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Kids Planet is a family-owned group that has grown to over 200 nurseries since being formed in 2008. From the initial two settings in Warrington and Widnes, our expansion has been through the acquisition of existing nurseries that fit well within the Kids Planet family, along with greenfield developments. We now operate across the North West, Midlands, Yorkshire, North East, Wales, and the South.
We know that joining an existing group of nurseries is daunting and comes with concerns from both team members and parents, so our latest podcast aims to reassure and take a closer look at the process of how we work with our new acquisitions when joining and settling into the Kids Planet family and how we aim to make this as smooth a journey as possible.
We are joined in our latest podcast by Kelly Everett, an Area Manager at Kids Planet. Here are some snippets from the podcast!
“Although we’re a large organisation, I still think it has that massive family feel. As an employee I’ve always felt welcome from the day I came into Kids Planet, and I want to instill that into my managers and staff team. There is so much support, right up to Clare, our CEO – she’s always there to talk to you and listen.”
“When new nurseries join us, they sometimes worry we’ll try and make everything the Kids Planet way but that’s not the case or what we aim to do. We work closely with the settings, celebrating what makes them successful – we learn from each acquisition. We want to take on their qualities, we don’t want to lose them. If it’s not broken, don’t fix it.”
We’ve acquired this nursery for a reason – they have a similar ethos to us; we think about how they fit into Kids Planet but also how we fit with them. We want them to feel part of Kids Planet from the day they join.
One group that joined us utilised sports coaches, and we’ve adopted this practice, and grown it, introducing new qualifications to support it. It’s brought a lot of males into the profession as well which is vital.
We know that people worry about the unknown, and we tackle this by building relationships. We have an onboarding process with is 17-18 weeks long, and acquisition meetings where teams are taken through the company, roles, and then different teams talk through their involvement for example finance, procurement, quality, marketing. We go through our standards and paperwork and find out how they are already doing things to understand what will work best moving forward.
When it comes to rebranding, we look at the area, the ethos, and work with the managers and local community to see what works for them. It’s not a one-size-fits-all, we look at what is needed and take time to understand the new nursery and the area.
Joining a bigger company ultimately means you have access to a lot of support – although we know it can feel daunting at first. “When you’ve got so many people with lots of different strengths, you can help each other, share resources and ideas and so on. Training is available with our very own Training Academy – from level 2 to master’s degrees, and the company is very big on succession planning.” Recognition is important, and this is demonstrated through many avenues including our annual awards ceremony, which praises the high level quality staff within our settings and instills a sense of pride, as without them, there would be no Kids Planet.
At Kids Planet, all we ever want is to provide the best for the children. We work closely with our new nurseries and parents to find a unique balance of introducing the Kids Planet approach, and maintaining the nurseries’ unique feel and ethos. Find out more about our expanding portfolio.
Episode 30: Joining Kids Planet as an Acquisition https://www.kidsplanetdaynurseries.co.uk/podcasts/
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