The Opt Out for the Working Time Directive

April 30, 2009

The UK government has just won the right to continue our ‘opt out’ from the European Working Time Directive.  And although I am in favour of opt outs from EU Directives that suit the needs of individual member states, it seems to me that as a country with one of the longest working hours cultures in Europe, we ought to attempt to adhere as much as possible to the concept of a maximum of 48 hours a week (this can be averaged across several months, so is flexible). In light of the fact that the average British family now has two-earners who both work long and intense hours, do we really think this move is in the best interests of individuals and their families? This is particularly relevant during a recession when ‘presenteeism’ (coming to work earlier and leaving later to show commitment as a means of protecting one’s job) is now so prevalent in businesses throughout the land.  Can perpetuating this culture of working long hours really be good for the productivity and effectiveness of our companies?

 The evidence from Working Families and other research in the field suggests that consistently working long hours can damage peoples’ health and, additionally, can have a detrimental affect on their performance.  We could always use more longitudinal research to highlight the impact of long hours on productivity, and the impact on family life, but it seems to me that it’s time for employers to challenge themselves on this and think really hard about the role they play in supporting this culture.  Like most people, I don’t like interference with or micro-management of our businesses and markets by EU agencies, but in some cases their ‘evidence based policy’ can be helpful in creating sensible HR practices.

So let’s retain the right to opt out from EU Directives, but let’s not throw the proverbial baby out with the bath water. We should embrace those aspects of EU and other governmental agency’s good practice, rather than reject their contents because of ‘where’ they come from.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8022095.stm

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Posted by Cary Cooper

Guest Blog Spot, Avoiding Organisational Resentment

April 24, 2009

Today I’d like to welcome back Gordon Tinline who’s a Director at my University spin off company Robertson Cooper and will be sharing his views on how to avoid becoming resentful at work due to the effects of the recession.  I hope you enjoy his post and please feel free to leave any comments. Thanks for coming back Gordon!

Gordon Tinline, Director, Robertson Cooper

Gordon Tinline, Director, Robertson Cooper

Cary has written recently about the need to stay focused on the positive and remain optimistic through a recession, and I agree that this is very important.  Clearly, if you’ve lost your job and feel very uncertain about your future prospects this is extremely difficult to do.  However, in some cases it may be almost as difficult to stay positive when there is little or no immediate threat to your employment or security.  One reason for this is the resentment that can develop when individuals feel they have little choice other than remaining with their current employer as, like homeowners flirting with negative equity at this difficult time, they perceive that it’s just too risky to move.  Initial mildly negative feelings towards an employer can quite quickly build into an unhealthy resentment that affects both the well-being and performance of the employee. This is often accompanied by a heightened sense of feeling tied to the organisation, combined with reduced control over one’s career trajectory.

 A number of years ago psychologists Meyer and Allen identified three forms of organisational commitment: affective commitment – the emotional tie you have to your organisation; normative commitment – the values you feel you share with your employers; and continuance commitment – a commitment to staying because the costs of leaving are too high.  As an employer, if you rely on continuance commitment you may be settling for your people turning up for work regardless of whether they feel a real connection with your business and those who work in it.  This is a certain recipe for reduced levels of discretionary effort and employee engagement.  The risk in these times is that continuance commitment begins to feel stronger than the affective or normative types of commitment. Employees will only ever resent a situation where they feel that they are staying with their employer because they have to, rather than because they want to…. even if they had no intention of leaving prior to the recession!  This is also bad news for the psychological contract because if employers sense that their staff resent them, despite the fact they are working hard to keep the workforce happy and employed, resentment can quickly become a two-way affair.

So how do we avoid this possible unfortunate outcome?  As an employer it is surely about making extra efforts to signal that you truly value your people – try revisiting your value statements and reviewing prevailing leadership behaviours to ensure they are aligned and authentic.  It is not about telling employees that they should be grateful that they still have a job!  That would further damage the way staff morale and strengthen a view that the espoused values, like respect and valuing people, are empty and meaningless.  As an employee, it is worth reminding oneself about the positive aspects of working for your employer – including why your job is important to you.  You must try to avoid the negative spiral of thought that stems from feeling you have no choices and as a result risk starting to feel like a victim, rather than someone who still has control over most of aspects their own life.  Most important, don’t get resentful – knuckle down to improve things in your current role or if, when you think about it, you really do need to leave the organisation then be brave and do so.

1 Comment | Engagement, Guest Blog Spots, Leadership, Uncategorized, Well-being | Tagged: , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Cary Cooper

NHS well-being interventions – closer to the private sector than some would have you believe!

April 8, 2009

Last week the NHS was being urged to get staff sickness under control in the wake of new figures that revealed workers take nearly 12 days off sick per year. This compares unfavourably with a figure of only 7.2% in the private sector. The BBC website reported that the ‘thinktank’ Reform said the Health Service was “shooting itself in the foot” by not making more use of the expertise it has in its workforce. The claim was that if the NHS followed the lead of private sector firms like BT, it could save up to £1 Billion by cutting sickness absence.

While I’m 100% sure that there are potential savings to be made in the NHS by reducing sickness absence, I think that the comments from Reform may be missing the point somewhat. Based on the experience of my University spin-off company Robertson Cooper, which has helped many NHS organisations improve well-being and employee engagement over the last 18 months, the Health Service has come a long way in this area. In many cases, sickness absence is now under control – particularly in Foundation Trusts and in areas where there is a strong vocational motivation to help others. Of course, keeping sickness low is important, but more common drivers for investing in staff well-being tend to be around staff retention, productivity, as well as quality and sustainability of service. Many NHS Trusts are now getting very sophisticated in terms of their understanding of and ambitions for well-being at work. In short, they are becoming more like private sector businesses – indeed, in the case of Foundation Trusts, they are only one step away from being private sector businesses!

At the end of the day, comparing public and private sector absence rates and finding that the former is higher is nothing new – it was ever thus – just check the CIPD figures for the last 10 years! Unfortunately, it is a fact of life in this and many other countries that the base levels of morale and energy are often lower in the public sector. Many good things are happening to change this, but since this is a culture that has taken over a century to form and solidify it will also take many, many years to change. The public sector has never been more like the private sector in terms of the way that its Boards and employees are held to account for their actions, performance and behaviours – so this bodes well for the future, but will take time to filter through to the hard-wired culture of organisations.

One of the key aspects of this change process concerns leadership. Absence management processes and management skills can only get you so far in terms of organisational development and it is your senior leaders that create the culture of the organisation, generate the role models, set the direction and provide an overarching sense of purpose for the workforce. So when my colleagues at my university spin off company have worked with NHS organisations, they have focused firmly on how leadership behaviour creates the stage on which staff are asked to perform. In my view, if you are talking publicly about where the NHS (and indeed all public sector organisations) need to look to boost employee engagement and take their work on the psychological well-being of staff to the next level, it would be a major mistake to ignore leadership. Focusing on improving absence management processes is already happening in most Trusts, which is fine – but on its own it’s just more of the same old-school thinking and, like the private sector, the NHS is moving on!
 
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/health/7968723.stm

Leave a Comment » | Absenteeism, Engagement, Leadership, Management, Productivity, Well-being | Permalink
Posted by Cary Cooper

G20— New world order; new confidence?

April 7, 2009

I’ve just got back from London where last week we witnessed the biggest show on earth, as some newspapers were calling it.  Sections of the media claimed that the G20 summit succeeded in creating a ‘new world order’,  while others stated that it has merely been a useful ‘talking shop’ and ‘photo event’, but of little use to the ordinary person who has lost his/her job or is worried about their personal finances. 

Another angle is that the events of last week will have little immediate impact, but may stimulate the world economy in a couple of year’s time.  We each have our perspective on this unique event and I feel it has been successful, not in pulling us out of recession today or even by the end of the year, but because it was a positive event.  It was a meeting of all the leading economies on a scale that has not been seen before – rather than just being a forum for the biggest few nations.  It was worthwhile because twenty human beings met one another face-to-face, spent a couple days together where they signed up to positive aspirations for the future and agreed to continue the dialogue.  The personal contact between these senior statesmen and women was critical. We all know, from our personal experiences that ‘touching the flesh’ is so important in developing honest, open relationships and dealing with difficult problems – trying to do this kind of thing remotely is much more difficult and more often than not ends in failure.
 
But again, for me the most important aspect of this meeting was the positivity of it – this was despite the press seeming to focus on the potential disagreements and conflicts in the lead-up to the event. I guess bad news is good news for many of them, but this doesn’t necessarily do the rest of us any good!  As we emerge into a bright spring after all the doom and gloom we have heard and endured during the winter, it was good to see such proactive steps from politicians who so often favour caution over risk-taking and positive action.  Fiscal stimulus may end up being important, but right now we also need a ‘positivity stimulus.’ Whatever the press might say about the Prime Minister and the government’s motives for hosting the G20, I feel it is a step in the right direction because it tries to catalyse the important ingredients for a recovery; co-operation, helping the less well-off, rejecting greed, taking control, acknowledging common dangers, building consensus and, most important of all, attempting to build confidence throughout the world. 

Sure, none of this constitutes a quick-win or short-term fix, but the problems we now face are not only economic – we have to deal with issues of trust, self-confidence and clawing back some sense of personal security and control.  What started out as a purely economic crisis has become a psychological one – a crisis of confidence, you might call it. The G20 was the first step in dealing with that, but now the banks, industry, indeed, the world’s population need to respond positively.

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Posted by Cary Cooper

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