HR Matters Ottawa
FOLLOW ME  -->
  • Home
  • HR Building Blocks
    • Building a Team
    • Compensating a Team
    • Optimizing a Team
    • Managing a Team
  • Consulting Services
  • About
    • Partners
    • Contact
  • Blog

And the Ignorant Buffoons Continue To Abound

5/20/2015

0 Comments

 
Here is another example of how people just don't get it.

I will sum up for those who do not want to read the whole thing…a female comedian was hired for a corporate gig, a BUSINESS event. She was heckled with sexual remarks from some ignorant pig in the audience. As she put it, if she had been in a comedy club, it may have been different and she would have handled it differently. However, this was a corporate gig, and her instructions were no dirty, or sex laden jokes. Yet, somehow, this cement head in the audience decided it was okay to go on about having sex with her in front of her audience.

Sigh…seriously…how can we still be dealing with this in this day and age?

There is a wide spread media campaign going on about sexual harassment and it is helping highlight the issue. This can only be a good thing, but sometimes it feels like an uphill battle. I think there are more women who are not saying anything than those who are brave enough to come forward. Because I will tell you, it takes guts to do what this comedian, Jen Grant ,did. There will be those people saying she gets up and makes jokes for a living so it comes with the territory…it does NOT come with the territory. Explain to me how choosing to make people laugh for a living should result in people shouting out to you about how they are going to have their way with you, have sex with you - and by the way, unwanted sex...yeah that is rape - so let's think again about what transpired here. There will be other people saying she should have been stronger, less “sensitive” to what happened, like she should just suck it up, put on her big girl panties and let some jackass shout at her about what he would like to do to her.

My faith in the human race shatters a little bit more when I see or hear comments like that. So bravo to Jen Grant, and Shauna Hunt and the untold numbers of other women and men who have come forward and shed the light on this. And to the other members of the audience who stood up to this ignoramus at the event, bravo to you too…every time someone has the courage to stand up to sexual harassment in any of its insidious forms, we take a tiny step closer to making all workplaces a safer place to work.

0 Comments

The Bigger Issue behind the HydroOne Firing...

5/13/2015

2 Comments

 
The WWW is aflame with the recent firing of a HydroOne employee who showed himself to be a complete ass while on camera. For those of you who have not already seen or heard about the story, here is the link. 

I have watched the video and read a few opinion pieces regarding this incident. Some are claiming that HydroOne got themselves a bunch of positive free publicity for firing this individual. Some feel that the punishment was too severe, others feel it was just about perfect.

I am not going to talk about whether or not this act of extremely poor judgement warranted public shaming and loss of a job but I am doing a deep dive into the issue of sexual harassment. How is it even possible in this day and age that women are going into their place of work, in this case a soccer game to do a legitimate job of reporting, and get harassed to this extent? It is vile. I actually am (almost) at a loss for words.

All employers have a duty to ensure that their employees are safe from harassment, sexual or otherwise. So my question is what the hell were CityTV and other networks doing about this issue? Clearly it is not a new phenomenon and these women reporters have been dealing with this for rather too long (well, dealing with it at ALL is entirely unacceptable). When did management know about this level of harassment and what did they do to protect their employees?

And what are all of these employers going to do about this now?

2 Comments

Favoritism...A sound business decision or sheer stupidity?

4/27/2015

0 Comments

 
The CBC report on the Jian Ghomesi affair has come out. And d'uh, they have identified that they handled it incorrectly and this issue of favoritism is now front page news. Everyone is weighing in on it, and now I shall as well.

Favoritism is everywhere. And it is unlikely to go away, well, not unlikely, it is NOT going to go away. We display favoritism with most of our decisions, whether it be choosing Granny Smiths over McIntosh apples or deciding to ignore bad behavior from a favourite employee when we may have terminated a less favoured employee over the same behavior.

Some would argue that the favoritism is a business decision that CBC employed, and let’s face it, it served them well, at least until it blew up in their face, but really...how much has CBC really suffered? It is not like they are a private company, and we can show our displeasure through our spending habits. A few people have lost their jobs, so I suppose that is a good message. Ghomesi was a very popular figure for the CBC, and yes, maybe they made a conscious decision to look the other way. However, there are far better ways to reward a favoured employee without allowing the individual to circumvent common decency and break laws.

Most of us are not running high profile, national and international organizations, but we are dealing with favoritism. We are humans; we have favourites. Just because you are a manager or an executive, you do not suddenly become a blank slate with no feelings or deeply held perceptions about what you like and do not like. And what happens when someone who is a favourite becomes more of a liability than an asset?

I am not saying anything new or exciting here, just weighing in on the issue. We cannot eradicate favoritism but we can manage it.


0 Comments

A bit late to the kicking post - Weighing in on Ghomesi

12/9/2014

0 Comments

 
Dear God, what a Human Resources nightmare! It has been a couple of months since this story broke and I have been refraining from commenting as I feared I could not be objective. Immediately following the news that Ghomeshi had been fired, one was inclined to feel a bit sorry for the poor old terminated, if somewhat pervy sod. Big bad CBC had struck again. Then more news came out that Ghomeshi was actually a predator and abuser, but still, that seemed at best a moral issue, at worst, a criminal one…again not something one would expect an employer to weigh in on. And now, an outpouring of women, interviews with key players, charges that all seem to point this being quite the debacle. And I feel I can now be objective…all players in this pile of dung need a kick in the head:

Ghomeshi – obviously. I do not need to go into more detail as to why.

The CBC – their mishandling of the rumours, informal complaints and formal complaints is stunning. I have watched the Fifth Estate program on the issue and while worth a watch, it smacks of a cover up job. Someone is going down for this, we just have to wait and see who.

The Union – the latest to come out is that they have issued a statement  to their members. If the reports I have read are true, one of the women went to the union regarding the harassment she faced, and the union also failed to do anything about it. It seems the union is now indignant about an investigation that surely should have begun the minute THEY had word of a complaint.

I do wonder what I would have done had I been in the Human Resources department at CBC. Would I have had the courage to stand up to the CBC and the union? I like to think I would have, but it is quite possible I would have just gone along with what seemed to be the culture – “Protect the Stars”. I would love to talk to an employee in the HR department at CBC, just to find out how truly deep this went, how much they knew and what the instructions to them were. I hope the investigation yields some of these answers. I am following this story with avid interest, but I worry at how long this will all take. Will we forget about all of this by the time a report comes out? And will anything change?

0 Comments

Seeking Permission to Invade your Inbox

6/25/2014

0 Comments

 
I must admit I have been vaguely aware that the Anti Spam Legislation was looming, but it was not until I started receiving MORE e-mail asking for my expressed consent to continuing receiving e-mail that generally remains unread, that I realized the time was upon us to comply.

Granted this is not really a Human Resource topic but it is an issue that is impacting small businesses. I have read several articles, and heard arguments for both sides of the coin. I also am annoyed and I wish to make my annoyance known through my blog, since clearly I cannot simply send out an e-mail to everyone I have ever come in contact with, unless I first send them another e-mail asking them if I can send them more e-mail. Geez, now I am just dizzy thinking about this.

This legislation is about 10 years too late as far as I can tell. By now, we all have spam filters, we have been educated to not click on links sent from Nigerian princes, and most of us have learned not to open attachments that come from unknown sources. Now, of course, this is the worst kind of spam, the stuff that does most damage to the uneducated, but the legislation will not protect any of us from THAT kind of spam. Nope, the spam it will be “protecting” us from is the type of spam that is infinitely less annoying than the crap that gets stuffed in our physical mailboxes every day. It is the e-newsletter from the local business in your neighbourhood that will be impacted, or the mostly relevant articles that your financial advisor sends out on occasion. The only businesses that are actually following this legislation appear to be the ones I wanted to hear from in the first place. But now, I have to actually do something more onerous than clicking delete.

Now, on the other side of the argument, I see that larger businesses do have some responsibility to ensure they are not taking advantage of their size and resources to send me daily reminders about their latest sales (yes, HBC, I am looking at you), but again, I am quite capable of clicking delete, and at some time, I was stupid enough to provide my e-mail address, so I feel I have to take responsibility for some of the junk in my inbox.

I am looking forward to hearing about the first fine levied under this legislation, I am betting it won’t be that nice broker that offered to help me release foreign funds if I simply send a registered cheque for $10,000.

0 Comments

Privacy over life and limb, Part 2

3/26/2014

0 Comments

 
Back in June, I wrote a blog about a ruling regarding random drug and alcohol testing. This issue has reared its head again, as there was a ruling today during arbitration regarding Suncor and their application to apply random drug and alcohol testing to their employees.

More information can be found in this CBC news article.

I will be following this closely, and am interested in other people's thoughts and opinions on what seems to be an issue keeps popping up.

0 Comments

    RSS Feed

    View my profile on LinkedIn

    Author

    For more information about the author, go to About Carolyn, and read more about me and about my philosophy, or don't and just read my musings...they may provide all you want to know about me.

    Categories

    All
    Benefits
    Compensation
    Compliance
    Employee Morale
    General Babbling
    Human Resources
    Legal

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.