Where do you spend your time?

When you run a business or a team, time is an important commodity. There is never enough of it. So where do you choose to spend your time when you are developing and managing your team? Is it with the high performer or the poor performer?

Let me share two fictional scenarios. They are fictional only in the names. These scenarios play out in businesses all of the time.

Nicky is a good performer, highly skilled and motivated and knows the job inside out. Nicky was easy to leave alone to do the job. When Nicky’s resignation landed on the departmental manager’s desk, she was surprised and had no idea why Nicky wanted to leave.

Charlie, in contrast, had been with the firm as long as Nicky and was a consistently poor performer. Mistakes in Charlie’s work cost time, money and, occasionally, customer confidence. Charlie’s departmental manager was often seen coaching, explaining and even doing Charlie’s work. Charlie needed watching like a hawk. The company was spending a lot of management time working with and clearing up after Charlie. In the end, there was no choice and the discipline procedure was invoked and Charlie was dismissed. Everyone in the team knew why.

As a manager in your business, would you have dealt with Charlie and Nicky any differently? Paul Hersey and Kenneth Blanchard, developer of the "One Minute Manager" series, created a model for Situational Leadership in the late 1960's. It allows you to analyse the needs of the situation you're dealing with, and then adopt the most appropriate leadership style. There are four leadership styles in Hersey and Blanchard’s model and four sets of circumstances. These are most accessibly explained in the book Leadership and the One Minute Manager (1985) by Kenneth H. Blanchard, Patricia Zigarmi, and Drea Zigarmi.

The four types are determined by two factors – competence and commitment.

1. High Competence and High Commitment (like Nicky) defined as experienced at the job, and comfortable with their own ability to do it well. May even be more skilled than the leader.

2. High Competence and Variable Commitment defined as experienced and capable, but may lack the confidence to go it alone, or the motivation to do it well or quickly.

3. Some Competence and Low Commitment (possibly Charlie) defined as may have some relevant skills, but won't be able to do the job without help. The task or the situation may be new to them.

4. Low Competence and Low Commitment (another Charlie possibility) defined as generally lacking the specific skills required for the job in hand, and lacks any confidence and / or motivation to tackle it.

It is relatively easy to see that types 3 and 4 need attention. Appropriate management interventions would be directing (especially for 4) and coaching. For type 2 people, time is needed to support them to ensure they can do a good job.

Which leaves the type 1 performers like Nicky to consider. They cannot be left alone. Good performers need to have investment of your time, though it may well be relatively less than the other types. Delegate tasks to them by all means but check in with them regularly to allow them to confirm they are doing the right things and that their output is still needed. Coach and mentor them and seek to extend their range and grow them.

People are like flowers in your garden. If you leave them alone they may lack the nourishment that they need to grow and develop. Unlike flowers they can choose to uproot and go where they feel they will get the nourishment they need.

Sapience is moving and growing

We are pleased to be moving our offices into a brewery. Well a former brewery, anyway. This is to accommodate our new team members who will be joining us over the next few weeks and months to cover the increased workload. We will also have space for meetings with clients.

The former premises of The Hayle Steam Brewery have been converted into office space and we will be among the first to take up residence there. The original Brewery at Bodriggy was owned by John Richards. In the early 1800’s he sold the business to Christopher Ellis Snr., who developed it and founded the Ellis Brewery in 1815. They owned hotels in Copperhouse and Lelant and built up a network of franchised public houses in the surrounding areas. The Brewery utilised the fields at Bodriggy Farm to grow its own barley and built the Malthouse on the corner of St. John’s Street in 1835. They also stabled horses at Bodriggy Farm. In 1934 the Hayle Brewery merged with St. Austell Brewery, and brewing ceased in Hayle. The buildings have since been used as a storage depot – and recently developed into 10 flats and two offices, of which we have one. Unfortunately there is no beer to be seen!

Our first recruit is Becky Palmer who joins us as Office Manager via the Plymouth University Internship scheme. With a BA in Business Studies she will be a great asset the company.

…and developing Training Courses

A new initiative is being launched in Cornwall offering SME businesses the chance to develop their managers to get the very most out of their employees. ‘Better People – Better Results’ is the title of a new series of innovative workshops. They seek to provide practical and pragmatic advice to employers on how to get the very best out of their people; improvements aimed directly at the bottom line.
Sapience HR is very pleased to be working with Talent Cornwall to deliver these workshops which are being co-sponsored by Business Cornwall Magazine, Business Link, CPR Regeneration and will be held at Pool Innovation Centre who are also co sponsoring.

The initial workshops cost £20 plus VAT and will be held morning and afternoon of 14th September at Pool Innovation Centre. Places will be limited and booking is essential – book at http://betterpeople.eventbrite.com.

Further workshops are planned on specific topics including Interviewing, Recruitment, Performance Management and Conflict Handling.

Talent Cornwall director Dougie Woods added: “We aim to cover a full spectrum of people management issues. This is not about offering complex concepts or expensive solutions; we will not be covering detailed employment law or tricky concepts. Good people management is mostly about the application of common sense solutions and knowing how to adapt clever ideas into your organisation.”
Sapience HR director Sue Hook explained: “We aim to deliver workshops that give sensible advice that is both inexpensive to implement and easy to understand. We have brought together years of good practice, hints and tips that are designed to prove that simple changes to the way we work with people can make a lasting difference.”

News and Comment

Retirement Age – What is Going On?

The default retirement age (DRA) will be scrapped on 1 October 2011 under proposals announced by the Government in July. Currently employers can force staff to retire at the age of 65 regardless of their circumstances. The new plans allow for a six-month transition from the existing Regulations, following the announcement in the Budget that the DRA would be phased out from April 2011.

The proposals state that from 6 April 2011, employers will not be able to issue any notifications for compulsory retirement using the DRA procedure. Between 6 April and 1 October, only people who were notified before 6 April, and whose retirement date is before 1 October can be compulsorily retired.
After 1 October, employers will not be able to use the DRA to compulsorily retire employees; if they wish to use retirement ages they will have to be able to demonstrate that these are objectively justified.

The consultation also proposes to help employers by removing the administrative burden of statutory retirement procedures. With the DRA removed there is no reason to keep employees' "right to request" to work beyond retirement or for employers to give them a minimum of six months' notice of retirement.

Views are also being sought on whether removal of the DRA could have unintended consequences for insured benefits and employee share plans.

Employment Law

Minimum Wage Rates from October 2010

From 1 October 2010 new rates and age bands will apply.

• £5.93 - the rate for workers aged 21 and over
• £4.92 - the 18-20 rate
• £3.64 - the 16-17 rate
• new minimum wage of £2.50 per hour for apprentices who are either under 19 or in the first year of their apprenticeship
  

The Equality Act 2010

…consolidates, harmonises and expands existing discrimination law. The bulk of it is expected to come into force in October 2010. The Act protects against discrimination in the workplace because of:

• age;
• disability;
• gender reassignment;
• marriage and civil partnership;
• pregnancy and maternity;
• race;
• religion or belief;
• sex; and
• sexual orientation.

These are described as “protected characteristics” and reflect existing law, with a couple of changes.

The Act uses the familiar concepts of direct discrimination, indirect discrimination, victimisation and harassment, but with some changes and a completely new type of disability discrimination is introduced

Detriment arising from disability replaces the concept of “disability-related discrimination”. It occurs when employers treat employees in a detrimental way because of something that is a consequence of their disability. A typical example would be dismissing employees with poor attendance records when their absences were caused by disability. This would be unlawful unless dismissal could be justified as a “proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim” or the employer could not reasonably have been expected to know of the disability.

Another new feature is a ban on asking job candidates about their health before offering them work. Some questions will still be permitted: for example, those necessary to establish whether a candidate can undergo an assessment for the job such as a test or an interview; carry out an intrinsic function of the job itself; or to monitor diversity. But untargeted health questionnaires, forming part of the application process, will no longer be allowed.

Employers that do ask job candidates about their health pre-employment will also find it harder to defend disability discrimination claims from unsuccessful applicants. A tribunal would presume the employer had discriminated; the employer would then have to prove their innocence.

The Act expands tribunals’ powers to make recommendations to employers on the action they should take where discrimination has been found. Tribunal recommendations can be aimed at reducing the effect of discrimination on either claimants (as at present) or the wider workforce (this is new). There is, however, no sanction for employers failing to follow a recommendation that does not relate to the claimant in a case.

Additional paternity leave regulations

Came into force on 6 April 2010 and 9 April 2010 and will apply to parents of babies due on or after 3 April 2011 and to adoptive parents who are notified of having been matched with a child on or after that date.

Key provisions under the above regulations:

• A mother will be able to transfer up to six months maternity leave to the father which can be taken once the mother has gone back to work and the child is over 20 weeks old.

• Some of that leave may be paid if it is taken during the mother's maternity pay period.

Fascinating Facts

Human eyes are the same from birth but our nose and ears never stop growing!

Quote of the Month

"All that we are is the result of what we have thought."
Buddha