Fit notes now required after 28 days, not 7 To support the current burden on GPs as they provide support with the COVID-19 vaccine programme, new temporary measures relating to the certification of sickness absence have been put in place by the government. The amount of time an employee can self-certify their sickness absence for […]
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Accountability and remote working
Prefer to listen? Click the play button above 👆 Prefer to read? Read on below 👇 Today, I want to talk about the topic of accountability especially in relation to remote working. How I see accountability is best explained, I find, through my job as an HR consultant travelling in and out of many […]
Employing Adults, not Children
“I tripped over the box on the stairs, why didn’t you tell me it was in my way”, “I saw the others using gloves, but no one told me I should use them too”, “You’ve no right to make my job redundant, you should protect every job”, “I’m not changing the way I do things.” […]
Leadership lessons from our daily Coronavirus briefings
It strikes me that the very visible leadership afforded us through daily Coronavirus briefings will leave a lasting legacy about what leadership looks and feels like in the UK. I love the fact that leadership has been visible at this time, daily briefings is something I have never experienced before. I have a few concerns […]
Have graduates made themselves unemployable?
57% of Graduates expect to stay in their first graduate role for less than a year … Only 12% of new graduates expect to stay in their first role for longer than 2 years. This research by Step has got to be the most dispiriting and damaging poll I’ve seen this year. Dispiriting for employers, […]
Are you racist? Are we all racist?
I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about Engagement recently, thinking it’s time to challenge a few of our ‘accepted’ D&I principles. I’ve slowly been coming to the conclusion that in this PC world of ours not enough challenging is going on about the essence of people, the essence of who we are, and how […]
Jaluch Culture – Tips from the Team
Leaders – face it! It’s time to tackle the ‘c’ word At Jaluch we think the time has come to face up to the ‘c’ word and challenge employers to take an honest look at how they run their businesses. We’re talking, of course about “culture”. Sexist scandals at giants like Google and Topshop […]
Impasse, Intransigence and Idiocy! Has anyone ever heard of Group Think?
Welcome to my blog. I read in the papers this week that the UK (that would be you and me then!) had expected our esteemed politicians to return from their two-week Easter Break having cogitated and ruminated on how to break the current political impasse. An expectation that views would have softened, minds newly opened […]
What CAN I say? Are my opinions insulting?
Good employee relations is dependent upon most of your staff getting on well with each other and their managers most of the time. We live in an imperfect world so I feel that ‘most’ is the right end goal and by ‘getting on well with’, I mean they talk to each other, laugh together, eat […]
Power and control in the workplace
Do your employees hold the power or do you? In my last blog I wrote about fear in the workplace, the all-encompassing fear that holds so many of us back. This time I turn my attention to something else that can leave us frozen and incapable of action … power. Of course power, when used […]
Fear in the workplace
It strikes me that far too many decisions are made in the workplace in response to fear. Fear of: Which of these is your greatest or most frequent fear? Is it on my list? But more importantly, what is the greatest fear of those you manage or work alongside? Do their fears impact how successfully […]
D&I and the danger of a narcissist in the team…
Is the most popular person in your business singlehandedly destroying it? For some years my path has regularly crossed an individual who on the face of it is the driving force behind the team’s success. She brings in energy, vibrancy, and draws people together. She appears caring and empathetic. But what I have increasingly become […]
Are the foundations of #MeToo behaviours being built in your workforce?
In the last eighteen months, since the birth of the #MeToo movement there has been much talk of unwanted sexual advances in the workplace (typically, but not always, senior men taking advantage of women who are junior to them). Some of those men either overtly or covertly even demand sex in return for opportunity, pay […]
From ‘I’ to ‘We’ – A positive culture can’t survive if there is no sense of team
How do you create a culture of engagement, high employee morale, great retention of good staff when for decades all the workplace legislation that has been published in the UK relates to Individual Rights, rather than the Rights of the team or group? How does it work in your family or friendship group? Do you […]
Panic Decision making
As the candidate market squeezes employers looking for the next great find, is there a danger we sometimes panic and just appoint the best person we can find, whilst our backs are up against the wall? I have certainly experienced this across two decades in business and with hindsight have always come to rue my […]
Fake news from the HR department…or is it a case of blame HR for everything?
It’s been my experience across the past few years that Google page 1, in trying to be helpful, is actually causing untold problems in our society. Have you found that everyone is becoming ever more lazy at checking the facts or digging into the detail? Books have already gone ‘audible’ so we don’t even have […]
NDA – no longer the protective shield it used to be?
With the announcement in parliament that Sir Philip Green is the latest businessman who has hidden behind NDA’s to protect himself and his reputation in respect of discrimination and/or harassment, let’s take a couple of minutes to talk about NDA’s. Nearly 30 years ago, I signed an NDA after suing a company that, in my […]
Am I a monster because I’m prejudiced?
“I’ve got biases. Serious bias. If ever I tell anyone about them they say I’m prejudiced. I thought I was just a normal feeling, sensing human being so how come I now feel as though I no longer fit into our society, into the workplace? Am I really the dinosaur, the pariah the media suggest […]
Do NOT commit to a 3 or 5 year HR services contract
Over the last few weeks I have read in numerous places about the likelihood of a recession hitting us in the next year or so. The last time recession struck there were tens of thousands of companies stuck with inflexible, expensive long term HR services contracts they were unable to get out of or renegotiate. […]
I asked for a covering letter with your application…
I asked for a covering letter with your application… You failed at the first hurdle! When I asked all applicants to include a covering letter with their CV, what conclusions do I draw when you don’t include a covering letter? I have a few options… You can’t read You can’t write a letter You have […]
Rethinking your Organisational Values? Don’t make it just a paper exercise!
When I step out the door in the morning, I don’t always recognise or like what I see around me. What’s happened to the bold and brave, value driven Britain I grew up in? There are a few glimmers of it, but some would say that when life becomes too soft, people stop trying. Why […]
The self-employment delusion
Who really wants to be self-employed once they find the grass is not as green as it looked? As those who work with Jaluch will already know, this year I am judging the Venus Awards Employer of the Year (London Region). That role has led to me having conversations with many business owners in recent […]
When ‘it’s my right to sue’ blinds employees to their own wrongdoing
Is your business at risk from employees who are so focused on their legal rights including their right to sue their employer, that they are blinded to the part they themselves played in their own downfall? A couple of weeks ago I read of an employee bringing a constructive dismissal case against his employer and […]
If You’re Hell Bent on Failure, Appoint a Fool!
I thought I’d start this blog with a few strong words. I feel these past two weeks I have encountered fool after fool. As a business person, it just breaks my heart to see how useless some organisations become as a result of putting idiots in charge. Sometimes though, it’s my impression that the fools […]
Is Lethargy in Your Business a Hidden Killer?
I find it so exciting when I meet businesses with a healthy shot of oomph. The day always seems so much brighter. In contrast, my mood dips and I find it so dispiriting when I come across the opposite. I see the dictionary suggests various words for the opposite of oomph: apathy, lethargy, indifference, inactivity, […]
Shape Up or Ship Out of HR-or Business
With Maslow in mind, one of the key ingredients in attaining a sense of satisfaction in life is working in a profession that you are proud of. I consider myself as working in two professions: HR and Business Ownership. There are times when I am hugely proud of both, but other times I am hugely […]
A Gender Pay Gap Horror Story! Could Unconscious Bias Training Kick Start A Change?
It’s A Gender Pay Gap Horror Story! Could Unconscious Bias training kick start a change? So with the gender pay gap horror story unfolding, there are no guesses allowed in respect of where good (competent) women will be heading this year! Invariably in the opposite direction of those companies that have fallen far short of […]
Do Employers Have a Responsibility to Retrain Older Workers?
Is Technology Wiping Out Jobs For Older Workers? As customers, we have all over the past few years seen the removal of checkout operators in our supermarkets and traditional bank tellers from our banks as self service and automation take over the majority of these roles. And apart from the irritating glitch when it asks […]
Bam! The frustration of dealing with staff who lack the skills to do their job!
I recently sat for 9 long hours on a plane. I read a really good book from start to finish, but 9 hours is a long time to be sat on your backside, especially following 3 hours bottom numbing in the departure lounge, and 90 minutes of inactivity on public transport getting to the airport […]
Could sexual harassment DENIAL sink your business?
In this #metoo world a veritable can of worms has been let loose to squirm their way into all corners of our organisations. What’s going on? Who in your world is a seething mass of resentment waiting for their turn to speak up or an exploding volcano of anger shouting out already about perceived slights […]
The Demonisation of Zero Hours Contracts
Welcome to my blog. In this blog I wanted to talk about zero hours and flexibility. It infuriates me when employment practices are dictated by over emotional and ill thought through media/public hysteria. In recent years, I have been horrified by the demonisation of zero hours contracts. We live in a world where 75% of […]
Harassment in the workplace … are your staff saying #Metoo?
#MeToo has been trending since the Harvey Weinstein media fury kicked off. Men and women are coming forwards saying that they too have had to deal with harassment. I empathise. It is endemic. Both the serious stuff and the lesser kind of harassment. The loud assertive voices saying ‘get over it’ or ‘you’re being over […]
Islamaphobia and Bathophobia, but should it be Metathesiophobia?
The HR Brexit Blog written by Helen Jamieson Welcome to the 2nd Brexit blog from Jaluch. The Brexit years are going to be a testing time for HR. This blog aims to address some of the issues we, as a profession, have to face as and when they emerge. This week my question for […]
5 key HR skills for surviving Trump’s madhouse
Welcome to this week’s blog. At the moment I don’t know whether to laugh or cry. If I laugh my pitch is likely to be pretty high and the laugh more akin to hysteria than true mirth. If I cry it’s because Trump and Farage between them have unleashed tensions in our societies never before […]
Difficult people at work – who’s making your life a misery?
All too often managers phoning our advice line ask for legal support with their ‘difficult person’. And all too often in training sessions am I asked to provide managers with my most amazing insights into how we should manage the difficult people in our teams. I think that delegates think they are asking me to […]
Is workplace anger making life miserable?
A topic that seems to have raised its head on a regular basis over the past few months has been that of anger. Perhaps prompted by us at Jaluch supporting a lot of organisations with redundancies, grievances and disciplinaries at the moment…. a real hotbed of change and unrest perhaps brought on in part by […]
What a miserable mess!
About role models, leadership examples and companies that think tech trumps law. In writing a blog this week, I really don’t know where to begin. Should I write about the unholy mess that is Uber? Uber has potentially just hit the rails in the UK after ploughing ahead with its jaw dropping business model that […]
‘Talking’ of Repercussions when you don’t keep your Data safe!
Today I read about Talk Talk being fined £400,000 for security failings that led to the data of over 150,000 customers being stolen in a cyber attack. The Information Commissioner’s response has been pretty swift given that this occurred less than 12 months ago. I think this is the largest fine I have ever seen […]
Racism in the workplace – act now and stamp it out!
In recent months at Jaluch, we have seen more racism in the workplace than at any other time I can recall in the past 20 years of running an HR business. And whilst some of it is mild (if there is such a thing) what is really worrying is that quite a bit of it […]
Bore out, bullying and Byron Burger – it’s a week of three B’s.
It’s a good week to blog. It might be the start of the school summer holidays but life is anything but mundane at the moment. 3 topics have caught my attention this week and I felt they all deserved some comment. It’s the week of the three B’s : Bore Out, bullying and Byron, with […]
Are Restraint of Trade Clauses about to disappear? Do you care?
Are non-compete/restraint of trade clauses important to your business? Probably submerged under a deluge of press about Brexit and the shenanigans of various politicians, it has barely hit the media that the government is currently consulting about removing the option of non-compete clauses. This will be in order to ‘make Britain the best place in […]
Project Fear? Project Irresponsible!
The British have for months been subjected to project fear, project threat, project utter ridiculous and project downright nonsense. I have been embarrassed time after time by influential political, business and civil leaders, with all types of affiliation, thinking that their airtime and public profile and self-important posturing are more important than calm, steady, honest […]
Managing yourself: productivity review
Is it time for a productivity review? We all spend much of each day striving to be effective and productive. But how many of us have a clue about our actual level of productivity? If you could rate your productivity in the past 60 mins what score would you give out of ten? Go on, […]
Feeling Jaded or weary? Feeling cynical about life?
If you’re feeling jaded then you’re not alone, if you’re feeling like you’re on a train that just keeps passing the same places you’re not alone, and if you’re feeling like ‘been there, done that ad infinitum’ then you are not alone. The problem though is that the jaded, cynical, or bored delegates I see […]
The diversity imperative
So often I am asked what companies can do to overcome diversity challenges. It’s a never ending tale of… not enough women, how can we recruit or retain more… not enough ethnic minorities, how can we encourage more to apply to us… massive cultural gaps between offices impacting communication… too many women leaving after maternity […]
Do leaders understand what society wants of them?
Last week I watched endless news reports about the Hillsborough verdict and the BHS fiasco. This all follows years of major issues around honesty and integrity in government, in the NHS, in boardrooms, in charities etc. With this in mind, I must ask… do leaders understand what society wants from them? It appears to be […]
Group think: the 8 symptoms
Sometimes I find there is so much going on in the world, I simply can’t decide what to write about. But applying a bit of mental self-discipline, there is one topic that both fascinates and horrifies me… Group Think. I’ll talk a bit in a minute about the workplace, but firstly, it’s not surprising that […]
Diversity – but on our terms…
In recent months, I have delivered numerous seminars on the topics of diversity, inclusion and unconscious bias. What strikes me is how often I hear people talk of other people’s – or other organisations’ – biases, whilst singularly failing to recognise their own. I was contacted around 6 months ago by an events manager […]
Seven key lessons I’ve learned about managing staff
There is a special art to managing staff. Here, I’ve put together my top 7 management lessons to help you effectively manage your team and guide your company to greatness! 1. One size doesn’t fit all… As a people manager, you must remain flexible and adaptable, because things change all the time. People are complicated […]
