Dinnerladies Win Again   How did they do it this time?

Personality assessment.   Increase your chances of recruitment success.

Thou shalt not Smoke   Why there will be some surprising sights.

Dinnerladies Win Again

Remember those dinnerladies who worked for Hertfordshire County Council. The Council wanted to change their contracts so it wrote to them and gave them 13 weeks notice. The dinnerladies took the council to the High Court and won their case because the Council had no right to change their contracts. It could have given notice to terminate the old contract and offer a new one but it didn’t do that. That case is in the records as “Burdett-Coutts and ors v Hertfordshire County Council. Does something strike you as strange there? A dinnerlady with the name of Burdett-Coutts. The Council should have known they had serious opposition. They didn’t stand a chance.

Well they’re back. Not the same dinnerladies though. This time the case is St Helens Borough Council v Derbyshire and ors. Ms Derbyshire and her fellow applicants taking on the might of St Helens Borough Council. But this time it’s not a High Court case. In the previous case Mrs Burdett-Coutts had to go to the High Court because she had a civil claim for breach of contract. Ms Derbyshire’s case was about sex discrimination. And she ended up in the highest court in the land. The House of Lords.

And what was all the fuss about? Nothing but a couple of letters which the Council wrote to the dinnerladies back in 1998 when they were trying to settle a sex-discrimination claim. Most of the dinnerladies had agreed to settle but Ms Derbyshire and 38 colleagues held out for a better deal.

So the Council decided to write a letter to all the catering staff. The letter painted a grim picture of what would happen if Ms Derbyshire and her colleagues got their way. The price of a school meal would rise so much as to make the service unviable and (reading between the lines) a lot of jobs would have to go. They were trying to put the frighteners on and not being too subtle about it.

Eventually of course the case was settled and the meals-service somehow survived the cost of it. But Ms Derbyshire and friends were not completely happy. They claimed that the letter which the Council sent amounted to victimisation.

Now victimisation occurs when someone is treated less-favourably because they made a discrimination claim. Ms Derbyshire had certainly made a discrimination claim. But did the letter amount to victimisation, or were the Council within their rights to robustly defend the claim.

Well these legal questions went to an Employment Tribunal and the Appeal Tribunal who both agreed with Ms Derbyshire’s argument that she had been victimised. The Council took the case to the Court of Appeal who reversed the decision and found for the Council. So the dinnerladies went all the way to the House of Lords. The Lords overturned the Court of Appeal’s decision so the dinnerladies finally won their case. As one of the Law Lords said, this does not prevent employers making “ordinary attempts” to persuade claimants to settle their cases. They will just have to be extremely careful how they go about doing so.

Personality assessment.

Ever recruited the ‘perfect’ candidate, only to find out once they join you that they’re not quite as good as you thought?

The high performing sales person who can’t manage their time?

The IT support technician who can’t keep track of multiple jobs?

The manager who can’t delegate?

An important additional tool to interviewing is psychometric assessment. This is a bit of a jargon term which basically means ability tests and personality questionnaires. Personality questionnaires are designed to assess the candidate’s preferred style of behaviour at work, their ‘team fit’ and their leadership potential. 

Ability tests can be used to assess anything from the candidate’s numeracy and verbal reasoning skills, to their level of accuracy on data entry and their suitability for customer services roles.

In addition, many assessment tools put the candidate’s results in the context of the performance in the same test by members of a comparison group such as other managers or graduates, letting you know how they really shape up.

The technology involved in psychometric assessment has also developed over the years. Where once most tests were ‘pencil and paper’, and conducted in a supervised environment, many are now accessible online in the comfort of the candidates’ own home. The questionnaires have also been specifically designed to make them difficult for candidates to fake.

Obviously caution needs to be exercised in the choice of psychometric assessment tools. They should only be used by trained practitioners and be recognised by a professional body such as the British Psychological Society. A good test provider should be able to give you information on the validity of the test and its suitability for the skills or personality traits you’re trying to assess.

Psychometric tools cannot give you the whole answer in isolation, any more than interviews can, but they can give you valuable additional information on the candidate. It’s a bit like a jigsaw puzzle really; the more pieces of information you can build up on the candidate, the better picture you get at the end.

At Picasso HR we have qualified staff who can organise and run the whole recruitment & selection process for you, from:

• dealing with the job advertisement
• applicant administration
• interview questions
• shortlisting
• interviewing
• organising the psychometric tests for 2nd interview candidates
• writing the report from the results of the tests
•  providing you with feedback and
• devising appropriate questions for the second interview as well as interview

Isn’t it great when you can off load something that can be long winded and time consuming to professionals who know what they are doing?

Call us to find out how Picasso HR can make the whole recruitment and selection process, from dealing with administration to interviewing, painless for you.

Thou shalt not Smoke

No it’s not the eleventh commandment. But the Dean of Southwark, the Very Reverend Colin Slee, put it rather nicely:

"We are going to have the ridiculous prospect at the next coronation of the sovereign solemnly entering Westminster Abbey past a 'no smoking' sign”.

Smoking was not a common problem in church, he insisted.  "We get all sorts of things, we get men wearing hats …. but I haven't seen anybody smoking ….for a very long time."

He’s absolutely right of course. But technicalities like that count for nothing. Churches will be treated in exactly the same way under the new regulations, as pubs, factories and offices.

And isn’t it ironic that 1st July, the day the new regulations take force, is a Sunday.

You can picture the scene in the early summer morning as hundreds of vicars and priests up and down the land struggle to make their shiny new A5 sized notices stick onto weathered ancient oak doors, before the congregations arrive.

Why there will be some surprising sights.And the eager council inspectors fresh from their training courses, armed with pocketfuls of on-the-spot fine pads, checking to see that no doors have been missed.

Colin Slee seemed amazed. "It is quite extraordinary that no-one saw this …. no-one noticed there needs to be provision, not just for churches but synagogues, temples and mosques as well."

It is indeed extraordinary. Especially when you realize that 26 bishops, priests and “lords spiritual” sit in the House of Lords. And it’s part of their job description to scrutinise new legislation.

So they missed their chance and the churchmen (and women) will just have to get on with it, like the rest of us. Because even though nobody ever smokes in church, the law says that if they don’t stick those signs by every entrance door, they could cop a £150 fine.

You can understand why the clergy are upset about having to put “tacky” no-smoking signs (their words) on their historic buildings. Church doors are meant for grander things. After all, in 1517 (before tobacco had even been heard of) a young monk called Martin Luther pinned a certain piece of paper to a cathedral door in Wittenburg. The Pope never got over it!

Nowadays a new law passes through parliament making us pin a notice on every church door in the land and 26 churchmen in the House of Lords don’t even notice.

The information in this newsletter is of a general nature and is not a substitute for professional advice. You are recommended to obtain specific professional advice before you take any action.

For further information, advice or assistance on any of the matters raised in this newsletter please contact Picasso HR on 01473 890037.

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