A question
Ask yourself this:
Bah humbug
Refreshed from a week of walking and climbing (and drinking) in and around Hadrian’s Wall, I should be in better spirit. But once again the dark powers of the evil twin Gods “Doom and Gloom” have conspired to make me want to take arms against the world and beat them to death with an over ripe pumpkin before shoving a plastic glow-in-the-dark skeleton, somewhere REALLY dark.
Let us be clear.
It is not Christmas. It is November. And only just November at that.
Therefore I do not want to return to an inbox of drinks and lunch invites (yep….still no PA).
I am not interested in Marvin the Magnificent and his Magical M*********ing Montage – available at improved rates – yep, no surprise there!
And as for “we need to communicate the Christmas working hours, so people can confirm their plans”…….
Work. That’s what their plan should be. Work and then stop. On 24th December.
Bah Humbug…….
The HRD is away
Climbing hills.
Normal service will resume on 2 November.
Conversations with the CEO
Regular readers will have noticed that I have not recently had a conversation with the CEO.
So have I.
If anyone sees a slightly mad, swearing, manic individual can they place let me know?
We need to talk.
The King’s Shilling
A long time ago, but not in a galaxy far far away, accepting the King’s shilling signalled your willingness to serve in the army or navy. It was a commitment to do your duty. The press gangs used to use all sorts of nefarious tactics to get people to accept the King’s shilling…including slipping it into a tankard of beer. The view being that when you finished your beer and looked at the shilling….you’d accepted it…..and hence why you can get tankards with a see-through base.
I mention this because I used this phrase yesterday with one of our Directors. To be honest, the guy is one intransigent fucker and in this specific scenario has been happily sitting on his hands for months rather than carrying out a piece of work that we need doing. Why? Because he doesn’t agree with the request.
We’ve had the debate, we have heard the arguments and we have decided on our path. He doesn’t agree so he is not doing what he needs to. His boss has had repeated exchanges and so I suggested I do the old Mystic Meg routine and “predict his future”. We danced around the subject for a while before we got to the main issue. His view was that he was happy to “put forward the company’s view”. My response was “you are the company”.
The practice was not illegal, or he could have used Whistle blowing legislation. It wasn’t even grey. He just doesn’t agree.
My view? No-one slipped this in your beer. You take the King’s shilling you do your duty.
Gender Bender
I’ve spoken before about gender stereotypes and work, but something happened this week that really gets my goat. I’m involved in a voluntary capacity at my local school, which is a village, state school for 5-12 year olds. The school is lucky enough to have two male teachers. I say lucky because I believe male teachers are hugely important role models for boys at this age and there are not enough of them in the profession.
One of the teachers is relatively new. It came out in conversation that the village witches had been gossiping about this guy and casting aspersions about his sexuality. Apparently it was their conclusion that he was gay. Unfortunately I wasn’t there when the conversation took place (or maybe fortunately), because I would have had one or two things to say about the matter.
What the hell does a teacher’s sexuality have to do with their ability to teach? If he was gay, does that really matter? But….perhaps….just perhaps the actual undertone here is something different….something more sinister?
Are these people having the same conversation about the women teachers? My outraged reaction was something along the lines of, “well that witch is fat and ugly and wears trousers all the time so she must be a dyke”. But are they wondering whether the nice Miss.Y from class 3 actually likes sleeping with corpses because she wears black a lot? Or Miss. Z who wears shorter skirts than most spends her weekends partaking in Romanesque orgies?
No, it’s because he is a man. And a man who “god forbid” is working in a predominantly female profession. Ergo sum he is gay and probably a kiddie fiddler to boot. The same conversations were murmured in the darkest recesses of the playground about the other male teacher, but he’s been around for a number of years now and since Special Branch haven’t swooped in and confiscated his computer, I guess he must be ok……?
Years ago I went for an interview with a major pharma. It was a long process and at the final stage, I waited a long time for feedback. The call from the head-hunter eventually came: “they really like you, you have all the skills and experience they are looking for, it’s just, well, they think you’re a bit…….gay…..” So I told them to go f***k themselves….up the arse. It doesn’t matter that I am married. That I have two kids. I’m a man, in a predominantly female profession. Therefore I MUST be a homosexual. And anyway, what if I was?
And it’s the same case for this guy. He has a girlfriend. I’ve met her. But I guess that counts for nothing to the school yard witches.
If you’re a man, in a woman’s world……well hell, there must be something wrong with you.
Sanity is not a competency
In our time I’m sure we have all come across our fair share of lunatics. Normally through job applications. You know the ones? The fantasists, the dreamers, the clinically insane….
Now I know that someone is probably going to call me for picking on the mentally unstable, but seeing as I have done the fat, the stupid, the ugly and women. I figure what is there to lose? Why alienate 99% of your readers when you can go for the big 100? Yes you. You know who you are.
I received this job application from Philip.
Philip was kind enough to apply for a job that I wasn’t advertising at a Company that I don’t work for. But I don’t think that should come between a potential employment relationship.
He is applying for the job because he thinks he would find it “easy and interesting”. So, you know, I’m kind of liking the guy by now.
His salary request for £300,000 per annum seemed a little steep, especially considering he could only work Monday to Wednesday. But his request for a £4,000,000 joining fee did start to raise some questions.
Fortunately he informs me that “the reports and results [he] produces are second to none”. So I’m starting to think that golden handshake might just be worth it….
There are a few gaps on the CV though, but Philip helpfully points out that he has recently been “helping various people overcome personal grief, and also with helping them with various problems and generally being sociable (WITHOUT REMUNERATION)”.
But just when I was about to pick up the phone, the bombshell. Philip informs me that “very fortunately indeed [he] has no ties with any of the companies that [he] has worked at”. He has, “never worked for the same company twice”. And “This will remain the case”.
You had me won over until there Philip. But company loyalty? It’s a must.
When negotiations turn sour…….
IDIOT: No offence………but I need to talk to the organ grinder and not the monkey.
HRD: (After a pause and a pretend phone call). Right I’ve spoken to the organ grinder and……“no offence”…..they think you only warrant the monkey.
The sounds of another icon turning to dust
Think of Britain and what do you see? Rolling fields, rain, warm beer, cricket. And how about postal boxes. The red ones. An archetypal image of Britain. A symbol of this sceptered isle.
Bring out your dead……
There has been a mighty brouhaha in the UK HR community about this article which appeared in The Times on 5 October 2009 written by Sathnam Sanghera. Message boards and blogs are filled with arguments pro and con. These basically divide along two lines:
1) HR is a pointless function full of bureaucratic little dweebs who failed to make it into traffic warden school
2) HR is misunderstood by society and is more strategic than a strategic thing from strategy land….if it could only be taken seriously
I was approached by one of the main trade press to provide a rebuttal to Sanghera’s article and after considering it for a while, well if I’m honest, I struggled.
That’s not to say I agree with him whole heartedly, the article is poorly written, poorly argued and lacks any real substance other than Sanghera’s views. And seeing that his biog shows that on graduating from Cambridge University he went straight into journalism – his views don’t carry as much weight as many in my opinion.
But let’s face it; our profession IS probably one of the most neurotic professions in the world, constantly doubting and questioning its own worth and worrying about how it’s perceived. Like an abused partner that is constantly told they are worthless and meaningless, are we really surprised that we have some sense of neurosis?
And then this just gets worse as we start to harm ourselves. Read the blogs, look at the comments. Lets be self depreciating, because if we say we are pathetic then it won’t hurt so much when others tell us we are. Will it?
So we change how we look, alter our views and appearance, because maybe they’ll love me if I change? All a load of old tosh and a waste of time and energy.
Business Partner? My arse!
Let’s get some confidence, let’s get some swagger, let’s stop worrying and start performing. If people don’t take us seriously lets work to persuade them, to show them, to convince them. We have worth, we have value, we ARE lovable. And if they don’t understand…maybe that’s their problem and not ours. Maybe they have the issue.
If anyone is going to sound the death knell for Human Resources, it will be the profession itself and its lack of spine.
Sanghera has that much right, if nothing else.
My Hell is Other People 
