its own pace, and some may feel they need additional time to fully embed processes and prepare for a seamless handover.

We’ll work with you to evaluate those needs and provide the extra time, training, or resources needed to ensure the transition is successful.  If this means an extension to the scope of work or more time beyond the 12 months is needed, then this will be subject to additional fees (all of which will be agreed with you in advance).