The government is announcing instant lockdowns on an almost daily basis on Twitter.

Your staff may have to go into self-isolation after a week in sunny Manchester.

Therefore we recommend giving out this letter to all staff who have holiday booked in the next month, so that everything is clear before they go.

All staff will need to be paid the same amount, i.e. all take unpaid leave, or all get SSP.

Do not discriminate between departments or full time/part time staff.Read More…

I love reading.

But, with a busy business, and two teenagers, I don’t usually get to do as much as I’d like.

Lockdown was different though – the extra time at the weekends meant I could indulge my passion to the full.

While I’m mainly reaching for a novel, the one weekly publication I never usually miss is the Economist.

However, during lockdown it started getting delivered on a Monday rather than a Friday or Saturday, which meant I didn’t have time to get through it before the next weekend, by which point it was often pretty out of date.

In the end, I turned to the digital version.Read More…

Your employees, however well you get on with them, are there to earn money.

Never forget this.

So many small business owners make the mistake of treating employees like family or buddies.

This is all well and good when things are going smoothly.

But what happens when a downturn in business means you have to make someone redundant?

I’ve seen it, and they react especially badly. They turn up to work to pay the bills.

When that has gone, any friendship you built is immediately in jeopardy.

They may instead feel moved to sue, and the business could fold. It happens; don’t assume you’re immune to it.

And this week, we had an added refinement on this theme:

Don’t assume they appreciate the same things you do.

Such as WhatsApp messages containing pornographic videos.Read More…

I tried to buy a TV this weekend.

We’ve needed a new one for months, ever since I pressed too hard on a corner and created black lines across the top of the screen.

In truth, we’ve bumbled along just fine, barely noticing the line, but now that the retailers have stock to shift and the email offers are coming in thick and fast, I thought it was time I sorted it.

After looking at the Which? recommendations, I found one that fit the bill – Samsung, under £1,000 and in-stock at my local Currys.

Simple and straightforward transactions tend to elude me, so you won’t be surprised to know that this is when things started to go pear-shaped.

After adding the TV to my basket, I got a ‘computer says no’ message.

“This item is not available for delivery, but you can click and collect”

Not ideal.  I had wanted it installed and the old one disposed of, but in these trying times I figured I could cope with a 6-mile drive to Didcot to pick it up myself.

Except I couldn’t.
Read More…

Unsurprisingly, we’re still SUPER busy here at Golf HR.

Thanks to the pandemic, we’re assisting with lots of changes, restructuring, and – unfortunately – the process of parting company with staff.

But during the sad – but crucial – process of deciding which roles need to go within a business, we all too regularly hit upon a serious mistake.

It’s usually when we’re in the middle of discussing staff members and what they do, when the manager pipes up with something along the lines of:

“This person needs to go – they’ve been with us for 2 years and 3 months, but they were never really good enough, they’ve got a poor attitude, so let’s get rid of them now!”.

Laying aside the fact that part of a manager’s job is to “manage” poor performance, the most irritating part of this statement is the fact that despite believing that their employee “needs to go”, they’ve allowed them to drag their employment on over the magical 2-year line.

What is the magical 2-year line?Read More…

As you might expect, we’re very busy at the moment.

Clearly, we’re heavily involved in several restructuring projects, but we’re also dealing with long-term sickness absences and a few – believe it or not – disciplinary processes.

One of our key roles in all people management issues is to ensure our clients follow all the correct processes, and if they do, they give themselves the very best chance of being protected.

We can’t stop an employee starting a tribunal, especially now they’re free.

But by making sure a fair and reasonable process is followed, we minimise the danger of an ambulance chaser solicitor seeing pound signs when they hear what has been going on.

In 95% of the processes we carry out, just following the correct process and guidelines is enough to make sure that there is no Early Conciliation or tribunal claim.

But for the other 5% we have an ace up our sleeve – settlement agreements.

What is a “settlement agreement”?

Read More…