Everyone – no matter how confident they are – fear “that call from the Regulator”.  But the more you know about what to expect the better prepared you will be.

Being confident about your logistics and how you will manage the process puts you ahead of the game.

This is your opportunity to understand the process, what to expect and prepare for how you will handle it:

• Who takes the call (email)? Who do you put in charge?
• What the Regulator will ask for and expect
• A rough guide to the timescales
• The information requests – what and when?
• What you will need – to provide the necessary assurance and evidence
• Your context statement
• How best to prepare:
  • Executive and leadership teams
  • Board members or councillors
  • Engaged tenants.
• What will be needed from the ‘support teams’:
  • Data and insight?
  • Governance and compliance?
  • Operations?

We have been working with landlords up and down the country who have been inspected over the past six months. We’ve also carried out over 30 assessments ourselves. We’ll share our experiences and those of practitioners who have been through the whole process from start to finish.

Led by HQN’s experts with a wealth of knowledge and experience across the sector this virtual masterclass will provide you with a practical step-by-step guide to preparing for inspection.

You’ll leave feeling ready and prepared for that call, together with a checklist to guide you. There’ll be plenty of opportunity to get answers to all your questions.

Essential for:

• CEOs and managing directors
• Directors of housing
• Directors of assets and building safety
• Directors of operations
• Governance leads and teams
• Compliance leads and teams
• Health and safety leads
• Consumer standard leads
• Performance teams
• Data teams.

10:30am Chair’s welcome and introduction

• Lydia Dlaboha, Deputy CEO, HQN

10:40am Preparing for inspection – part 1: receiving the call and preparing for the on-site work

• Lydia Dlaboha, Deputy CEO, HQN

• Damian Roche, Director, HQN

11:10am How was it for us? – The EMH experience

• Tim Brown, Associate, HQN and Expert Panel Member, Civic Voice

11:40am Break

11:55am How was it for us? – The LHP experience

• Nicola Ebdon, Director of Governance & Regulation and Company Secretary, Lincolnshire Housing Partnership

12:25pm Preparing for inspection – part 2: the on-site experience and beyond

• Lydia Dlaboha, Deputy CEO, HQN

• Damian Roche, Director, HQN

12:55pm Questions

1:00pm Close

Lydia Dlaboha, Deputy CEO, HQN

Lydia joined HQN in 2007 and is currently the Deputy CEO. Her background is in housing management – both general needs and supported. She has worked extensively as a consultant on a wide variety of performance improvement projects. In her current role, Lydia has responsibility for overseeing all of HQN’s work and for quality assurance in particular. She spends the majority of her time talking to HQN members to make sure that our service meets their needs and on consultancy-related work.

Damian Roche, Director, HQN

Damian is one of HQN’s experts on the consumer standards. He has played a key role in our consultancy projects since the new regulatory framework began its journey into law and supported a wide range of organisations (local authorities, housing associations and ALMOs) with their self-assessments and improvement plans. His particular areas of expertise are in customer engagement and wider stakeholder engagement as well as governance and complaints management.

Damian is a regular speaker at HQN events and recently devised and delivered a series of workshops to assist providers with their preparations for the new regulatory framework. He has developed toolkits for use in self-assessments, the latest covering the empty homes and lettings process and our condensed toolkit for the regulation of social housing.

As well as the learning and insight that Damian has gained through consultancy and project work Damian also has hands-on practical experience of delivering services. He has worked in the housing sector for more than 20 years, much of which has been at a senior/executive level, including eight years as director of customer experience for Accent Housing.

Tim Brown, Associate, HQN and Expert Panel Member, Civic Voice

Tim specialises in housing, planning and local government and focuses on social housing allocations, homelessness, affordable housing provision and safeguarding. He has worked on projects for many councils and housing associations as well as for government departments.

He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, a Member of the Regional Studies Association and a Corporate Member of the Chartered Institute of Housing. He was previously chairperson of the Homes Board of East Midlands Housing Group (EMHG) and an Honorary Research Associate at De Montfort University on housing and local government.

Nicola Ebdon, Director of Governance and Regulation and Company Secretary, Lincolnshire Housing Partnership

Nicola has responsibility for governance, regulation, legal, data protection and executive support at LHP.  She has over 20 years’ experience of working as a qualified senior corporate governance professional, with regulatory, compliance, planning and performance expertise. She is also LHP’s data protection officer, with over 10 years’ expertise in data protection. Her experience spans regulatory, charity, professional body and trade union services, with a focus on leading project and programme delivery, facilitation of change and champion of continuous improvement, and equality, diversity and inclusion.

If you are unable to attend an event or public training course, please let us know in writing via email or letter at least 48 hours beforehand. Please email [email protected]

Otherwise, a cancellation fee of £60 plus VAT will be chargeable.

If you are using a package place to attend and do not inform us within the agreed time frame, then a place will be taken to cover your non-attendance.

Cancellations must be made in writing, and will be acknowledged by HQN Limited.