April 2008

Dear Reader,

Welcome to the first Gap HR newsletter. I hope to concentrate on HR issues that are particularly relevant to small businesses with fewer than 50 employees. I have therefore chosen to send this first newsletter primarily to current or past clients, and colleagues and friends. If you do not want to receive another issue please forgive me for sending this one, but do please forward it on to someone else who would benefit from receiving it before you ‘unsubscribe’!

Approachable HR

Most of my clients get in contact with me because they want to check that they are “doing things correctly” with regard to employment law issues. Employment legislation has turned into the bogey monster over the past few years, with some justification. However many employers are ignorant of, or choosing to ignore, the reasons why the employee market has become so strongly regulated, and how employers can still run successful businesses, despite everything.

In the good old days, the employer held all the cards and the employee had to do what was asked, or go and find a new job, often without a reference if there had been an acrimonious split. Much as some employers hark back to that situation as the golden days, it actually didn’t make for productive employees, more likely vindictive employees who took every opportunity to “get what they were owed”.

Much of today’s employment legislation (although there are major changes afoot) actually helps employers to get the most from their staff and encourages them (admittedly with the stick rather than the carrot) to manage them properly!

Discrimination legislation helps to encourage employers to clearly define what the role needs and what the necessary skills and experience are to do the job well, for the benefit of the company (and revenue), rather than employing someone based on what they look like and how entertaining they would be at the office party.

Statutory disciplinary guidelines help create a more level playing field for both sides. If the employer has a bad day and, as a last straw, fires an employee for being back 2 minutes late from lunch, this is damaging for the business and unfair on the employee. It is damaging for the business because you have spent money recruiting and training the employee and, particularly if it is a customer facing role, you risk losing the custom of those clients that were working well with the employee, generating revenue. Surely it is far better to have an informal chat and then a more formal meeting if necessary about such a small issue, rather than wasting all the money and time already invested? Unfortunately, although you would think that this is good management practice, often the stick of a hefty fine is needed to encourage the most resistant of managers to conform to best practice, which is a shame.

Gap HR works closely with its clients to ensure that they can work effectively within their external constraints to continue to grow their business and generate high profit margins from motivated and productive staff.

How to ... employ someone and not go mad in the process

When your staff come to you and say “There’s too much work! I can’t cope! You need to hire someone!” you’re first reaction is probably “Thank goodness we have so much business” and the second one is “I can’t afford more staff”. And you’re possibly right, maybe you don’t need to.

Before you rush to put the ad in the local paper, sit down with your existing staff and go through your processes. Is there a way of changing the processes to make them more effective? If you ask the team, you will probably be surprised at how innovative their ideas are, with their experience of “working at the coal face” they often see what is superfluous or duplicated.

If there is a genuine need for more staff, seriously consider promoting your existing loyal and experienced staff into more responsible or varying roles and hiring the new person at the “bottom of the ladder”. This is probably the most cost effective way of adding to overhead. The existing staff are more loyal because they feel recognised and rewarded for their hard work and loyalty, and are usually more than happy to show the office junior how to do things, maybe more than if you had brought someone in above their heads... And if, for whatever reason, it doesn’t work out, it is easier to find less skilled workers and has less impact on the revenue earning side of the business.

Free Stuff and Resources

On the website you will find an employee information sheet which you can download and use. This will gather all the information you need in one place for setting them up on payroll (your bookkeeper/accountant will love you) and also acts as checklist as to what documents you need to have about your employee. I strongly recommend taking a copy of the passport of all staff, current and future, because if you now, even unwittingly, hire an illegal worker, the fine is £10,000. Worth taking a copy of the passport of all staff, just to make sure that there is no risk to the business. Unless you have a spare £10,000 of course!

Often Health and Safety is lumped together with HR because it deals with employees. However, it is actually an extremely specialised area, even for office-based companies. Goode Business Management works with SMEs, offering a range of consultancy services, helping companies implement or maintain their ISO9000 quality and health and safety management systems and facilitating the implementation of best practice against the EFQM Excellence Model. The experience and specialist knowledge that Goode Business Management consultants bring to their clients provides the professional resources to support the business or legal needs of IS09000, EFQM and health and safety.

Best wishes

Carolyne Wahlen