HR Practitioner’s Diary: CheckMate!

Annie Hayes

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HR Practitioner’s Diary: CheckMate!

By Annie Hayes

Making promises that can’t be met is not a good way to start a relationship with a new hire; this week Sue Kingston treads on eggshells to defuse the situation while getting clucky with a mystery man.

W/C 11 July 2005
What a busy week! I’m feeling exhausted and I’m ready for a serious Saturday morning lie in to re-charge my batteries. Here’s why:

Moving the chess pieces
A marketing client has made a job offer to a vibrant, enthusiastic lady (Alexis) for the position of new business development. The CEO (Larry – have you guessed these are characters from Dallas?) in his own endless enthusiasm has made the offer and covered off some of the ‘detail’ with her.

Unfortunately, he has got it wrong! Larry didn’t consult with me beforehand or, even better, he ideally should have passed the responsibility to me to explain the ‘detail’ to Alexis.

1st problem – Larry has promised Alexis a company vehicle or car allowance of £300 per month. Problem here is that he has not specified the car type and has also got the car allowance amount wrong.

2nd problem – Larry has promised that the company will contribute 4% of salary to a pension scheme and the death in service cover is 4 x salary. Again, wrong!

3rd problem – he has stated her job title as Development Manager which Alexis does not like. She has categorically said that she wants ‘Director’ to be part of the title as her CV needs to be consistent. If her title states ‘Manager’ it will look like a backwards step.

4th problem – Larry intends for Alexis to replace the existing Business Director (Cliff) who is not performing. Although Cliff is still in his probationary period he thinks he is doing okay and, along with the other members of staff, he has been told that Alexis will be working alongside him to develop new business.

Alexis has been told she will be in charge of Cliff! The staff who currently report to Cliff are unsure of who they will report to in the future. Oh the tangled web I hear you cry!

5th problem – Alexis (who is an American – seriously) thinks she will have her private fuel and private calls paid for with no detriment to her – again, wrong.

6th problem – Larry wants Alexis to join on 15 August, but has not checked this with her, he has simply assumed!

Here is where the whole package of problems gets handed over to me to sort out – I love a challenge!

I’ve liaised with the Group Financial Controller to get clear directive on company car type and list price value and related this back to Alexis for clarity. She had been teasing Larry that she wanted a Jaguar or Aston Martin!

Reality check – she now knows it will be a four door executive saloon, list price around £25K. If she opts for car allowance this will provide her with £500 per month towards a vehicle of her own choice.

I’ve clarified the pension rules to Alexis in that she can contribute anything from 3% upwards within the Inland Revenue limits and that the company will match her contribution up to a maximum of 5% (bit different to just 4%)!

Also that the life cover is 3 x salary and not 4 x. Thankfully Alexis was not worried by either of these facts as she currently benefits from her husbands own company scheme.

The battle of the title still goes on, but I suspect Alexis will have her way and ‘Director’ will be included in it. It’s a fine line as to how much a potential new employee calls the shots as it sets a precedent for future negotiations.

I’m meeting with Larry to discuss ‘moving the chess pieces’ around in terms of Alexis and Cliff. It looks like Cliff will be leaving, with Alexis to replace him, but Larry hasn’t thought how he is going to negotiate his way around this one yet, especially in terms of the remaining staff understanding the changes.

Also, at this stage, Alexis has no idea she may be responsible for staff. This whole scenario is going to need very sensitive handling indeed.

Alexis now understands, having explained to her clearly, that private fuel and telephone calls will be treated as a taxable benefit. She has wisely opted to reimburse the company for private usage and keep things simple!

I’ve confirmed to Larry that Alexis is not available until 17 August which produced some brief mumblings from him. It means he will have to have a slight re-think on the timings in relation to how he is going to deal with the ‘Cliff’ situation.

Tune in for the next episode next week…………..(dah da dah, da dah da da da da, da dah dah da da dah dah – who remembers the Dallas theme tune)?

Growing old gracefully?
I attended an Employment Law seminar to look at future legislation. The liveliest debate was in respect of Age Discrimination and the impact on business.

The overall effect will impose a different approach extending from advertising jobs, recruiting and selection, benefits and rewards, retirement, redundancy, you name it, virtually every element of HR you could imagine.

Even, would you believe it, sending ‘age’ specific birthday cards to employees? If some soul is sensitive to personal comments relating to, say, their ‘big 40’ or reaching ‘half a century’, they could claim harassment and/or victimisation due to age discrimination. Companies will be expected to have clear rules in place to protect staff from this type of problem. To have nothing in place could leave you wide open to a Tribunal claim.

Bearing in mind this new Act will be on our doorsteps from 1 October 2006 I’d be interested to know what HR people are doing to prepare companies, managers, CEO’s etc for this ‘bigger’ way of thinking?

It’s bound to produce resistance and I’m sure there will be some very innovative, creative ideas to skirt around various issues.

No doubt I’ll cover off more of this subject in future diary entries, but please share your thoughts with me on this Act and we can ‘watch this space’ together.

Don’t worry, be happy
Attended another seminar on ‘Unstoppable Life’ (www.UnstoppableLife.com), how interesting was this – WOW?

Their guest speaker, Michael Markham, told us his story, how at three months old his mother returned to the hospital where she had given birth to him and returned him to their care as she was bored with him! What an introduction to life and a great opening sentence to his talk – he had our undivided attention.

Michael spent most of his youth in and out of care, treated as second best to his older brother in his adoptive home, his confidence and self-esteem shattered.

Expelled from school and in trouble with the law he had the choice of borstal or the Army – he opted for the Army. Needless to say after 14 years in the services he shaped up to become a very capable and motivated guy and since leaving the Army has gone on to be a very successful entrepreneur.

In addition he now does a lot of work mentoring under privileged youths and works with the Prince’s Trust to help others to get on in life. Michael’s enthusiasm is endless. He was invited to attend Buckingham Palace, flanked by Nelson Mandela and Bob Geldof, and was presented as a “Pioneer to the Life of the Nation.”

What a journey he has travelled through life and he’s a true inspiration. There’s quite a lot of information on the Internet on Michael which is interesting reading.

Michael’s focus is something that I think a lot of businesses could benefit from and it is something that HR professionals could feed out to their staff generally. Here’s a thought –

“Happy people are usually appreciative, flexible, tolerant, forgiving people who like people and don’t argue or seek to control. Unhappy people are less so. If you want to be happier, cultivate more appreciation, more flexibility, greater tolerance and be more forgiving.

Appreciate the person who makes you a cup of tea today or the colleague who smiles at you. Strive to forgive others who do not have the same standards as you, accept they have their own standards. You’ll find that you are happier as your journey evolves.”

Curry for your troubles!
I delivered a very successful disciplinary and grievance course in Leeds. The whole day was ‘buzzing’ with enthusiasm and everyone went away feeling that they had lots of answers to their many questions. We happily let the course run over for an extra hour as everyone was getting so much out of it – GREAT!

The delegates invited me to join them for a curry afterwards which was delightful of them, but I had to decline as I faced a long journey back to Northampton. As it was, I’d been up since 5.00 a.m. for an early start! Still, they have promised when they visit Northampton, which is fairly often, they will look me up to enjoy a curry together, no doubt to discuss their success.

I’ve set them an objective to nip workplace difficulties in the bud at informal meetings in order to avoid full blown disciplinary hearings. It can save so much time, money and stress. I enjoy the feedback so that I can measure how effective my courses are.

Roll on Saturday morning for that lie in!

Vital Stats:
For all of those ‘singletons’ out there:

Weight – 9st 11lbs (slight blip, but enjoyed a 2nd helping of a very tasty Lasagne)

Chocolate – nil again – I think the chocolate in my fridge will still be there at Easter!

Wine – nil, but three halves of Cider after three separate games of golf, it’s so refreshing.

Boyfriends – two dates (same guy) – 1st date – drive in the countryside with Charles (the Veterinarian/Farmer). No bumpy fields this time, but found two lovely pubs en route. Back at his place I helped feed a two week old Dove chick he is hand rearing – its parents had been attacking it. Handling its food (live mealworms) is quite an experience, but he (the bird, not Charles) was a grateful little thing!
2nd date – Charles had a busy day making hay, so I invited him to mine for a BBQ to save him cooking. He’s offered to help on some heavy landscaping I need to do in my garden. Great, I’ll take him up on the offer and get the job done in half the time. Sounds like another good reason to BBQ too.

Deep thoughts – When your alarm goes off in the morning shout “Under Fire” and pretend your journey to the kitchen is through enemy territory – see how many times you can ‘duck and dive’ on route to your first cup of coffee. It starts your day off in a whacky way, but you’ll smile throughout the day just thinking of it – go on be a devil and try it! Even better, try it with your partner, see who’s first to the kitchen, loser makes the bacon butties – great fun!

Keep it simple everyone and enjoy your week ahead!

*Sue Kingston is a self-employed HR Consultant with 23 years HR experience. Sue can be contacted on T: 07966 216561 or at hr@suekingston.co.uk

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