People-first HR,
built for Irish SMEs

Yes — and the timeframe is tighter than most business owners realise. Under the Employment (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2018, you must provide employees with their core terms of employment in writing within five days of starting. A full written contract must follow within two months. Operating without contracts exposes you to WRC complaints and potential awards. This is one of the first things we sort for every new client.

The Workplace Relations Commission is Ireland's employment rights body. They handle complaints from employees, conduct workplace inspections, and adjudicate disputes. Any employee can make a complaint — and you don't have to do anything wrong for one to land on your desk. What determines the outcome is whether you followed the correct process and have the documentation to back it up. Our job is to make sure you do — long before any complaint arises.

Yes — and arguably more so with a small team. In a small business, one difficult employee situation can disrupt everything. A handbook sets out the rules of the road clearly — attendance, disciplinary procedures, leave entitlements, grievance processes — so everyone knows where they stand. It also gives you the legal basis to take action if something goes wrong. Without it, you're managing by gut instinct which rarely ends well at the WRC.

The once-off setup gets your HR foundations in place — contracts, handbook, core policies, and a GDPR-compliant record structure. It's a one-time piece of work. The monthly retainer is ongoing support — we're available whenever you need us for queries, employee relations issues, performance management, and policy updates. Many clients start with the setup and move straight into a retainer. Others come to us for ongoing support from day one. We'll recommend the right option for your business during your free consultation.

Quickly. After an initial free consultation — which we can usually arrange within a few days — we'll have a proposal to you promptly. Once agreed, we get started immediately. For businesses with urgent HR needs such as an active disciplinary matter or an upcoming WRC inspection, we prioritise accordingly. You won't be waiting weeks for a call back or passed between account managers — you deal directly with us from day one.

It's never too late — and you're not alone. The majority of SMEs we work with come to us having operated informally for years. The important thing is getting the right structures in place going forward. We'll carry out a straightforward review of where you stand, identify any gaps, and put a plan in place to address them. Getting compliant now is always better than dealing with the consequences of not being compliant later.

This is exactly what a retainer client calls us about. We'll guide you through the correct process step by step — from how to conduct the investigation, to how to handle hearings, to what documentation you need at every stage. Getting the process right matters enormously. A poorly handled disciplinary procedure, even where the employer was clearly in the right, can be overturned at the WRC on procedural grounds alone. We make sure that doesn't happen to you.