Impellam Group's Able Futures story

‘Virtuosity’ is defined as the quality of being extremely skilled at something; to perform exceptionally well. It’s an attribute that the Impellam Group takes very seriously, building their culture of Virtuosity with the Virtuosos they employ across the world – 1,200 of them here in the UK.

As the backbone of eight collaborative talent and workforce solution brands including Carbon60, Comensura, Guidant Global, SRG, and Lorien, the group freely acknowledges that their people are their greatest strength. Their teams are specialists in their field, breaking down barriers to unleash people’s potential and harness the power of good work.

It’s unsurprising therefore that supporting their Virtuosos to perform at the top of their game in the demanding world of recruitment and talent solutions sits high in Impellam’s priorities.

“Building trust and psychological safety is vital to being happy and healthy at work, and fostering good mental health is a huge part of that,” says Impellam’s HR Business Partner, Lisa Smith. “We look at every point of our employee lifecycle and build wellbeing support in throughout. We offer blended working, mental health first aiders, an employee assistance programme, fully flexible working policies and we host feedback surveys.

“Yet people’s mindsets changed massively during Covid and we realised that something deeper and further was required, more robust, and independent of our in-house offer. We’re all buffeted by organisational, personal and world events at times and that’s where Able Futures comes in.”

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Able Futures delivers the Department for Work and Pensions’ Access to Work Mental Health Support Service and it provides free mental health support to anyone in work. It also offers advice and resources for employers, again with no charge.

“We invited Angela Han from Able Futures to detail the service to our managers in November 2022 and the response was phenomenal,” Lisa recalls. “More than 60 managers attended the first virtual session and the feedback was fantastic – from relief at having a trusted partner to signpost staff members to, to positive surprise at the longevity of support offered and collateral provided. I remember one colleague saying how thought provoking it was and that they’d even gained some helpful tips to take home and share with family members."

With Angela’s support, the service was subsequently rolled out across Impellam’s eight UK brands, promoted to direct staff members and agency workers in early 2023.

"Able Futures is simply easy to work with. They have in-depth knowledge of mental health issues both in and out of the workplace and their advice and materials are well considered."

Lisa

Lisa feels that “not just being a short-term fix is very important”. The service offers nine months of individual support from an Able Futures Vocational Rehabilitation Consultant. Entirely confidential, participants are given practical tools, advice and encouragement to tackle common mental health issues including anxiety, stress and depression.

She also rates the “extremely helpful collateral” available, including an employer toolkit, promotional items, and backdated virtual sessions on common mental health pain points.

But it’s the expertise and trust, embedded in a relatively short space of time by Able Futures, that Lisa most values: “Able Futures is simply easy to work with. They have in-depth knowledge of mental health issues both in and out of the workplace and their advice and materials are well considered. They take absolute accountability for the people they support and are responsive and regular communicators. It’s what we strive for at Impellam – trust at work – and it’s a partnership which only adds to our Virtuosity.”