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NOVAManagement & Human Resources

Expertise

Four divisions, and three supporting areas of expertise to make them work. Most mandates touch more than one, because the problems of a small business rarely sit in a single box.

01

Management and strategy

For the owner still carrying every decision alone.

  • Overall diagnostic of the business
  • Strategic planning and action plans
  • Organizational structure, roles and responsibilities
  • Delegation and organization of the work
  • Performance metrics and dashboards
  • Management finance: budgets, forecasts, cost and profitability analysis
  • Coaching and mentoring for owners
  • Growth management and expansion planning
  • Succession planning and ownership transfer

02

Human resources and talent

To build an HR function that does not exist yet, or that rests on a single person.

  • HR diagnostic and strategy
  • Recruitment and selection, including key positions
  • Job descriptions and hiring processes
  • Welcoming and onboarding new employees
  • Employee handbook, policies and procedures
  • Performance management and reviews
  • Compensation, benefits and pay equity: initial exercise, five-year maintenance, DEMES declaration
  • Retention, engagement and workplace climate
  • Training and development for managers
  • Employer legal obligations: harassment (Bill 42), prevention (Bill 27), sexual violence, francization, Law 25
  • Employer brand and careers page, with the Marketing division
  • Part-time day-to-day HR management, and annual compliance follow-up

03

Operations and processes

For the business that works, but loses time without knowing where.

  • Operational diagnostic
  • Process mapping and analysis
  • Written procedures and standardized methods
  • Identifying bottlenecks and inefficiencies
  • Organization of the work and allocation of responsibilities
  • Improving productivity and quality
  • Project management
  • Continuous improvement

Customer service

A service queue is a process like any other: it has steps, deadlines, owners and breaking points.

  • Mapping of the customer journey, from first contact to after-sales follow-up
  • Assessment of customer service: interviews with your clients, call monitoring, complaint analysis
  • Written service standards and evaluation grids for your managers
  • Training for service teams, and for the managers who lead them

04

Marketing and business development

To attract the right clients and the right talent, with promises the business can keep.

  • Business and marketing diagnostic
  • Marketing strategy and positioning
  • Target clientele and value proposition
  • Business plan and marketing budget
  • Commercial brand and employer brand
  • Careers page and job postings
  • Website, content and presence on LinkedIn
  • Analysis of the sales process: steps, response times, conversion rates, follow-ups that get lost
  • Integration with your CRM: what gets recorded, by whom, and what is done with it
  • Sales metrics: where clients come from, acquisition cost, conversion rate
  • Selecting and overseeing agencies
  • Training for sales teams, including the ethics of sales practices

Nova is not a marketing agency. Strategy and oversight are provided by the partners; the execution (website, content) is entrusted to a marketing partner or to an agency we select and oversee with you, with no referral commission.

Loading docks seen from above: two rows of trailers backed in at an angle.

And everything it takes to make them work

Three supporting areas of expertise come on top of the four divisions. They arrive within a mandate and make the divisions work. Only change management is included by default.

Change management

It is not one more area of expertise; it is what makes the others useful. Communication, engaging the teams, training, adoption follow-up: included in every transformation mandate, never billed as an extra.

  • Change management plans
  • Communicating the change
  • Managing resistance and engaging employees
  • Supporting managers and preparing teams
  • Training and adoption
  • Tracking adoption and performance

A structure nobody applies is worth nothing.

Technology and business systems

To stop doing by hand what a system should be doing. Technology follows a management problem, never the other way around: we clarify the process, then select, implement or build the tool.

  • Technology audit and needs analysis
  • Software selection and rollout
  • Custom development: management systems, CRM, internal tools
  • Human resources management systems
  • Task automation and digitization of processes
  • Integration between your existing tools
  • Document management
  • User training and support through adoption
  • Ongoing support for your tools: updates, user assistance

When no product on the market does what you need, we build it. And when an existing product will do, we say so — with no vendor commission.

Administration and finance

So the numbers serve decisions, not just the year-end financial statements. An administration that holds together, in coordination with your CPA.

  • Budgets and financial forecasts
  • Cost and profitability analysis
  • Expense tracking and cash flow management
  • Financial metrics and dashboards
  • Management reporting
  • Administrative processes, invoicing and internal controls
  • Payroll and bookkeeping handled through an accountant engaged and coordinated by Nova
  • Coordination with your external professionals

If you need us to take payroll or bookkeeping off your hands, we engage an accountant and coordinate the work. You deal with one party. Tax and audit work remain with CPAs.

A mandate rarely touches a single area

That is what a first meeting establishes: what is stuck, where, and which end to take it from. One hour, at no charge.

First meeting, no charge