Companies, both large and small, rely on the knowledge and expertise of their People and Culture (P&C) teams. Avenue Living’s People and Culture unit is a forward-thinking group that plays a progressive and diverse role within the company, continuing to focus on our most important asset, our people.
Andrea Bherer, Chief People Officer, leads the P&C team with the help of Joellen Short, Director, Talent Development and Atara Harrison, Director of Organizational Effectiveness. Avenue Living is lucky to have the opportunity to tap into their significant expertise within the functions of human resources and professional development.
Progressive in her approach, Andrea is working to create a welcoming and inclusive culture for Avenue Living, planning and carrying out new programming which enables our people to further grow and evolve. “Our P&C team works hard to understand the ever-evolving needs of our employees as they pivot to meet the rapid growth of the company and require added support in the development of their careers here at Avenue Living.”
Joellen’s focus looks at enhancing employee engagement and operational excellence. She has helped Avenue Living implement talent development programs and optimize organizational results by introducing and managing various technical applications that automate functions such as reporting, payroll, and benefits. “We are growing fast as a company and have therefore invested in more sophisticated technology. In only a short period of time, we’re already seeing outstanding returns from the new systems and processes,” she says.
Atara works to help employees perform at their best, from strategy to operations. She bridges Avenue Living’s corporate vision with key actions that help our people excel. She seeks to understand both sides of the business and translate the business needs into effective operational results. Organizational Effectiveness (OE) connects the workforce to learning. By way of example, one channel she uses to guide professional development is what we call our Avenue Living University. This set of programs delivers role-specific education, including vital training such as Occupational Health and Safety. Atara’s focus on operational excellence has her partnering with our various operations teams for process and documentation development and the roll out of new training. “Our occupational excellence work affords us the ability to support our people and keep them on the path of continuous development.”
Key Initiatives
Our P&C team is well-equipped to continue managing and building new orientation activities, diversity, inclusion and equity strategies, wholistic peer review programs, and additional growth and development programming.
Andrea has put together this team and actioned many critical items to support our organization’s growth and to continue to meet the needs of the various business units. She came in with a game plan of growth and structure.
As a robust team who helps facilitate our accelerated growth, People and Culture is a trusted business partner and key part of the platform that is essential to the success of our business.
Collaboration is integral to People and Culture. They work closely with our leadership teams and various departments throughout the organization across our group of companies to ensure everyone has a safe and fulfilling employee experience.
Building on Technology
People and Culture uses technology and data to support all parts of our business. A big part of Joellen’s role has been the design, implementation, and maintenance of UKG Pro, an end-to-end HR and workforce management software program. UKG Pro serves as our Human Resources Information System (HRIS), awarding flexibility, organization, and security to seamlessly administer and support the employee lifecycle. This technology has been integral in helping us use employee information to identify trends and make important business decisions.
“Data helps us better grasp and analyze trends, realize programs, and generally keep a pulse on the evolution of our workforce,” says Joellen. Her team has partnered with Atara’s team — and others — to continuously improve automation, training metrics and statistics.
Building for the Future
“We are intentional with the development of our P&C programs. We care about our employees and their experience. As we continue to react to the current needs of the business, we commit to further growing and maturing as Avenue Living continues to expand into new regions, bringing on more staff and reaching more customers. It’s an exciting time at Avenue Living,” says Andrea.
(This is a partner content initiative between Avenue Living Asset Management Ltd. and MegaPixx Media)
