From recent experience I would like to offer up 3 very small titbits about the working time regs:

Always get an opt out form signed by the employee - better to make it a separate form and get it signed on induction or before, of course they don’t have to and they can opt back in again, but believe me, forgetting or neglecting this and they do over the hours - HEADACHE!

KEEP RECORDS - always keep records of the hours worked - it is easy to get people to send in a timesheet to record what hours they do. Failing to keep records incurs financial penalties, if find out, and frankly it is good management to know what and when your people are working

If your people are regularly doing excessive hours - look at hiring someone else, it will mean BETTER PRODUCTIVITY in the long term and possibly less cost in overtime.

This is a very interesting concept and analysis of the financial gains for the organsation when not only employees are engaged but those engaged employees meet engaged customers. This article/book brings together the ideas of Six sigma analysis which has been so successful in manufacturing (I was green belt trained in Six Sigma by GE, so I know of the advantages of it being conducted well) and applying the rigour to employees and customers.

It is not good enough for HR just to be interested in employee engagement, this in itself does not create a large financial gain, combine it with a engaged custoemr base and BOOOM!!! financial impact made.

The book advises 5 golden rules:

Human Sigma is based on five new rules to bring excellence to the way employees engage and interact with customers:

RULE #1: E Pluribus Unum. Employee and customer experiences must be managed together — not as separate entities.

RULE #2: Feelings Are Facts. Emotions drive and shape the employee-customer encounter.

RULE #3: Think Globally, Measure and Act Locally. The employee-customer encounter must be measured and managed at the local level.

RULE #4: There Is One Number You Need to Know. Employee and customer engagement interact to drive enhanced financial performance. And this interaction can be quantified and summarized with a single performance metric.

RULE #5: If You Pray for Potatoes, You Better Grab a Hoe. This means that good intentions alone do not constitute a plan of action. Sustainable improvement in the employee-customer encounter requires disciplined local action coupled with a companywide commitment to changing how employees are recruited, positioned in roles, rewarded and recognized, and importantly, how they are managed.

I find this theory very exciting and I will blog about it when I have absorbed the book, I have always had an objection to employee engagement as a very internal measure of productivity, slightly lacking in substance - I am interested to see a hard measure for bring the reported large benefit to the bottom line.

Thank you big brother for sending me the article!!

DLA Piper, legal firm has conducted some interesting research across the UK regarding preparation for Swine Flu.

It seems to indicate that regional businesses have taken the threat of swine flu seriously, with 83% reviewing their business continuity plans, however not looking closely enough at the legal impacts of changing working arrangements and conditions.

Of 428 businesses of all sizes across the UK, over half believed themselves to be at high or very high risk of swine flu affecting their business and 80% had reviewed their absence management procedures as a result of the outbreak.

However, a quarter of regional businesses had opted not to communicate their business continuity plans to their staff, whilst almost half had chosen not to inform their customers or suppliers of their arrangements. Hmmm, so how are these plans going to be activated quickly and without panic or fuss? Better keep the communication going strong.

This is not the first time businesses have been faced with continuity planning and possible ammends to terms and conditions, remember Bird Flu? Maybe it is time to have a hard look at the overall long term policy on business continuity and make sure you have something manageable, well communicated and robust in place that can be activated at a moments notice.

It would save on re-writing the rules everytime there is a propective pandemic or other disaster looming.

A London police constable managed to boost his salary to more than £100,000 last year with repeated overtime, the officer was among 38 in the Met to receive more than £100,000 last year, while one sergeant also received more than £100,000, and three others received £100,000 each.

Considering a constable’s basic salary can reach £34,707, but with London weighting and other allowances, this can go up to just over £42,000. This still double the original salary in overtime.

Overtime can become to some employees a right rather than a business need - if overtime is excessive you have your manpower plan wrong and you need to review and re-align to actual business requirements.

I just got out of the habit of saying DTI (department of trade and Industry) and now BERR (Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform) is becoming BIS (Business, Innovation and Skills). BERR joins with DIUS (Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills) which in the press release should “create a single department committed to building Britain’s future economic strengths”. The last re-brand cost the Government a total of £218,063, I imagine the cost this time is likely to be inflated over the cost two years ago.

Will there be cost savings in removing any duplication or possible redundancies?

I like the fact that the higher education sector will be brought closer to the world of commerce and industry, as a recruiter I see many graduates poorly prepared for the actual work they are supposed to be trained to carry out.

Interestingly the first item mentioned on the Government’s press release is “Advocate the needs of business across government, especially of UK small businesses” which is a nod towards the huge SME sector of the UK economy.

We shall see what occurs in practice…

The UK Government suggest in its contingency plan that large organisations should plan for absence up to 15% and for small businesses up to 30%. Also bad luck for smaller organisations as it is said that it is likely to spread quicker in smaller workforces.

Also you need to think about emergency time off for dependents – those caring for a sick dependent, also those advised to stay at home or are even too worried to attend work.

All this means contingency plans for coping in a crisis, this should include:

enhanced protection for sites and vulnerable employees
raising employees’ awareness and testing readiness
maintaining health surveillance and hygiene measures
producing action plans that are specific to locations

Here is a link to the Cabinet Office checklist for Business and a pdf from the NHS on HR issues

I suppose I am like the rest of the country, hoping that it will phizzle out but as the Scouting Movement’s motto goes “Be Prepared”.

The Work Foundation has announced that it will be examining the future of HR, looking at:

- Who and what HR can uniquely champion.
- The role HR plays in levels of risk aversion, professional judgement and accountability in the organisation.
- Employee engagement where alignment of objectives and motivation cannot be taken for granted so that this tension drives innovation, diversity and positive energy.
- Future trends in the economy, the workforce and the workplace within which HR operate.

Thank you The Work Foundation! I will be watching the progression and final outcome with great interest. What does HR produce? Has it been the case that HR has hidden behind the intangibility of people management? I have always though this to be an excuse, although direct impact is sometimes difficult to measure we can measure preceived indirect benefits and absolutes like reductions in employee turnover, absence, recruitment costs etc.

Is there also a propensity hide behind the need for process and procedures, generally driven by legislation, but occasionally over-engineered for political correctness and to feel that HR controls the process rather than management?

In regard to engagement, I seem to get a different and vague response about what “engagement” actually is from almost every HR practioner I meet, I will be interested in their results in that respect.

Personnel Today are looking for your views on this…

Mercer has produced a report on Absence and Healthcare benefits for 2008. I am a bit cheap and haven’t purchased the 2008 survey but looking at the 2007. One of the most interesting facts for me is that 80% of business managers surveyed know the rate of absence (eg the percentage) but only half of that number know the reasons and even less know the cost of the absence.

No surprises, but how can you tackle absence if you don’t know the reasons (you could have an institutional problem you don’t even know about) and why would a business manager but motivated to do anything if they dont know the cost effect?

I received a message from a blog-reader (if that is the technical term!) on Linkedin about my blog about it is the job not the person. The writer has recently been made redundant and it helped to remind him that it wasn’t about him or his performance but the fact that the job couldn’t be supported any longer.

At the time of writing the blog, I wasn’t thinking about the employees, just business reasons and lack of knowledge/good sense on the behalf of management (HR can be included quite happily in this catagory). It allowed me to remember the time I was put at risk - I cried. I knew intellectually it wasn’t about me - it was a case of wrong time, wrong place in the organisation but I still was very emotional about it - which rather took back my Director as he thought I was “stronger than that”.

It is too easy to forget or neglect the human impact in redundancy, sometimes as a protection mechanism for ourselves against the obvious emotional impact of telling someone they are to be sacked through no fault of their own (well, those who don’t end up at the bottom of the selection pile for poor performance etc).

I suppose let’s remember the “human” in Human Resources.

Whenever I am asked about redundancy and the process required, I am confronted with the same issue over and over.  Managers and business owners look at their organisation and think about people not jobs, then make first judgements on “who” should go, not “what” should go.

If you need to loose staff, please remember this:  Redundancy is about a cessation in work or a reduction in the work available, think about what jobs are no longer necessary, don’t think about who is not performing.  Otherwise you could be damaging your business by getting claims for unfair selection for redundancy.

There are other methods for dealing with poor performers…�