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Black Lives Matter
Photo credit / explantion: (Great Uncle) Michael Leigh wearing a T-shirt designed by (Uncle) Neil Mandel in 1990/91 as part of his Young Enterprise business project. It appears that we still have not learnt the lessons. Over the past few weeks many of us will have seen the horrifying video of George Floyd, an African…
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To return or not to return?
This is the question at the forefront of each and every business mind at the moment. Many employers are asking the following questions: How can we bring back employees in the safest way possible? What can we do to mitigate risks all around? Do we bring back employees or leave them on furlough? Do we…
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Is It Safe Yet?
In the past week, I’ve been speaking to a lot of employers who are pulling out all the stops to get their staff back to work and back into the workplace, wherever reasonably practical and safe to do so. While they’re leaving some staff furloughed and some staff working from home, many employers are trying…
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What do you need?
Years ago, when I was a Psychology student at University, the first concept we studied was Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. For those of you not familiar with this model, the concept is that there is a basic level of needs which everyone has and once this foundation is in place, you can progress up the…
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Please Sir, Can I work from home?
I have been in HR in one form or another for the past 25 years and over that time I have seen a significant increase in the number of requests to work from home. In part, this is being driven by significant improvements in technology, but there is a whole range of reasons given when…
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Veganism
Written by HR Advisor Michael Mason Depending on your point of view, the recent decision by an Employment Judge that Veganism could (and I use the word could advisedly!) be protected under the Equality Act 2010 as a philosophical belief akin to a religion may have been something of a shock. But what lay behind…
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Gifts for Employees
In a recent survey carried out by a hamper company (so you need to be a little cynical about the findings as there is a vested interest here), they found that 1 in 6 British businesses have sent gifts to the homes of their employees, by way of thanking them for their hard work and…
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Health and Safety claim?
Every employment contract contains an implied term that the employer will take reasonable steps to ensure the safety of their employees. If an employer fails to take care of its employees’ safety during the pandemic, employees may be able to resign and claim constructive dismissal on the basis of a fundamental breach of that term.…
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Convictions
Can we refuse to employ someone based on their previous unspent convictions? While with certain exceptions, it is unlawful under the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 to refuse to employ a “rehabilitated” person on the ground of a spent conviction, the same does not apply to unspent convictions so you are able to refuse to employ someone…
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The New F-Word
To Furlough or not to Furlough, that is the question. By Fiona Mendel Well it’s been the question I have been asked continuously over the last few weeks. Should we Furlough our staff? If so, which ones? How do I go about it? How do I get them back afterwards? We are all screaming the…
