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Posts for March 2011
Deal with real problems at work - do you feel old?
March 16, 2011
Georgina Harris explains how to cope (in nice big type)
There comes a time in every working life when the creeping realisation dawns that you are no longer the newbie flush with promise, the gilded youth sparkling at clients, or the one with the worst hangover, and you know in your soul that you are Not That Young Any More. Makes those bones ache a bit, eh?
As much a rite of passage as passing exams or filling in start-up forms, your new state is characterised by being nameless – ‘middle-aged’ cannot yet be used as that is your parents, surely - and a subterranean, fervent urge for action.
Which is where the trouble starts. A mid-life crisis at work these days is more shaming than announcing I Used to Be a Woman in the Gents’. We’ve all seen it – the wincing car crash of the exec with three kids who picks the two-seater Clarkson likes, the accountant who lives the 80s – again - with leather pelmets that stick her to the swivel chair, ponytail flailing as everyone leaves the meeting. The ipad you accidentally call a Walkman. That “interesting” tie. Jaunty shoes. Like, you could lose all your colleagues’ respect? Your clients will soooo laugh. Or be kind, meh.
Time to sort things out. I am thrilled to announce that, unlike most of your daily problems, the solution to this issue is Do Absolutely Nothing. But, if you want to get away with this idleness, you must, silently, Thank The Law. Consider this:
Dave Cameron is your bruv, guy. From 6 April 2011, employers will no longer be able to retire anyone using the Default Retirement Age (DRA). This means they can’t sack you for wearing coloured deck shoes on Fridays any more.- Well, until you go senile or terrify Kylie the Work Experience when you climb a ladder. However, the national debt is so unimaginably, cosmically vast that we will all be working till we are 100 anyway. Thank Dr Brian Cox, sorry, Mr Fred Goodwin, for this, not fresh-faced Cleggeron. (Young people don’t know much anyway.)
- Where you see peculiar hair growth in the mirror, other people see experience and skills. Your clients are paying for this – they honestly like it. You can charge for those wrinkles – do so. Remember that people aged 50-64 have spent on average 13.7 years in their current job, which is impressive. (Possibly more impressively, brow threading is now acceptable for both sexes and available inexpensively nationwide.)
- No one expects you to be, or look, young. Self-employment, for instance, is more common amongst those aged 50-64 compared to younger workers – 18 per cent of workers in this age bracket are self employed compared to a scanty four per cent of the 16-24 year olds.
While crimes against fashion aren’t illegal, being rude about coffin-dodgers at work is. Anyone over 35 – or with a keen interest in 80s music – can rest assured that they are protected by law from sartorial slights, and more to the point, protected as part of an increasingly huge majority. Although the media does nothing but feature those of poreless skin, the UK isn’t a young country; more over 50s are in work than people aged 16-24. Get in! Parade those coloured shoes with pride.
Georgina Harris, Law Donut editor (and wearer of a nice comfy cardi)
April fool - are you on top of new law at work?
March 16, 2011
Big changes to business tax and employment rules become law in spring and autumn. Use our checklist to make sure your business is on top of the new rules:
1 April
Corporation Tax falls to 27 per cent and the Small Profits rate drops from 21 to 20 per cent. You must now submit your Company tax online and pay all the tax due under it electronically through HMRC’s online services.
3 April
Additional paternity leave : most working fathers gain the right to additional paternity leave and pay. Your employee(s) will only be able to start the leave 20 or more weeks after the child's birth (which should be after 3 April) and he must give you eight weeks’ notice.
Unless you have a contract that says otherwise, you only have to pay your employee(s) additional statutory paternity pay during the time his partner would otherwise be receiving statutory maternity or adoption pay, or maternity allowance. You will need a declaration saying the employee is taking the leave for childcare and a statement from the mother.
Proposed flexible working for parents of 17 year olds withdrawn
Initially due on 5 April 2011, employers should note that the proposed extension of the right to request flexible working to the parents of 17 year olds has been withdrawn.
6 April
Tie-breakers when recruiting : you can use positive action as a tie-breaker when hiring staff, but only in pretty limited circumstances. If you think someone affected by a certain type of characteristic – such as their age, disability, race or sex - could be suffering as a result or is underrepresented in your firm, you can choose them over another equal candidate.
But positive discrimination remains unlawful, as do your chances of getting two entirely equal candidates, so you may wish to steer clear of this new power.
Retiring staff: as from today, you can’t. Our guide shows you what to do instead.
Georgina Harris, Law Donut editor
Up the Twitter
March 08, 2011
You might think your main problem with Facebook is the sheer boredom. Oh, the relentless fun of those endless updates of daily lives – how did we survive before we knew Jade Green in Payroll had dodgy tuna for lunch?
But if you’re the boss, watch it: your staff could be sharing more than their daily diet of banality with the rest of the planet. Sneaked into that gripping account might be the killer comment about clients, customers or, heaven forbid, the management, which could empty your order book faster than the tuna’s cheeky 3pm revenge on Ms Green.
Most pitifully, you can’t rely on anyone you know to be too bored to read it – or forward it. Especially not in work time or if it’s properly rude/funny. As lawyers are fond of quoting, “A good name, like good will, is got by many actions and lost by one” – from Victorian judge Francis Jeffrey, who knew the value of a Tweet-length message to business about Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn before his time.
Your staff probably use these forums to communicate, if not to work. This has blurred the distinction between personal and work life and created much legal strife. The latest case in this area ended up at the Press Complaints Commission (PCC), who ruled a civil servant’s grumbles to her mates on Twitter about Dept of Transport cuts and a punishingly late night in the pub were “public”. Like many of us, the bleary Miss Baskerville didn’t realise we live in a public age but the Daily Mail did and she and the Dept of Transport ended up with more than a hangover.
While it might seem mean to haul a whingeing worker into court, not to mention a bit unnerving for anyone employed who isn’t on Prozac, the fact remains this employee embarrassed and discredited her employer. As social media users grow ever faster in the UK, so does the risk of this happening to your business. Like it or not, you need to take action – but what can you sensibly do without impinging employees’ privacy?
There’s no need to monitor every communication. Apart from the agonizing tedium, it’s intrusive and probably illegal. If you must, monitor it in a way that is compliant with data protection and privacy laws; for instance, you must tell everyone you are tapping their channels. Instead, create a wide-ranging social media policy from your organisation for employees and freelancers. Make sure they read it; if you don’t communicate with them they may be able to waltz off with your most valuable clients contacts, if not worse.
Explain what business information is confidential. That probably includes mailing lists, finances and new products as well as client details and computer passwords. Don’t put temptation in anyone’s way; limit access to anything juicy to those who need it and set up your IT to block exits of confidential information from your server. Remind staff that once confidential material is gone, it’s gone forever.
Tell the staff, where you can, that contact lists are yours. That covers client and mailing lists as well as your employee’s LinkedIn account. State your ownership clearly where you can – wherever they originated from. If your most useful lists contain contacts employees have introduced to the firm or brought with them, case law suggests that the whole list belongs to your firm – make this clear to staff who may, not unreasonably, believe lists containing old friends or trusted freelancers are ‘theirs’. Include this clause in employment contracts too.
Keep work phones, blackberries and ipads for professional communications only. Yes, it’s joyless – no, you don’t need to be held liable for an employee’s rudeness, harassment or bullying. Unlawful treatment of others also applies to online communication. Add this clause to your equality policy too.
Don’t let staff be rude about your business online, ever. Think about whether you can cope with identifiable staff commenting on their working life in a forum. If you can, be very clear that you won’t tolerate criticism about customers, clients or products. Include examples, such as the Facebook addicts at British Airways who were fired for declaring happy holidaymakers “fat and smelly”.
Once you’ve established a policy, employees will be clear about what they can and can’t say and be more likely to do it; they will also know they can face disciplinary action for breaching it, which should improve the safety of your business reputation and information. End of status update.
Georgina Harris, Law Donut editor
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