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| July 2010 |
| Businesses helped to pass their MOT |
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 28 businesses from across the south coast attended a seminar and workshop yesterday at 1000 Lakeside, Portsmouth where they put their marketing and HR through a thorough MOT aimed at better preparing them for the road ahead.
The free seminar, which provided dozens of valuable tips on achieving peak performance, was hosted by renowned business coach Ian Dickson and HR specialists Handover HR.
“We put together our HR MOT as a quick checklist any company can use to assess compliance, performance and how good their foundations are” explained presenter Kirstie Loveridge from Handover HR. “It helps companies to be in the best condition to run and run as the economy grows stronger.
We were very pleased with the turnout today, the input everyone made and the positive buzz in the room.”
Many of the guests left armed with immediate actions that could prevent their businesses from running into trouble further down the track, including Helen Somerset-How from The Rainbow Charity in Fareham.
“I found the whole workshop very useful” she commented. “There were so many points from the Handover HR audit that just struck such a note with me. I shall go back and look at all my processes and procedures to try and get the building blocks in place for the future.”
 Ian Dickson has won many accolades and awards as a business performance coach, mentoring hundreds of businesses to greater success. His seminars run each month and he frequently partners with experts that can provide greater insight into specific areas that are often minefields for businesses. “It was great to be able to share and combine my knowledge, experience and content with a forward thinking, modern and professional HR company like Handover HR today” Ian said. “They delivered a fun, though-provoking session.”
The seminars that Ian runs are designed with one clear objective - to enable people to take better control of their businesses and develop themselves. “There are no shortcuts to great places” Ian told his audience. “Taking massive action is the key to success!”
David Hewlett, Managing Director of The Business Business in Southampton was one of many attendees inspired to take action after the workshop. “It was excellent and coherent” he told us. “I am taking away lots of tools I can use”.
Any business that missed the seminar can have a free onsite MOT and HR audit run by the Handover HR team to check how fit they are for the journey ahead. Handover HR can be contacted on 0845 389 3505 (www.handoverhr.co.uk) . The next free seminar “Mind your own Business” is on 27th August at the Inn Lodge, Burrfields. It can be booked through www.iandickson.biz
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| Assessment centre a huge success |
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| Hampshire’s HR specialists Handover HR walked away worthy winners of one of Solent EBP’s “Amazing People” awards on July 14th, after being praised for their commitment and work within the Adopt a School initiative.
Over 400 students passed through the doors of Taunton College in Southampton recently as local business experts gave students a taste that they might face in the real jobs world. HR specialists Handover HR from Bishops Waltham, who led the assessments and were involved in the preparation and planning of the event, hailed the day a huge success.
“It was a great honour to be able to contribute to the logistics of running such an event at the college” commented Kirstie Loveridge from Handover HR. “We saw how much the students enjoyed the day but also benefitted from preparing them for future employment.”
Handover HR have been involved with Solent EBP over the last 12 months in various capacities. Their extensive HR experience has helped to fine tune students’ career planning and preparation for entering the future jobs market. “And we really enjoy going back to college for the day!” enthused Kirstie.
The event was organised by Solent EBP, Fortis Insurance, Handover HR and Young Chamber, with many Hampshire Chamber of Commerce members giving their time free of charge to interview students.
During the day there were scenario based assessments testing initiative, creativity, cooperation, teamwork and communication skills as well as psychometric testing to assess ability to judge and handle diversity issues. Handover HR provided mock interviews, something that strikes fear into the heart of most people.
Liz Lee, Curriculum Director at Tauntons Colllege told us “The feedback from students (and staff) has been very positive and I know our students had a really valuable experience, particularly having people like Handover HR to interview them”
Students were also taken by bus to the QEII Cruise Terminal Southampton where they met still more business people and were involved in a number of diverse activities.
Handover HR’s directors are also actively involved with Business Southampton's “Adopt-a-School initiative, working with Wyvern Technology College. Since the launch of the programme at the Business Southampton Annual Conference in 2008 there are now 27 local organisations involved in the scheme.
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| HR stars shine at Amazing People Awards |
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|  Hampshire’s HR specialists Handover HR walked away worthy winners of one of Solent EBP’s “Amazing People” awards on July 14th, after being praised for their commitment and work within the Adopt a School initiative.
Kirstie Loveridge, Director at Handover HR was at Harbour Lights with other directors to collect the award from South Todays’ Laura Trant, who hosted the evening. Kirstie and two colleagues has a particularly personal reason for being passionate enthusiasts for their adopted school Wyvern Technology College – they are all previous ex-students there.
“We have been involved with the programme for about a year” Kirstie said. “In that time we have helped Wyvern’s students to get a taste of the real world by running workshops, role-playing of interviews and business insight exercises. Not only do these build understanding, skills and confidence, they also help students to see whether HR might be a career they are interested in pursuing in the future.”
Solent EBP promotes the building of valuable partnerships between businesses and education across the south coast area.
Over 200 people were gathered at the awards event, which celebrated the successes of many organisations and was co-hosted by Queens Award winner Angela Wright of Solent Education Business Partnership.
“It’s always a privilege to be nominated and we never expected to win” said Chloe Carey, Handover HR. “I’m proud of how much time and energy all our staff and directors put into the scheme. We are constantly amazed by how much difference it makes to the young people we are involved with at Wyvern.”
Handover HR will be running a free seminar for south coast businesses in conjunction with European Business Coach Ian Dickson on July 28th. Designed to help businesses to prepare for success in the future and packed with tips for better sales, marketing and HR performance, the event is from 12-2pm at 1000 Lakeside, Portsmouth. To register visit www.iandickson.biz
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This Months Q & A
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Q. One of my employees recently left and I need to recruit to fill the vacancy. I know of a person who I think would be perfect for the role but someone has told me that it would be illegal for me to offer them the job without advertising it internally and externally first, is this true?
A. This is a popular urban myth that has no real substance. Selecting the most appropriate candidate is the key activity in any recruitment process, as getting it wrong will waste time and money. One of the best ways of finding the right person, whilst saving costs, can be a referral to a suitable person. When you are recruiting the area you have to be careful about is discrimination and not treating a protected group of people any less favourably. People are protected from discrimination on grounds of age, sex, race, religious beliefs, disability and part time status. You should clarify your commitment to avoid discrimination in your equal opportunities policy and you may also have a recruitment policy. If so I would check you haven’t committed yourself to advertising every vacancy. Assuming you have no contractual commitment you would be safe to offer the person you say the role and good luck.
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| June 2010 |
| This Months Q&A |
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Q. If an employee is struggling, can we demote rather than dismiss, and should we give them notice?
We have an employee who is on a final warning relating to their capability. A further incident has arisen, also linked to their capability, but the next step would have be to dismiss them. I would like to give the person one final opportunity to work it out and believe that we may have promoted them beyond their capability. Instead of dismissing, can I demote them and do I have to give them notice?
A. The ACAS Code of Practice refers to actions such as demotion as a sanction short of dismissal. With capability issues it is vital you follow your disciplinary policy, explain the issues you have with the person and give them time to improve. Assuming you have completed this, It is certainly an option to consider demoting the person. Unless their contract of employment specifies a notice period for implementing such an action, it is fine to just do it with immediate effect following the final disciplinary hearing.
If the employee has an issue with the demotion they can appeal, but effectively in doing so would be opting for dismissal instead of demotion.
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Free Business Seminar
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| May 2010 |
This Months Q & A
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We recently dismissed an employee after she was off sick for two days but stated on Facebook that she was out at her friend's drinking on the night of the first day 'sick'. She was at the end of an extended probationary period as we had many misgivings over her reliability and absenteeism. We were about to give her 1 weeks notice, however, after having been caught taking a ‘sickie’, we dismissed her on the spot. Is she entitled to pay in lieu of notice?
Well she will have under a year’s service so she will not be protected against being unfairly dismissed, however that doesn’t mean she may argue it wasn’t gross misconduct. She will not be entitled to a payment in lieu of notice if her conduct which led to the dismissal constituted gross misconduct. You may be wise to hold a meeting with her to find out if there is an explanation, although I wouldn’t suggest you need to hold a full disciplinary hearing. She may admit that there was nothing wrong in which case you don’t have to pay notice, or she may give you some other information from which you can decide if paying notice is justified.
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A unique training method indeed!
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The mere mention of redundancies can make people nervous, so training HR people in the correct handling and processing of redundancies has to eliminate the fear factor from the start.
Handover HR rose to this training challenge with our usual mix of knowledge, humour and audience participation, the key ingredients to make training events memorable. Very soon, all our trainees were resplendent in different headbands featuring words relating to the redundancy process, trying to rearrange themselves into the correct order. Too easy? We thought so, so they weren't allowed to talk or communicate with each other until they finished. After giggling and much maneuvering, we got down to the serious stuff, to review and discuss the stages of the process. Did someone say HR was boring?
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| April 2010 |
This Months Q & A
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An employee has resigned giving us three months notice. We prefer he leaves in 4 weeks as he is starting up a business in competition. Can we respond to his resignation letter stating that we do not require him to work 3 months, and that he will finish in 4 weeks time?
His contract states that he only has to give 4 week’s notice. Although you say that his contract states he only has to give four weeks’ notice, that doesn’t seem sufficient to prevent him giving longer notice. In other words a requirement that to resign you have to give 4 weeks notice is not the same as saying you can only give four weeks’ notice. I can, however, see the problem. There are really three ways to deal with this. First, require him to be employed for the notice period but put him on ‘garden leave’ this will ensure that he cannot do any work for anyone else during that period, offer some protection to the business in terms of access to information and you can also make him take any accrued holiday during this period so that will reduce any final payment. Second, you could pay him in lieu of the notice period he has given, although in this instance holiday accrued would need to be paid. Third, persuade him to leave at the end of four weeks with no further payment although this maybe the most difficult to achieve. My view would be it’s best to get him out of the business as quickly as possible reducing his opportunity to spend any time preparing to compete with you. Also check your employment contract to see if you have any restrictive covenants which will prevent him from approaching your other employees, or existing customers etc. If you do point them out to him and explain that you will enforce them.
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Welcome to Handover HR's news page. Here you'll find recent stories relating to the wonderful world of Human Resources.
At the bottom of the page you'll find links to stories from previous months.
Enjoy! |
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It’s Not How You Start, It’s How You Finish
Redundancies are back in the news following Portsmouth Football Club going into administration and with that comes a warning to employers over how to handle this emotional experience.
Nearly one in three jobseekers said their employer handled their redundancy poorly and half the respondents believed their overall treatment by their last employer was unfair or poor.
Whilst this dissatisfaction doesn’t always turn into an Employment Tribunal claim, the survey revealed that jobseekers often told other people about their redundancy experiences and a third told more than 10 people about their treatment by an ex-employer which is potentially damaging to the Company reputation. |
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Drinking On School Nights
A new survey has found that employees are most likely to call in sick on a Monday with the most popular reason being a hangover.
One in three admitted that they would be more inclined to call in ill on a Monday as it tended to be the quietest day in work and just under half said that they thought they were more likely to get away with it.
Wednesday was the day that people were least likely to take a day off work, with people stating that it was the day that they liked most at work when they actually felt the most productive.
The top reasons for calling in sick were:
Hangover 89%
Tired / late night 68%
Staying with a partner 53%
Have a day off 49% |
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| Pay Rise, Or No To Pay Rise That Is The Question
Pay rises seem likely to be around 2% as the number of business imposing pay freezes decreases according to feedback from private sector businesses.
A 2% average pay increase in the private sector is forecast compared with an average of just 1% seen in 2009.
Complementary research adds that nearly four fifths of organisations intend to increase salaries over the next 12 months - compared to 57% that actually did in 2009. |
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| Fit & Maybe Raring To Work If …
Dry your eyes and lament the passing of the old sick note for next month it is replaced in the new so called ‘Fit Note’.
The new documents will give GPs the option to declare a patient either “not fit for work” or “fit for some work”. The GP can then recommend a course of action for a phased return to work, including amended duties, altered hours, and workplace adoptions - which employers can then consider. Guidance on the new document and an opportunity to download a specimen copy is available on the DWP website.
Of course that is in theory and whether this materialises in practice will remain to be seen.
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| Dress Codes Gone Mad?
In a new dress code, workers at the North West Ambulance Service (NWAS) have been banned from wearing novelty socks. Staff could face disciplinary action if they break the code! |
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