Makes You Think: Industrial Relations & Union Consultant

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Welcome to Makes-You-Think.com, my home on the web. I’m Simon Sapper. I have over 30 years’ experience in high profile campaigning, regulatory and membership organisations across public, private and voluntary sectors. My core areas of expertise are work and workplace relations, membership-based organisations and governance, probity, and conduct matters. I have a reputation for leadership, innovation, independent thought and integrity.

Feel free to email me at info@makes-you-think.com, or fill in the contact form.

Clients

What they say

The Fire Brigades Union has engaged Simon on a number of organisational projects. These included giving presentations on his reports to our Executive Council, as well as a to a meeting of brigade and regional officials. I found Simon to be very thorough in his work, with timeframes adhered to and regular updates given. The feedback I received from officials at all levels of the union was very positive and helped us immensely in producing a strategic plan for the union, whilst operating under extremely difficult political circumstances.

Dave Green, National Officer, Fire Brigades Union, 18 August 2020

Thank you for your hard work and immaculate integrity

Ajay Ahluwalia, CEO, Male Centric, July 2020

I worked as HR Director in a unionised environment for a.number of years and Simon was the National Officer in the collective agreement negotiations and a large number of TUPE transfers with collective consultation.

We had many tough negotiations and discussions and I was always impressed and challenged by his knowledge, thoroughness, articulation, debating and negotiating skills.

 Throughout this period we worked well together and embraced a modern employee relations relationship of true working partnership – so much so that after the collective bargaining agreement had been overtaken by restructuring, we (the Company) employed  the now-freelance Simon as a consultant to brief and train employee representatives in skills,  protocol and legal requirements in large outsourced TUPE situations. This was well received and worked well for all stakeholders.  

Daire Farnon, Alchemy People Ltd

The Royal College of Midwives engaged Simon to lead us through a strategic review of our membership networks. He undertook this with considerable diplomacy and provided us with a thorough report to guide future developments. As a critical friend, Simon was able to help us see what was going really well and to challenge us about what we needed to improve. He brought experience of other organisations, a professional manner and a deep understanding of what makes for effective membership engagement to this project.

Dr Suzanne Tyler, Director of Services To Members, RCM, September 2018