With the Federal Election off and racing, now is the time to remind  all of your staff about appropriate codes of conduct in relation to elections.

Generally that means:

• No use of company emails or faxes to share party political comment
• No use of company photocopiers or material to copy political material
• No bringing of how to vote material and leaving it in the lunchroom
• No wearing company branded clothing in any political photo shoot (without your prior authorisation)

If you have the discussion now you won’t have to discipline later!

Ingrid Cliff

We put your business into words

Heart Harmony – Freelance HR Writer

If you are in Australia, trying to keep up with all the IR changes can be a challenge. The Council of Small Business, Australian Government, Workforce Guardian and Telstra Business have all got together and put together an incredibly useful website to help small business learn and stay up to date with all the Fair Work requirements.

This is definitely a site to save into your bookmarks www.fairworkforsmallbusiness.com.au

Sign up for the free monthly newsletters, watch a webinar, check out the interactive guides to help you work out what you need to do for business.  Finally … a decent website that tries to make a very complex issue easier to understand. Now all small business needs is the same thing for Workplace Health & Safety!

Until next time

Ingrid Cliff

We put your business into words

Heart Harmony – Freelance HR Writer

In case you have been living under a rock for the past 24 hours, a simple skit on a television program with 6 everyday people performing in black face on a tongue in cheek talent show, has created almost as much press coverage around the world as the recent Tsunami’s and earthquakes.

As someone who was in Human Resources for over 20 years, and who specialised in employment equity for a number of them I feel I have to weigh into the debate.

You see – I am actually loving what has happened. I love that this issue is prompting debate and discussion in the workplaces as it is only through active discussion that sometimes hidden assumptions and beliefs can be reviewed and looked at.

So what were the essential facts of the case? The show in question had a very long run – they were on for 28 years which in TV time is as long as it gets. They then had a 10 year break and were brought back for 2 “reunion” shows – bringing back all the key performers from 28 years into the one show. One of the segments of the show is a very tongue in cheek “talent” show – where people embarrass themselves and generally the least talented who gets the biggest laugh along the way would win the show.

In the reunion show, a group of 6 performers reprised their “act” from about 20 years previously where they did a Jacksons tribute with what is termed “black face” – wearing dark makeup to make them appear as African American. They won with the skit the last time they performed. This time one of the judges (Harry Connick Jnr) was less than impressed and stated he was offended by the act – giving the act a zero score. A flurry of apologies ensued – both public and private.

That’s the essence of it … so what changed in 20 years and why was someone offended?

No one can deny that society changes – what is acceptable in one generation is not acceptable a few generations later. 20 years ago it was common practice to ask women at interview when they intended to leave and have babies. It was also common practice to refer to women as “girls” , “love”, “sweetie” and “honey” in the workplace. Patting the office girl on the butt as they walked past was a relatively common game.

20 years ago people still smoked in their workplaces, the boss was usually called “sir”. Girly calendars adorned the walls of many workplaces and the greatest joke was “hazing” the new apprentice – often quite violently at times.

Workplaces struggled with the changes – but today if you call a woman “love” you will often get a rather rude retort back. Women will tell you quite bluntly that they are not your love and they find that word offensive. Just look at the response by Tracy Grimshaw to the Gordon Ramsey comments for an example.

People smoke outside the buildings (10 metres from the nearest entry) thanks to people who were offended by breathing in the smoke from smokers.

Girly calendars are now out of sight in most workplaces – thanks to people who did not want to view near naked people while they worked.

New apprentices sometimes still get an initiation of sorts, but the old fashioned covering them in grease, and duct taping them to the wall has generally fallen out of favour.

You see, in the past 20 years people started to learn that sometimes things they did or said in fun could be taken a different way by other people. That what they did or said may cause offence. They started to learn to try and think from the other person’s viewpoint – to put themselves in the other person’s shoes. It was termed “political correctness” and copped a lot of flak along the way – but still the changes happened.

Managers realised that they had a legal requirement to provide a safe place of work – which included a place that was psychologically safe and free from harassment. They also realised that as a manager they could be held vicariously liable if someone in their workplace breached the rules and harassed someone else.

So … let’s look at the Jackson Jive issue. A behaviour from many years back was repeated … but the world had changed. African Americans started to gain positions of authority and started to speak up that they didn’t like to be made fun of just because of the way they looked. The Black and White Minstrel show disappeared the way of the dodo.

That’s why it was such a big thing when Obama was elected President. A black person in the highest office in the USA was un-thought of 20 years ago.

In Australia we haven’t quite made it that far. People of indigenous descent are still not very visible in Australia. They still face discrimination. We only apologised to the stolen generation when Kevin Rudd came to power – as before that there was  a belief there was nothing to be sorry for. People of indigenous descent were only allowed to vote from 1962 (1965 in QLD) and mandatory voting by people of indigenous descent only occurred in 1984, compared to 1924 for white Australians).

The different opinions that have been coming out of the Jackson Jive issue show in a very clear light what managers trying to do the right thing on harassment and bullying are up against. 50% of the population see things these sort of issues as a joke and without any malice.  They feel it is in fun – and “can’t people take a joke anymore”. 50% see the issue for what it is – the simple act of black face can cause offence to people of a black or indigenous background.

This is going to be the same in your workplace. Many people who bully or harass are unintentional – they think they are having a joke. The issue is that it is the person on the receiving end that defines whether or not they feel offended and it is doesn’t matter what the person intended. Unless people are aware that the world (and laws) have changed, then problems can and will occur.

As a manager – if you permit bullying or harassment, you are vicariously liable for that action. If it humiliates, intimidates or offends someone – you are liable. (You may want to read up on your legal responsibilities here). It doesn’t matter what you may personally feel – you have a legal responsibility to deal with that type of behaviour.

The flack that Harry Connick Jnr received about stating his offence at the skit is exactly the same that any whistleblower or person who makes a complaint receives. That person is often derided, their history combed for misdemeanors and their initial objections ignored or trivialised. Understand that this often stops people from speaking out. Also understand that you have a legal role in protecting people who make complaints in the workplace.

So what do you need to do about it? Well legally you need to ensure each and every employee is regularly trained in your policies on bullying, harassment and racial vilification (contact me if you need the name of some good trainers). You need to keep your policies up to date and you need to take action if your policies are breached.

Personally I would hate to be Channel 9 right now – they stuffed up as managers by letting the skit go to air and they will have an “interesting time” of it to come. But you as a manager need to learn from the issue. You need to get your own house in order. You need to read up on your responsibilities and you need to have this discussion with your work team.

OK – I’m getting off my soapbox now.

Ingrid Cliff

We put your business into words

Heart Harmony – Freelance writer

Employee manuals are something that most businesses who have more than one employee need to have. The trouble is often they sit on a shelf (next to the Strategic Plan) and gather dust. The only time the cobwebs are removed from them is when there is a disaster and you need to work out what to do.

Employee Manuals need to be living breathing documents, full of enough useful information that you and your team refer to them whenever they need to do something out of the ordinary (like hire someone new, run a performance review or work out how to deal with the employee who has BO). Of course they also need to deal with crisis situations such as dismissing someone, dealing with sexual harassment or what to do when an employee goes off the rails.

Good employee manuals also need to keep pace with emerging technology with policies covering blogging, social media use including Twitter and instant messaging.

Finally, they need to be regularly reviewed in light of new industrial relations legislation to ensure that your business still complies.

After 20 odd years as a Human Resource Manager with companies ranging from less than a hundred employees to a few thousand, I put together all the best policies that I had written, implemented and used in each of the organisations into our Instant HR Policies & Procedures Manual for Australian businesses.

I designed it to be a super simple to use template HR manual – just insert your company name, check out the fit of the policies for your business (for example – not every business offers staff discount so you may not need that particular policy), do a quick check with your legal team to make sure your particular business structure is taken into account and then you are on your way. You don’t need a huge HR team to make it work.

Over the past few years, our employee manual has been successfully used by hundreds of Australian businesses from small start-up IT companies through to large mining organisations. From Opera companies to plumbers – the essentials of good HR are still the same. We even have discovered our manual appearing in some of the Pacific Islands, the UK and the USA. Even though the legal contexts vary, good HR transcends geographic boundaries.

Yesterday, after many months review, we released our latest version 3.1 which takes into account all of the changes from the Fair Work Act. And late last night, everyone who had purchased the manual in the past 2 and a bit years was sent a new free download link to the new edition – just to make sure they were current with their policies (we like surprising people with that little bit extra!)

So … if you have been meaning to create an employee manual for your team, perhaps you may want to check out our Instant HR Policies & Procedure Manual. It will make your life a whole lot easier!

Until next time

Ingrid Cliff

We put your business into words

Heart Harmony – HR Writer

Day 1 of the Ultimate Marketing Seminar saw 4 world class speakers grace the stage here at Brisbane – Siimon Reynolds, Adam Ginsberg, James Schramko and Brad Fallon.

It was fascinating watching them each tackle their topic (basically how to grow your business) from different angles – and how they wove their pitches to buy their seminars throughout their content.

Siimon Reynolds is definitely a showman. His pitch was very fast paced and content rich. His gems from decades in the marketing game were certainly high quality.

I particularly loved his stories of campaigns that worked like Bamboo Lingerie – a local lingerie store in the US that chalk stencilled onto the pavement “From here it look s like you could do with new lingerie. Bamboo Lingerie 200m”. Very clever, funny and cheap as chips to create.

I also liked his analysis of USP/ESP & TSP. USP = unique selling proposition, ESP = emotional selling proposition (the emotion you build your brand about) and TSP = Tribal selling proposition (where you create a tribe around your brand).

His question “Is what you’re doing living up to your marketing of your company” is one all businesses need to ask themselves – as if your marketing is creating one impression, but your company misses the boat on key customer touch-points then you are setting your business up for failure.

Adam Ginsberg is the most successful e-bay seller in history. Unfortunately his session was basically one long pitch – with zero real content. It was entertaining and amusing to watch – but without content to back up the fun, it left me hollow.

James Schramko is one of the truly nice guys in internet marketing. I have been fortunate to see James present a few times and to meet with him socially. He is as my grandma would say “one of nature’s true gentlemen”. He is a doer and not a polished high gloss speaker – what you see is what you get – honest, genuine and real. He spends most of his time happily building his business and and has only recently started presenting after much badgering by his colleagues.

James knows his stuff and went through what was in effect abeginners guide to the world of internet marketing. Showing many possibilities and ideas – and stretching imaginations. Having someone put together a coherent picture of how all the internet marketing pieces fit together and how people can harmonise them into a thriving business is rare. All I can say is if you truly want to succeed in Internet Marketing – James would be one of the ones to learn from. Check out James’s blog and get his e-book to get an idea of the sort of things he can teach you.

Finally Brad Fallon from Stompernet took the stage. Brad is an icon in the internet marketing world and this was the first time I had seen him present. What really stood out for me was how well read Brad was – his speak was littered with references to amazing books to tap into (and as you know my love of books you can imagine Amazon’s joy when I go shopping over the next few days to pick up the main ones).

So here’s a few to look for “Execution”, author Felix Dennis, “Predictably Irrational”, author Ken Fisher, “The Choice”, “It’s not luck”.

Brad’s presentation looked at a whole raft of business blocks that stop people from succeeding drawing from the best business theorists.  The insight that “every business has 1 thing that limits throughput the most”  and our job is to identify and eliminate the one thing is quite powerful. Think about it for a moment – “if you could make a lot more money in the next 6 months if I just (fill in the details about the one constraint)” – what would you do?

Brad demonstrated the power of the word free in campaigns and why the free line has shifted over the years.

He looked at four core limiting things that trip people up:

1. Reality is complex
2. Conflict is inevitable
3. Others are to blame
4. The sky is the limit

Finally he looked at how to create a “Mafia Offer” – one that customers can’t say no to. Very very clever and worth joining Stompernet to learn.

What else did I learn from the seminar – the value of upgrades. I paid for an additional upgrade package – which meant access to a VIP room. So what? Well at the simplest level it meant coffee without queueing, lunch and snacks. It also meant meeting people who were serious about their business (and I booked 2 new clients yesterday during the breaks).

The highlight was access to a cocktail party in the evening to chat with the speakers and other like minded businesses. From my side of things, talking with John Carlton (one of my copywriting heroes) was priceless. Catching up with James with my colleague Donna-Marie Coggins was also brilliant.

Well – off to get ready for Day 2

Ingrid Cliff

We put your business into words

Heart Harmony – Freelance Copywriter