Madi Fabricius, Skrap

When Madi joined Skrap, there were only 6 people and the startup was barely more than an idea in the making with just 6 employees. She is now the HR Manager for what has become a thriving business with a team of 25, based in North-West London.

The idea for Skrap came about from the founders experience in the construction industry and their frustrations with getting skips delivered in a timely manner. They developed Skrap as a booking service which is entirely driven from an app that allows construction companies to quickly order skips, port-a-loos, concrete, diggers and other plant-hire equipment - all from the click of a button. It’s essentially like the Uber Eats for the construction industry!

According to Madi, when she joined the company, “we knew we were going to grow rapidly and we needed to have good systems in place to help onboard new team members.” She was also keen to find a HR system with an employee portal so that team members could keep their details up-to-date and manage their leave. “Price was also a consideration as we didn’t want to be locked in to paying huge monthly fees - HR Partner offered very good value for money.”

Since then, “HR Partner has become our central point for documentation. I love that everything is digital and it’s saving us so much time not having to deal with paper!”

One area that Madi has made particularly good use of is the Checklists. She has created onboarding and offboarding checklists which she says have been invaluable - especially lately when everyone has been working remotely. For new employees, she’s put together checklists that include the many tasks that need to be done before an employee starts (providing a contract, conducting reference checks, setting up various accounts, providing equipment etc), collecting information like their contact details, assigning an agenda for their first day and an overview of their first month, providing the company policies to review and sign, ensuring they meet the relevant team members, and also including Loom videos that demonstrate how to use various systems. By using a checklist system, nothing is forgotten and new employees have all the information they need.

Madi says that she loves the efficiency, but also believes that it creates a positive impression for new team members.

“Having a system like this shows employees that we’re organised and we know what we’re doing. They have all the information they need without having to email me for everything! A new employee’s first few days are critical so it’s important to make a good first impression and make the transition as smooth as possible.”

Skrap also uses the Xero integration and leave is kept in sync between the two systems, with employee leave requests and approvals all being managed through HR Partner. The holidays, birthdays and work anniversaries all sync to Madi’s Google Calendar - which makes it easy to recognise staff members and helps to create a really positive culture. Madi says she’ll generally email a team member when it’s their birthday and copy-in the rest of the team. She’ll include a funny meme that is relevant to their position, along with a personal message. It’s a small touch, but little things like this show employees that they’re valued and you’re thinking about them.

Madi says the culture at Skrap is very flat and non-hierarchical. “Everyone is open to learning and bouncing ideas off each other to find the best solution. We like to employ team players and create a positive environment by celebrating milestones together and giving lots of acknowledgement.”

When we spoke about everyone working remotely due to the pandemic, Madi said that they prefer to work together in the office as it helps things move quickly. But over the last 3 months, productivity has been really high and working remotely has demonstrated to everyone that being physically together is actually not needed as much as they’d previously thought. Going forward, she expects that they’ll adapt a more flexible approach with some combination of working in the office and from home.

Madi also adds that having KPIs really helps with working from home as everyone is very clear about what they need to focus on and it’s easy to measure performance.

She also says that having all their company documents available in the Document Library means that people can access these from wherever they are. She’s recently started using eSignatures too - so if she needs a new policy signed by everyone, it’s easy to create and assign that within HR Partner, and great that it’s automatically stored in the employees’ records.

Skrap has big plans for growth and says that they’re planning to expand into Germany by the end of this year and into the US by next year.

“If we didn’t have an HR system, I’d feel vulnerable and concerned about the prospect of more growth. But with HR Partner, we have one place for everything and the system ensures we don’t forget about anything. I also love that HR Partner is so easy to use, and the support has been great. If I ever have a problem, I get an answer very quickly.”