When does capability kick in?
January 30, 2009
A friend of mine is in a tricky position at work, and when he was describing it to me the other day, it got me thinking as it’s quite an interesting situation from a HR point of view.
My friend is a project manager, and therefore oversees jobs, delegating work to people in his team and ensuring the different tasks are completed on time and in budget. The projects have very specified fees, and time spent on a project is costed to that project through a project management system that logs timesheets and project codes. Therefore work has to be efficiently completed to enable projects to be completed within the budgets allocated.
This is all really straightforward stuff, but what happens when you have a situation with an employee who is perhaps not able to complete works in the most efficient manner because of an illness or disability? In my friend’s case, one of the employees that had been allocated to his project suffered a stroke a few years ago, and as a result has not worked as fast as he was previously able to since then, and struggles to pick up new skills and knowledge. Therefore the tasks my friend allocates to this employee cannot be completed as quickly or effectively as was perhaps quoted, yet the employee’s time still needs to be allocated to the project so that the company can charge for him and pay his salary.
So my friend is in a quandary: on the one hand the company wants to make ‘reasonable adjustments’ so that the employee is able to continue to work, which in this case means giving him fewer tasks or more time to complete tasks, but on the other hand the project manager has to deliver the project on time and in budget, which will be seriously hindered by this employee’s capabilities. What is the answer?
I feel this case is lodged right in between the ‘reasonable adjustments’ element of disability/sickness legislation and the statutory capability procedures. Do the adjustments become ‘unreasonable’ when it involves not delivering projects within the fee and therefore losing money for the company? Should the employee be taken through capability procedures? I think it is a really interesting debate and I would be really happy to receive your feedback and ideas.
Supermarkets lead the way in new job opportunities
January 28, 2009
Supermarket giant Asda has announced that 7,000 jobs are to be created as part of plans to extend a number of existing outlets and the opening of several new stores. The supermarket sector is one which appears to have fought off the recession better than other industries such as retail and car manufacturing, and recently other supermarket chains have announced growth and new jobs to be created, including Sainsbury’s, Tesco and Morrisons.
Many of the new jobs at Asda will be aimed at people who have been unemployed for a long time, presumably as part of local employment partnerships in conjunction with the Job Centre. The chain is also intending work with Remploy, which is a government agency that provides:
“employment services and employment to people experiencing complex barriers to work” (www.remploy.co.uk)
Another company that has announced new jobs to be created is BSkyB, with 1,000 new vacancies to be made available due to the continuing growth in demand for services.
This is excellent news after weeks and weeks of announcements of redundancies in many industries including retailers such as M&S and car manufacturers such as Nissan. Recently Business Secretary Peter Mandelson announced a £2.5billion ‘lifeline’ package for the struggling car industry, a lot of which is to guarantee loans taken for lower carbon initiatives, and some of which is to provide funding for training and support for workers in the industry.
The jobs crisis is not just in the UK - the International Labour Organisation (ILO) has said that the global economic crisis could lead to the loss of 51million jobs worldwide this year, and the worst affected places will not be developed countries such as the UK but those who are still developing, such as countries in North Africa and the Middle East.
The security monster strikes again
January 27, 2009
Another day, another major loss of data for thousands, if not millions of people. One of the UK’s biggest recruitment and job search websites, Monster, has had a major breach of security after hackers have carried out what has been described as
“the biggest data theft in the UK since the details of 25 million child benefit claimants went missing last year” (BBC news).
4.5 million people in the UK use the site to directly find jobs or speculatively browse the market. Many users post their CV to the site just to keep their hand in the job market and are offered interviews and positions from recruiters and companies that search the CV database for candidates matching their needs.
The main danger from this breach is from potential ‘phishing attacks’ – this is where a user is sent an email ‘phishing’ for information, e.g. to confirm their username and password (the type of thing we are often warned about in relation to our bank accounts). Another possibility is emails that fool readers into installing malware (software that is designed to damage a computer) by clicking on links in emails.
The hackers have stolen phone number and emails, as well as usernames and passwords. Many people use the same passwords for more than one of their online accounts, so if you have a monster account it is a good idea to check what other sites you have used the same password for and change them.
Don’t wait a year to have those important conversations!
January 26, 2009
In my organisation we’ve been carrying out annual appraisals over the last few weeks, and I would say that overall the process has been a success. Managers have had very informative conversations with their members of staff, and have been able to better understand their concerns, ideas and future aims as a result. For more than one employee, the appraisal has been an extremely positive event, because they have finally been able to air their issues and explain what is making them unhappy in work – and as a result a clear action plan has been developed to resolve these problems which will have a positive effect on the employee’s job satisfaction, and will ultimately help to retain those important members of staff, some of whom have openly admitted that they have considered changing their job in recent months.
Whilst I am really pleased with the outcomes of the appraisals, and I feel that many people’s futures will be better because of the open conversations that have taken place, I am disappointed that valued employees have had to wait for a number of months before being able to voice their concerns and find a resolution. I wonder how many leavers we could have saved in the last year if we had made more of an effort to ask them how they are feeling and listen to their concerns on a more regular basis than an annual appraisal?
It might sound silly saying all this, but I bet that in many organisations employees go a long time without having the important conversations with their line managers; there’s a difference between speaking to someone every day and giving them the opportunity to discuss their overall happiness and job satisfaction. There are different types of people of course – some people don’t have a problem approaching their manager without being asked if they have a concern, others will sit back and keep all their worries in, whilst feeling that the company does not care about how they are doing – and these are the people companies will eventually lose.
So basically the message is this: managers need to take more time to speak to their staff at regular intervals, and not just once a year in the annual appraisals. The key is listening to (and not simply ‘hearing’) what the employee has to say and acting on anything that may be negatively impacting on the employee’s job satisfaction or ability to achieve their job effectively. It’s simple stuff but will make a huge difference in the workplace.
When is a TUPE not a TUPE?
January 22, 2009
With all the recent events as a result of the economic crisis, many business owners and HR professionals are currently dealing with TUPE issues. With companies facing troubled times and struggling to keep their heads above water, there are a lot of mergers and last minute buy-outs taking place or being negotiated. But it seems impossible to work out when TUPE regulations apply in the different situations, and even the most experienced legal experts cannot advise us with any certainty.
TUPE stands for the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) regulations (2006). It means that when an undertaking (business) is transferred from one person or company to another, the people employed in the transferring company (the ‘transferor’) automatically become employed by the company taking over the business (the ‘transferee’), and their employment, including all their terms and conditions, is therefore protected. This legislation obviously provides implications for companies or investors considering buying a business or its assets, and unfortunately the law is very complicated and because of this, it is hard to know whether TUPE applies in certain situations.
A recent situation I heard about was a company that went into liquidation, and therefore all the employees became redundant. An investor started a new company in the same place, took over the lease of the equipment, and employed some of the staff that had worked in the company that was liquidated. I thought that this sounded like a classic case of TUPE, however I was informed that it wasn’t because the previous company had gone into liquidation under the supervision of an insolvency practitioner, which has different implications for TUPE than administration. I should really be satisfied with this explanation, but in reality the TUPE regulations are really difficult to comprehend and can be interpreted in different ways, so it means that in most situations you can never be completely sure. Basically, each case is different and it would be up to the Employment Tribunal to make the final call, which is not ideal for anyone.
I recently read a blog written by an experienced legal advisor who described TUPE as “Totally Unworkable, Penalises Everybody”. This is because it is too hard to decide who is right and wrong before a case reaches tribunal, and therefore nobody can get decent advice. Because of this problem and the difficulties in deciphering the legislation, many buy-outs that might happen which would save struggling businesses and many jobs, fail to go ahead because the potential buyer is too afraid of the implications of the possible liabilities they might or might not take on under TUPE.
I don’t think I will ever understand TUPE, and until the law is reviewed to make it more practical and helpful, I doubt a lot of other HR professionals will either.
What is your experience of TUPE?
HR bolt-ons
January 21, 2009
I’ve been thinking recently about the range of responsibilities HR departments need to cover in the service that they provide. It might be because I have always worked for either relatively small organisations, or in a small head office for a larger company, but it seems that a lot of extra things can be bolted onto the role of HR.
For example, facilities. I actually quite like the fact that one minute you’re thinking about developing key HR plans to support the business strategy, and the next minute you’re sending emails about keeping the kitchen clean or finding carpet cleaners in London because the new office needs cleaning up before the London team move in! Another regular bolt-on is Health and Safety, probably because it is about keeping people safe, and therefore can be linked to people management.
This versatility and the need to change hats from one minute to the next is often a key requirement for HR Managers. My manager in a previous role had a background in HR but ended up looking after administration, facilities, IT and Marketing in addition to HR, and her ability to switch between different functions and bring the whole thing together was a real strength of hers.
I believe that the seemingly small and insignificant parts of the HR person’s role are just as important as the top level stuff. Whilst I may need to prove to senior management the strategic value of the HR function, at the other end of the scale people need the everyday things like toilets to be an acceptable standard or the fire alarm to be tested regularly.
Do your responsibilities stretch beyond the realms of HR? How do you manage all the different areas you need to take care of and how do you feel about it?
Court of Appeal decision affects tricky discrimination legislation
January 20, 2009
A recent case in the Court of Appeal has changed the way that legislation covering discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation can be applied.
In English v Thomas Sanderson Blinds Ltd the employee, Stephen English, argued that he had been discriminated against on the grounds of sexual orientation after being subjected to repeated taunts of “faggot” by his workmates, because he had been t o boarding school and because he lived near Brighton; despite the fact that he is not gay and his colleagues are aware of this.
Last year the Employment Appeal Tribunal held that English had not been discriminated against, and the key factor here was that his workmates knew he is not gay. UK law on sexual orientation discrimination is currently different from the European Directive on which it is based; which states that the reason for the behaviour that led to the claim does not need to necessarily be caused by the sexual orientation of the victim. So under the European Directive, English’s sexual orientation would be irrelevant to the fact that the behaviour was related to sexual orientation; and this is why the case was appealed and went to the Court of Appeal, which found in English’s favour. The Judge stated that the 2003 Employment Equality (Sexual Orientation) Regulations applied to the case because:
“The incessant mockery created a degrading and hostile working environment, and it did so on the grounds of sexual orientation”
This decision means that the legislation is now more far-reaching, and organisations will now need to ensure their internal procedures and staff training covers the new requirements.
What’s your opinion on this? I am slightly split. On the one hand I feel that the type of behaviour English was subjected to was completely unacceptable and should be managed very stringently within companies, so this example is a good reminder to organisational leaders to do something about inappropriate behaviour within their workforce. On the other hand I can’t help feeling that in some way the legislation has been stretched slightly to cover someone that did not belong to a protected group, and will this now open the door to claims under other legislation arising from behaviour that is not acceptable but is equally not “discriminatory”. For example, I can think of a lot of derogatory words and phrases that relate to learning disabilities but that are used commonly against people who are clumsy or have said something wrong – does this mean they can claim disability discrimination? I don’t think disability legislation covers this at the moment but could this be argued after the Court of Appeal decision in the sexual orientation case? Let me know what your thoughts are!
HR’s credibility in organisations (2)
January 17, 2009
This post continues from yesterday’s article, HR’s credibility in organisations (1).
I think another thing that I have recently realised is that for HR to have credibility and to show value, it is necessary to find a tangible way of linking the performance of the function to the performance of the organisation. This might sound obvious coming from a HR professional who has been through the CIPD qualification, but until you see for yourself through experience what the drivers in the company are, it is sometimes easy to forget that you are here to do a ‘value-adding’ job, and that this does not just mean managing paperwork, recruiting people, ensuring the company acts legally etc. It means contributing to making the company succeed. In my organisation, as with most others, the most important indicator and driver is the bottom line. So it can seem difficult sometimes to demonstrate that you are contributing to this, when many of your activities come at a cost rather than a financial output. Areas in which you can directly look at achievements in a financial sense could include things like achieving recruitment targets under-budget, but there aren’t many of these areas.
I was chatting to my line manager today and we were discussing how you can show a link between what HR does and the outcomes for the company, without resorting to generalist observations such as ‘if employees are happy they will work harder’. We discussed using good, measurable key performance indicators (KPIs). KPIs look at key areas of workforce performance such as productivity, work quality, customer complaints and feedback, budgets and timescales, whilst concurrently measuring things like employee satisfaction, to identify any correlations. This measurement could never completely accurately link changes in workforce measurements or KPIs to HR developments, because there are many other factors influencing changes in the workforce, for example in my organisation many new processes are currently being implemented which will make a difference both to performance output and employee feelings. However, starting with clear measurements and actually reviewing the outcomes of these is a good way to raise the credibility of the HR department, as this is a clear, strategic approach to using the ‘human resource’ in the organisation to secure its success.
HR’s credibility in organisations (1)
January 16, 2009
I was just having a browse through People Management Magazine (15 Jan 09) and noticed an article on a recent piece of research that found that less than a quarter of line managers believe their HR function adds value to their organisation. The research, entitled Management Agenda 2009, carried out by The Roffey Park Institute, surveyed 1,050 managers and highlighted some disappointing results.
Only 11 per cent of managers surveyed thought that their HR function was customer focussed, and more than half said the department was reactive rather than proactive. Even more worryingly, 44 per cent of 200 HR Managers that were also surveyed felt that the function was not adding value!
This is something I have been thinking about a lot lately, and whilst I think that in my organisation the HR function does add value in many areas, we could definitely do this at a more strategic level. Being supportive and proactive on a day to day level, through supporting line managers in people management is one thing, but really contributing to organisational success through strategic thinking and organisational development is quite something else, and in my opinion, quite difficult to achieve, especially if, like me, you are quite newly qualified and not hugely experienced.
I think the starting point for increasing value adding activities and building stronger credibility within the organisation is communicating with relevant stakeholders on developments that are needed. This might be in the form of employee consultation – but real, valuable consultation. The staff surveys that sit on a shelf in HR and collect dust for years but are not acted upon are one of the biggest credibility-crushers for a HR team. We’ve not been that successful at getting a response to staff surveys in the past so this year we have introduced a face to face meeting in which the employee discusses their responses with a member of HR; we are carrying out annual appraisals so it is easy to slot in the consultation meeting at the end of the review, (of course it is probably only possible for HR to carry out all the consultation meetings in small companies). HR might also look at customer feedback as a starting point for their strategic plan, or the operational plans for each organisational function to see where HR can support and drive the objectives aimed at throughout the coming period.
… post continues tomorrow.
Government announces plans to help small businesses survive recession
January 14, 2009
Today the Government has announced plans to assist small businesses to survive in the challenging economic climate through the provision of loan guarantees. This means that banks will be insured against companies that default on repayments. The intention of the plan is to help companies with existing loans and other facilities such as overdrafts, as well as encouraging more loans to be made for:
“innovative, viable and growing [companies] that are finding it difficult to access working capital” (Lord Mandelson)
The plans are for small to medium businesses, many of whom rely on credit, overdrafts and loans from the bank to manage their cash flow and often to pay things like staff salaries when sales have dropped. It is hoped that the scheme will help reduce the numbers of companies going under by supporting them with their cash flow during the economic downturn, and therefore will hopefully save many jobs. The three key parts of the scheme are:
- The working capital scheme: will secure up to £20bilion of loans made by banks to companies with a turnover of up to £500million.
- The Enterprise Guarantee Scheme: will secure up to £1.3billion of loans made by banks to companies with a turnover of up to £25million.
- The Capital for Enterprise Fund: will provide £75billion to invest in small businesses with high debt that desperately need a cash injection.
These measures will hopefully kick start more lending and get the economy moving, and hopefully avoid more and more job losses. Many jobs in the UK are now at risk, and unemployment is rising rapidly. It is hard to find anyone who doesn’t know someone who has been affected by the recession, or is directly affected themselves through the loss of their employment.
Recent announcements of job losses in larger organisations include JCB which has announced 700 job cuts, Land of Leather which has gone into administration and is looking for a buyer, Travis Perkins who will be making 1,400 redundancies and Waterstones which is restructuring, and as a result will cut 200 jobs. This shows that companies of all sizes and in many sectors are affected, and not just the small to medium firms.