My wife and I have been reading Richard Carlson’s Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff. It sounds easy: identify the small stuff in your life and let go. But, no. The real challenge is the subtitle: … And It’s All Small Stuff. According to Carlson, everything is ‘small stuff’: our ‘in […]
Ian Webster
Shuter and Shooter Publishers, a special client of mine, experienced a tragedy last month when one of their long-serving and much-loved employees passed away. It was a humbling experience to join the company in a morning of grief and celebration. There were tears and laughter, as you would expect from […]
Tragedy at work: Four steps to help your staff cope
So, you have done your investigation (see ‘Seven Questions You Need to Ask Before a Disciplinary Enquiry’), collected the evidence, written out the allegations and issued the Notice of Enquiry. Now you just wait for the enquiry to happen, don’t you? Not quite. There are two things you will have […]
Two Things to Establish at a Disciplinary Enquiry
A Pietermaritzburg Girls’ High School learner ranted on WhatsApp recently, using the K-word against her fellow learners. What was she thinking? Did she learn nothing from Penny Sparrow? However, this article is not about the young woman’s foolishness, parental responsibility or how the school is handling it. We are discussing […]
Racist Rants: Six Rules for the Workplace
One of the problems managers have when it comes to difficult, ineffective, poor-performing employees, is our emotional state. By the time we decide we must act, either because the behaviour has been going on for so long or the incident is so serious, we are really angry and want nothing […]
Seven Questions You Need to Ask Before a Disciplinary Enquiry
Employers beware! The appointment and promotion of managers and supervisors is much more risky than you thought. Since no one is a perfect fit, we are used to assessing whether a candidate’s shortcomings can be dealt with through training and coaching. A lack of technical and people-management skills is the […]
Sexual Harassment and Other Misconduct: Employer Risk
1 The Marikana massacre four years ago, was a watershed moment in South African labour relations. The Farlam Commission into the tragedy pointed out multiple failures on all sides. For employers, the failure of management on a number of levels makes for sober reading. However, it is tempting to heave a […]
Avoiding Marikana: Four Years On
Sorry ladies. Women’s month got knocked off the front pages by the Local Government Elections this year. For those who supported the smaller parties, there was hope that this would be the year of breakthrough. Mixed results there. For ruling-party supporters, perhaps this would be the year of service delivery? […]