About Shaw Trust
Name: Catherine Mellington, Head of People Operations and Ellie Alderdice, People Data, Reward and Benefits lead
Organisation: Shaw Trust
Website: shawtrust.org.uk
Industry: Charity/not-for-profit
Region: UK
Organisation size: Around 3,000 colleagues
Products:
Shaw Trust is a large UK charity and not-for-profit organisation that supports people to achieve greater independence through employability, wellbeing, training and development, children’s services and charity retail.
With around 3,000 colleagues across a diverse range of services, Shaw Trust operates in multiple regulatory environments and supports a workforce that includes paid colleagues and volunteers. Its people team needs to keep HR practice compliant and commercially sustainable while supporting the organisation’s mission and colleague experience.
Today, the HR & Compliance Centre and Compensation Planning support Shaw Trust across the full flow of work: helping the team track what is changing, interpret the impact for its workforce and act through practical guidance, policy materials, training resources and evidence-based reward decisions.
How we helped
The challenge
Shaw Trust’s people team supports a large and varied workforce across employability services, wellbeing support, apprenticeships, children’s homes and charity retail. That creates a wide range of HR, compliance and reward needs, from employment law change and TUPE activity to pay benchmarking, policy review, manager guidance and workforce data.
The organisation also operates with the budget pressures common to the charity sector. The team needs reliable employment law guidance it can access quickly, without relying on legal advice for every routine question or spending unnecessary time searching across disconnected sources.
For reward decisions, Shaw Trust needs data that can stand up to scrutiny. Managers may come to pay conversations with expectations based on advertised salaries or broad online searches, but the people team needs objective market evidence based on actual employer data to support fair and sustainable decisions.
“Brightmine provides us with two incredibly important things: confidence and evidence.”
The Brightmine solution
A connected source of HR guidance and reward evidence
Shaw Trust has used Brightmine, formerly XpertHR, for many years. The HR & Compliance Centre gives the people team access to up-to-date employment law guidance, policies, procedures, templates, letters, training materials and practical resources that help them respond to day-to-day HR needs, plan for legislative change and prepare for Employment Rights Act developments.
For pay and reward work, Brightmine Compensation Planning helps Shaw Trust benchmark roles, review market data and support conversations about pay expectations with evidence. The team uses the data not only for organisation-wide structures and frameworks, but also for individual roles where managers need a clear view of the market.
Together, the HR & Compliance Centre and Compensation Planning support Shaw Trust across the flow of work: track what is changing, interpret what it means for the organisation and act through practical guidance, documentation, training and reward decisions.
“We need a solution that combines practical HR guidance with robust reward data, and Brightmine works for us in that way.”
Implementation & results
More confident HR advice grounded in current guidance
The HR & Compliance Centre gives Shaw Trust’s people team a reliable source of current HR and employment law information. The team uses it to sense-check policy updates, support complex casework, access practical guidance for managers and prepare for developments such as Employment Rights Act changes. The Employment Rights Act 2025 Hub is especially useful because it helps the team see what is changing and organise its response before new requirements take effect.
“The Employment Rights Act 2025 Hub helps us see what is changing, focus on the right areas and plan what we need to do next.”
Faster access to practical resources without starting from scratch
The HR & Compliance Centre helps Shaw Trust reduce the manual effort involved in drafting and reviewing HR materials. The team uses policies, letters, forms, contract clauses and training resources as trusted starting points, then adapts them to Shaw Trust’s context and internal approach.
“The HR & Compliance Centre helps us save time when we’re looking for practical resources, and that has a ripple effect in how quickly and confidently we can support the business.”
Evidence-based reward conversations supported by objective data
Compensation Planning helps Shaw Trust bring structure and evidence to reward decisions. When managers have expectations based on broad online salary ranges or advertised roles, the team can use Compensation Planning data to show what is happening in the market and explain decisions clearly.
For a charity managing different services, funding models and reward structures, that evidence is especially valuable. It helps Shaw Trust balance market expectations with fair, realistic and sustainable pay decisions.
“Anyone can Google a role and find a wide salary range. Compensation Planning gives us structured data we can use to clearly demonstrate what is happening in the market.”
Support that extends beyond the product
Shaw Trust also values the expertise and support available around Compensation Planning. The team uses webinars for continuing professional development, takes part in reward-focused network discussions and can request tailored information from the compensation planning team when a specific question arises.
That responsiveness helps Shaw Trust get more value from Brightmine over time, especially as its workforce needs, legal obligations and reward priorities continue to evolve. It also reflects the way Shaw Trust uses the HR & Compliance Centre and Compensation Planning together: reducing risk, supporting fair reward decisions and helping the people team deliver clearer results for the organisation.
“The Compensation Planning support is very responsive, very prompt and very helpful. It’s bespoke to my needs.”
Brightmine gives us confidence that our HR advice is compliant and up to date, and evidence that supports our reward decisions.
Catherine Mellington
Head of People Operations, Shaw Trust
