Carolyne Wahlen - GAP HR

Disciplinaries and solicitors

When can they bring a solicitor to a disciplinary meeting? When the consequences of them being dismissed would mean that they could never work in their profession again. Ever. The best example of this is a real case where a secondary school teacher was being investigated for inappropriate behavior with a pupil. If the teacher … Read more

Verbal warnings

When can you give verbal warnings to an employee?

Never! Verbal warnings were abolished in 2009.

At a recent talk I was asked “but can’t we keep using them, if they are part of our policies and procedures?”.

Tales of an HR Services Expert – Day 10: Sickness absence don’ts!

If your employees call in sick there are things that you shouldn’t do. If you are worried about levels of sickness absence, there are ways to solve that. These things are not the way to go! Make them call you every hour they are sick, to prove that they are still at home Call them … Read more

Tales of an HR Services Expert – Day 9: Avoiding expensive mistakes

So. You’re a small business with just a few employees, and managing them is one job you have to do yourself. And do it well. Learn from the costly traps that other employers have fallen into, with this free guide on the pitfalls you simply must avoid. Remember these are the seven biggest mistakes that … Read more

Tales of an HR Services Expert – Day 8: Autobankruptcy!

Auto-enrolment? No! Auto-bankruptcy! The Government is really serious about auto-enrolment happening and you can tell because they are willing to make companies go bankrupt rather than avoid doing it! Well okay, that isn’t their stated intention, but look at the fines for not doing it. If you thought H&S fines of £20K for infringements were … Read more

Tales of an HR Services Expert – Day 6: I row – it could have been me!

I had the huge pleasure of meeting Ben Hunt-Davis (who is really tall, 6ft 6!). Ben is an Olympic gold medal winner from the Sydney 2000 games. He won, with his team, the gold medal for rowing in the men’s 8s. This is particularly relevant to me as I rowed in the Goring and Streatley … Read more

Tales of an HR Services Expert – Day 4: Sickness absence – too much?!

In the past few months we have been asked by 6 separate clients (different industries and locations) to help them deal with sickness absence. Before that, we hadn’t had to do any GP reports for almost a year. What is going on out there??!! The situation could be long-term sickness absences (are they ever coming … Read more

Tales of an HR Services Expert – Day 1: they do resign!

Just to let you know, that sometimes problem staff really do resign without us having to follow the long process to fire them! The employee in question was approaching the end of her maternity leave. As she normally worked at a third-party site, we informed them that she would be back on site in the … Read more

The importance of being formal

Many employers don’t like to have formal meetings, i.e. in private, with closed doors, with staff who are not performing. They feel that an informal comment at their desk or the coffee machine will be enough for the person to understand the feedback and act on it. But as this incident that we had to … Read more

The show must go on!

I have had a great summer. It seems like the kids have been off for months! And one of the reasons that it has really felt like a holiday for me is that I have been to London to the theatre four times in the past 4 weeks! That might not seem much to you, … Read more

The Seven Biggest Mistakes That Employers Make When Dealing With Staff Issues

Over 76% of new businesses fail in the first 5 years of life. One of the major reasons for this is that once sole traders start employing staff, any number of mistakes can be made which hobble the business. These management mistakes stop it from growing and maybe even destroying it! From my 14 years … Read more

Discrimination – everybody’s doing it!

We all know that it is the others who are discriminating, we are obviously making rational decisions. However, after reading Malcolm Gladwell’s book “Blink – The Power of Thinking Without Thinking” on holiday, I am less convinced that it is only the others. So as someone who is in business to make money and not … Read more

Employers: Penalty For Not Issuing Contract Of Employment (5 Reasons)

Most employers think that they’re being clever by not issuing a contract of employment – what could the harm of that be? Is there even a penalty for not issuing a contract of employment? The answer is actually quite a lot of risk involved. Here is a short guide as to why you must issue … Read more

Announcing Redundancy To Staff

”I have been made redundant before and it is a terrible blow; redundant is a rotten word because it makes you think you are useless.” Billy Connelly Picture the scene. You’re about to make a redundancy announcement to a staff member. You are seated at your desk when there is a knock at the door. … Read more

The Real Cost of Redundancy

This is a formula worked out by the CIPD to show companies that making “knee jerk” redundancies is not necessarily the easy and cheap way out of a financial bind. (n ×R) + (x ×H) + (x ×T) + ny(H + T) + Wz(P – n) Where: n = number of people made redundant R … Read more

Up your game and motivate others to a ‘Triple Win’

Up your game and motivate others to a Triple Win Helen Liddar, business coach, gives us pointers on how to get the most out of our work relationships in the office. In a recent customer survey, a service was ranked ‘average’ for the routine work that it did, and ‘excellent’ whenever an urgent situation arose. … Read more

Women are more expensive than men to employ. Or are they…?

It’s an accepted “fact” of business life – women are more expensive to employ than men. But is it true? Few people like to go on the record about it – largely through fear of getting a knock on the door from politically correct vigilantes, waiting at any opportunity to strike them down for voicing … Read more

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