Estelle brought out our brilliance.
David Pattinson, Director and General Manager, G F Tomlinson Ltd
A management strategy which will influence our busines for years to come.
Alvin Waters, Divisional Manager, G F Tomlinson Ltd
Estelle has an infectious way of running her workshops and you cannot help but be motivated and throw yourself fully into the subject matter. I would strongly recommend we use her services again.
Les Needham, Sales and Marketing Manager, G F Tomlinson Ltd
Fantastic enthusiasm and content - makes you think!
David Jones, Contracts Manager, G F Tomlinson Ltd
This was an enjoyable experience and unexpectedly so.
Nick Lane, Contract Manager, G F Tomlinson Ltd
We have experienced a source of team working, which has lifted the aspirations of all who took part.
Graham Cliff, Director, G F Tomlinson Ltd
Estelle joined my Firm in November 2000 and had been specifically recruited to set up and head an HR Department for us. This, as she soon realised, was a daunting task because of our previous lack of HR policies but also the scepticism displayed to her and the whole project by some of the Partner Owners of the Firm. These were difficult times for Estelle and she coped magnificently. She brought to the task her unbounded enthusiasm, preparedness to work hard and her undoubted people skills. From the start I recognised Estelle as ambitious and also keen to improve herself.
She very quickly established appropriate HR systems and policies. Noteworthy successes for her were the major improvements she made to our appraisal systems, recruitment procedures and absence monitoring. At her recommendation we established a Communications Forum for our staff well in advance of the legislation which required us to have such a body. To persuade the Partners to do this, and then bring the Forum into being in the face of considerable scepticism by all is a tribute to her tact, organisational skills and hard work.
At about the time when Estelle had successfully installed most of our HR systems, I became the full time Managing Partner of the Firm. Although I had been involved in the management of the Firm for many years, this was a very challenging time and role for me and I found Estelle’s support and assistance during this difficult time to be invaluable. She is both thoughtful and innovative. She, “bubbles with new ideas”. Her enthusiasm to get on and get things done can someti
mes be her worst enemy and challenging to others but what manager does not want this trait in all his senior staff?
Estelle’s role within the Firm, with my blessing, changed in the last 18 to 24 months of her employment. I was anxious to introduce a number of major changes into the Firm and my regard for Estelle’s abilities was such that she was my confidante when, as I often did, I struggled to define what I wished to do and how to do it. She was a keen member of the Vision and Values Group that evolved in mid 2003 and which became the vehicle for much of our present work towards modifying the internal culture of the Firm. She has also given me considerable support and assistance in my attempts to introduce a viable Partner Personal Development Plan system. In reflecting on the assistance that she has given me both with Vision and Values and Partner PDP I am struck by her near unquenchable enthusiasm and pro-activity for the projects.
Finally, I would like to pay tribute to what I believe has been her loyalty to me and to the Firm. I told her very early on in her employment with us that her admirable ambition would mean that she would only stay with us for a limited period of time. As she has often pointed out to me, I was wrong about this. I know that she has received offers of very attractive employment with other organisations and chose to stay on the bus and continue the journey with us. The very circumstances in which ultimately she decided to pursue her career away from the Firm is, I think, a tribute to her loyalty.
Graham Dean, Managing Partner at Smith Partnership & Ex President of the Derby and District Law Society
