We learnt plenty about osmosis during “O” level biology; trouble was that by the time it came to the exams, I’d forgotten it all.
Perhaps I thought the process of osmosis would bail me out – just sleep with the textbook under the pillow, and my brain would be magically instilled with everything I needed to know.
Fanciful and bizarre, maybe, but I’ve noticed a similar approach being adopted by plenty of employers, with one recent story springing to mind.
A client got in touch about an employee being off sick.
They’d not followed the absence reporting procedure, so there was a chance they could be dismissed, which was the employer’s preferred outcome.
I just needed to check one tiny little thing – that the handbook containing the absence reporting procedure HAD been given out to all staff.
The answer wasn’t reassuring: