People Focused. Commercially Minded. Confident H.R.
Clear, practical H.R. services that save you time, cost and keep your business safe.
Our Story
Could we add a link to my Island Influences podcast?
Compass Strategy was founded in 2024 with a clear mission: to help Isle of Man businesses navigate employing people with confidence, clarity, and commercial insight. Our purpose is simple — to give leaders the direction they need to build strong teams and avoid the costly pitfalls of ineffective people management.
What sets us apart is the depth of real world experience behind the service.
Compass Strategy is led by Vicki Hotchkiss (link to my linkedin profile), a commercially focused consultant and non-executive director, with a career spanning global financial institutions, regulator approved pension trustee roles, and broad independent consultancy work.
This international, multi sector experience means she understands business far beyond traditional HR boundaries. Vicki has led major change programmes, partnered with senior executives, and navigated complex commercial environments, giving her the pragmatic insight needed to show how people decisions directly drive performance, manage risk, and protect the bottom line.
Now a trusted partner to a wide range of regular clients, Compass Strategy has established itself as a leading commercially minded, pragmatic, H.R. consultancy.
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Compass Strategy is a boutique H.R. consultancy that helps local businesses navigate the complexities of employing people with clarity and confidence. By combining deep commercial insight with practical H.R. expertise, we deliver employment practices that are compliant, pragmatic, and tailored to your business needs.
Choosing Compass Strategy is a strong commercial decision
Experienced leaders know that bringing in external expertise isn’t a weakness – it’s competitive advantage.
When you partner with Compass Strategy, managing one employee or a hundred becomes simpler, safer, and more efficient. We cut risk, prevent costly missteps, lift productivity, and free you to focus on what you need to do instead of getting pulled into time consuming people matters.
For entrepreneurs and first time business owners, we act as your HR compass from day one—helping you avoid early pitfalls, build solid foundations, and set a clear course for sustainable success.
Compass clients are small and medium sized businesses that need experienced HR capacity or specialist expertise. Many of our clients are growing organisations where in-house HR is focused on day to day operations and needs extra capacity for a specific topic or senior commercial insight to support strategic progress. Others have no in house HR at all — these smaller, successful businesses know outsourcing their H.R needs is the smartest, most commercial choice.
We also work with confident, experienced Heads of HR who know the value of bringing in an external specialist for high risk, sensitive, or complex people matters.
If you’re starting up, scaling fast, juggling HR pressures, or simply need expert backup, Compass is built for you.
Compass Clients
The Small Business That Grew
Mergers, acquisitions or organic growth means your once small team is now a bigger one. There might be different ways of doing things or conflicting priorities making everything harder work than it needs to be. We’ve worked with clients to align their people behind a common set of strategic objectives. In simple terms, we translate your strategy into clear areas of responsibility, align job descriptions upwards, and co-create measurable outcomes for you to manage and reward performance. We design and deliver the communications and training needed to embed the changes.
Redundancies and Exits
Businesses need to evolve to stay successful. This means some roles may need to change and others may no longer be required. When this happens, it is important for employers to treat impacted employees fairly and respectfully. This is time-consuming for everyone involved. Our service provides clients with the capacity needed to take the matter through to conclusion, combined with expertise and diplomacy to ensure it is delivered smoothly and without redress.
We Need a Better Way of Doing This
Change is not always internally driven. Times are changing. You likely have a workforce that is becoming multi-generational, with increasing social and cultural diversity. Ways of doing things that have always worked in the past, now feel dated. Commercial risk is increasing. You may have a completely different issue. The point is you know you need a better way of doing it. We support clients to modernise ways of working, improve delivery and reduce risk.
Client Testimonials
"Vicki brings a wealth of business acumen to the role as INED for Isle of Man FA. Most recently she drove the inception, development and delivery of the new Isle of Man FA Grassroots Strategy 2024 – 2028, working with local operational staff and key stakeholders to develop a plan for football on the Island over the next 4 yrs. Vicki sees the advantages of utilising the strength of The FA to support local ambitions. Her previous experience in building strategies for large multi-national organisations was obvious, and she ensured the local strategy dovetailed into the national one for grassroots football. Vicki demonstrates a unique set of skills that are influencing change from within, challenging where necessary and empowering when required. She is reducing commercial risk and is a binding force within the local Board of Directors."
Alice Watson
Regional Manager, The FA
Wembley Stadium, London
"I have known Vicki for over 10 years. During this time, she has been a member of my leadership team and has supported me directly on a broad range of strategic and board level projects. A seasoned facilitator and critical thinker, Vicki is skilled at enabling teams to find their way out of a problem. Her natural charisma brings people onboard. She is trustworthy, conscientious and ultimately, she delivers."
Sean Christian
M.D. and Executive Director, Canada Life
Isle of Man Business Park
"We engaged Vicki's services to help resolve a complex H.R. matter. She provided a structured plan for us to follow and working alongside legal counsel, guided our executive team through it to conclusion. Professional and efficient, end-to-end it took about 6 weeks."
Mark Kiernan
CEO, Boal & Co
Isle of Man Business Park
“Having worked together for a number of years, when we were looking for the right person to deliver our Consumer Duty training to the Isle of Man team, I knew Vicki would make it happen"
Emma Fallon
Senior Learning Partner, Canada Life
22 Bishopsgate London
“Vicki and I work together to strengthen equality, diversity and inclusion standards across Isle of Man football. The FA see E, D&I as a cornerstone for the future success of the professional game, and grassroots is no different. In a very short space of time, Vicki has delivered a series of tangible changes that are addressing systematic challenges and historical norms. Her leadership is laying foundations for increased representation and equitable access to opportunities in football. There is still a long way to go, and I am confident Vicki is the right person to keep driving this modernisation forward.”
Anwar Uddin MBE
Diversity and Inclusion Manager, The FA
Wembley Stadium, London
“We worked with Vicki in her role as trustee for a large company pension scheme on which LMS Partners were engaged to provide independent financial advice.
Vicki is the utmost professional. She is knowledgeable and was committed to obtaining the right outcome for all stakeholders. We saw first-hand her dedication to maintaining good governance, regulatory compliance, and effective communication, to everyone and at every stage of the process.
Her enthusiasm to meet any challenge is infectious! We cannot recommend Vicki highly enough!.”
John Walker
Head of Corporate Solutions, LMS Partners
Athol Street, Isle of Man
Compass Services
Compass services are provided via three types of engagement.
Project Based
A short - finite contract to resolve a specific problem or deliver a specific outcome.
Examples of project-based services:
- Employee grievances, dismissals or redundancies managed through to conclusion
- Delivery of training
- Build out of a new strategy or implementation of a new way of working.

Best for clients with a one-off problem to resolve.
Retained Services
A long-term contract to provide services for a set number of days at a fixed cost per month.
Examples of retained services:
- Part-time, or fractional Director services
- Pension Scheme Trusteeships
- Independent Non-Executive Director positions
Best for clients who prefer a cost-effective solution and the assurance of having time secured for them.

Open-ended
A contract with no fixed timescale, for services provided as and when required.

Examples of project-based services:
- Employee grievances, dismissals or redundancies managed through to conclusion
- Delivery of training
- Build out of a new strategy or implementation of a new way of working.
Best for clients with a one-off problem to resolve.
Get in touch
“In any moment of decision, the worst you can do is nothing.” Theodore Roosevelt
Contact Us
Phone
01624 604516