Hello PPMA friends

Last night, I should by rights, have had an early night – as a long trip down to see our wonderful South West Region colleagues awaited me this morning. Well, the moral of that story is best laid plans and all that.

But, 2 things kept me awake:

– The BBC Panorama programme that has seen much twitter traffic.

– Gemma White, QC’s report into inappropriate conduct in Westminster, published today.

I find myself, yet again, in a mixture of absolute rage given what has been revealed.  But also grateful that light is finally being shone on issues in a more coordinated way.  In the interests of equity, it is important to say that the BBC Panorama programme on anti-Semitism could easily have been on Islamaphobia (and a different political party), homophobia or any other form of despicable treatment towards a groups in society.

It should go without saying that the behaviours we see demonstrated towards ANY group that is ‘different’ often has ignorance, intolerance, fear and a smattering of cowardice as core ingredients.

There is something important to say too about this ignorance. It is often caused by short, snappy headlines that serve to further confuse and cause anger.  Asking a simple question e.g., is political party x (or y) anti-this (r that) is deeply unhelpful. It implies that everyone in a party has a problem and that is deeply unfair – and for many deeply offensive. It usually causes people to become defensive or closed off to the very issue we are trying to explore. And, it forces binary choices in terms of how issues are seen.  These binary choices rarely reflect human perception and behaviour.

So the 2 things that stand out and give me pause for thought are as follows.  Firstly, Gemma White’s report contains the following quote:

“As long as getting political jobs in Parliament are dependent on who you know and who you’re related to, sexual harassment will be a necessary evil for ambitious young…. people like me who will choose our careers over our comfort every time”.

There are any number of things that I take exception to in this quote.  As a tax payer, I find it utterly risible that such a culture has been allowed to take hold in some parts of our parliamentary democracy.  As a HR professional I also find it mind bogglingly risible that the ‘who you know culture’ prevails so strongly in some parts.

As HR and OD professionals we surely have obligations to our organisations to discourage such behaviours. By the way,  that means we shouldn’t be indulging in it ourselves.  If I was writing a political blog I’d make a sarcastic observation that perhaps it’s this very culture – that people are clearly willing to condone by participating in it – that is a fundamental part of why our politics is so broken. And why it’s so damned difficult for extraordinary public servants to do their jobs days in and day out. I suppose it’s just as well then that I’m not writing a political blog……

Safe to say it is way beyond time that Westminster got its house in order in terms of how it treats its own workforce.  I’d venture further and say it is testing credibility for Westminster to legislate on workforce matters whilst not addressing it’s own toxicity.

Secondly, what stood out in a profoundly compelling way in the Panorama programme is the behaviour that the Dispute Investigation team described. These experiences are deeply akin to the experiences of people being bullied in workplaces across public services. And of HR and non-HR investigators doing their damnedest to uphold organisation values and bring justice to people in the workplace. That justice does not always mean that complaints are automatically going to be proved, but even the most basic justice absolutely must be that people have confidence that investigations can be conducted independently without fear or favour; that organisations will have the balls to accept investigation outcomes and also have the balls to discipline people found guilty of bullying etc.  It is a profoundly disappointing situation to see investigators being bullied, threatened and defamed.

We are living in troubled times. I suspect we would all agree, but I’m sure there would be healthy debate and disagreement on why those troubled times have arisen.  That’s fine – different opinion is ok.  BUT what is not fine is a denial that bullying cultures exist and an acceptance that these cultures are something to be tolerated.

We have to challenge and call out every instance of bullying, harassment and victimisation wherever we see it.  To do that successfully, we must be clear about what this means, how we will investigate it and how we will deal with it.  We also need to be ruthlessly and consistently clear about what supportive and enabling leadership, culture and behaviour looks like.

All these issues of course are at the heart of #outoftheshadows.

I want to share with you where we are on this important campaign. I am absolutely delighted to share with you that the wonderful Helene Donnelly OBE, has agreed to be the PPMA Ambassador for the campaign. For those of you who may not know, Helene was the Nurse whistleblower at the Mid Staffs Public Inquiry.  You will be reading a blog from Helene in the near future. Her story is utterly horrifying but her humanity and courage is humbling.

I am also incredibly grateful to our friends in ADPH. They agree with us that bullying, harassment and victimisation is a public health issue. ADPH council has agreed to formally endorse our campaign and you will see their logo on future materials.  The force of nature that is Professor Jim McManus will be bringing his own experiences, his considerable wisdom and knowledge to supporting our campaign. We very much look forward to working with Jim, ADPH colleagues and Directors of Public Health across the country.

Our #outoftheshadows webpages and research survey are undergoing final review. They will be up shortly. We are pleased with them but are working with other partner organisations to get their input too, to make sure they really are as good as we want them to be.

My final reflection is a plea. Please please participate in #outoftheshadows. Our research is comprehensive and is looking at the issue from the widest number of perspectives that we believe has been done before. We’re not doing that to win a prize or because we think we’re smart.  We’re taking a comprehensive approach because this isn’t a single issue problem. And there won’t be a single answer.

Future blogs will feature Helene, Jim and other key partners in our campaign.  Until then, I want to share with you the most meaningful advice that I have ever been given. It has saved me in many situations and I hope it will comfort you too.

A dear friend said to me once that I must always remember that ‘wherever you are in your life, you are there for your highest good’. Given that I wasn’t in a great place at the time of that advice, I pretty angrily dismissed it as psychobabble bullshit. And that is the printable version.

But of course, friends are often smarter than you would like to acknowledge. Carole’s advice has sustained me in the two darkest times of my life. Believing that in everything you go through there is learning – and that you’ll get through whatever situation you are in, is a profoundly healing and comforting notion. It has stood me in good stead and I hope that in some way it will help those of you currently struggling.

With love
Karen

Hello  PPMA friends

I was delighted to attend the HPMA Annual Conference in Manchester last week. With a theme of Future Thinking, it was wonderful to spend time with our HPMA friends. It was a great opportunity to see the new Chief People Officer for NHS England and Improvement, Prerana Issar speak. She shared the key priorities from the Interim NHS People Plan that was recently issued.  Workforce issues are clearly at the heart of the overall NHS agenda – delivering great patient care is hugely dependent on the workforce – that’s not news to the rest of us working across public services.

A few things came to my mind – firstly, Prerana is the real deal. She brings strong public service experience (gained at the UN) with equally strong private sector experience. She spoke on Day 1 of conference and I found her very compelling, authentic and utterly inspirational. Secondly, she has been in post only 8 weeks but she has a deft grasp of the key issues. Thirdly – and most importantly to me – she made sure to credit the team who had developed the plan.  Dean Royles, the new HPMA President is also the real deal – he has had a stellar career in the NHS and he takes over from Deborah Tarrant who has taken HPMA through a significant journey and restructure as a Charity.

There were lots of interesting sessions and we had chance to share our key objectives from the MOU partnership with our HPMA colleagues. What is really clear to us is that we share common challenges, can learn from each other and frustratingly, that we are often reinventing the wheel across public services HR & OD. So, we continue to be committed to working with HPMA, UHR and CIPD to raise our collective voices, but just as critically share learning and promote good practice. We do not have the luxury in terms of money and resources to plough our own furrows; and if we want to provide opportunities for colleagues to work effectively across public services, then we must collaborate – we are much stronger together.

I also very much enjoyed the HPMA Awards evening – it was a wonderful evening and there were some fantastic winners. I was really pleased to see that our colleagues in Greater Manchester won an award for the Health and Social Care partnership. That was fantastic. James Devine won HPMA HRD of the Year – it was a hugely popular choice. James is from Medway NHS Foundation Trust. He has recently been appointed as Chief Executive which is a fantastic achievement and is another example that being a HRD is not a barrier to further success. Many of you won’t have heard of Jan Bloomfield, but she is this year’s HMPA President’s Award Winner. Jan has recently retired from the West Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust (WSFT), where she served as Director of Workforce (and other portfolios) for 27 years. Jan seemed completely taken aback to receive a standing ovation but it was absolutely clear that her colleagues adore her. It is easy to become cynical – and we clearly know that there are people in senior leadership posts who aren’t admired or respected – but the level of emotion displayed towards Jan was deeply deeply moving.  It was an honour to witness it first-hand.

Sometimes the Universe conspires to send you messages about the path your are on. Our #outoftheshadows campaign isn’t the only time that bullying has made the headlines – and progress has certainly been made. We’ve had much publicity around individual NHS cases and indeed in Universities too. Conference Day 2 gave us the opportunity to hear from Helene Donnelly. This extraordinarily courageous and humble nurse was at the heart of the maelstrom of the Mid Staffordshire scandal. Helene described a number of incidents where her own physical safety was threatened – and for a period of time her husband and father would need to meet her at the front of the hospital to make sure she got home safely. She also told us of other incidents were colleagues threatened to manipulate medicine that she was due to give patients so that she would be blamed for harm that would come to those patients. You could have heard a pin drop. Even after all this time, her voice still breaks on telling her story. I don’t mind saying that her talk upset me greatly and enraged me deeply. On the one hand it was good that my drive home was so much longer than normal as it gave me time to reflect on how things have gone so wrong in our workforces where people who are genuinely wanting to help are being so badly treated.

Her comments about the lack of support she received from HR cut deeply. Helene described the expectation that all of our colleagues should rightly have of us – that we are guardians of values and behaviours and that we are a trusted friend when people need to come to us and tell us when things are going wrong. She was wholly let down by HR and that is a horrible realisation for those of us who should take our obligation to those in trouble so seriously. Brene Brown’s quote struck me deeply too. We must be the people who colleagues know will listen and respond with empathy and understanding. In this way, we can mitigate some of the terrible emotional consequences that people who have been bullied often feel.

I’m pleased to say that I’ll be continuing my conversations with HPMA and UHR about #outoftheshadows and whilst there are details to sort out, I am in no doubt that our friends are bought into this very important campaign. One of our primary drivers behind our MOU was to raise our collective voice – and I feel ever more strongly that we are going to achieve that for #outoftheshadows.

Wherever you are this week, I hope it is kind to you.

Karen

Dear PPMA friends

In our first Out of the Shadows blog and I’m reflecting on the input from our amazing #PPMAHR19 speakers and some thinking from the inspirational Brene Brown. For those not familiar with Brene’s work she is a research professor who has dedicated her life to studying shame, vulnerability, empathy, courage and leadership.

I wanted to see how this would fit into our Out of the Shadow campaign. All of our speakers dedicate their work to empowering organisations and individuals. And it seems to me that in addition to Brene’s work, our Don’t Worry: Be Happy theme can help us find sustainable ways to better tackle bullying and harassment in the workplace.

In our conference PPMA supplement I outlined that we would be focusing on lots of different aspects of bullying and harassment. To do justice to this subject we need to do that. In my view it is only by looking through the eyes of those who have been bullied; developing appropriate responses to people who bully, understanding the legal definitions of victimisation, harassment and bullying; thinking about leadership and culture and the impact that has; and of course thinking about what we need to be doing as HR & OD professionals, that we can ever hope to develop and deliver holistic and sustainable change.

However, we need to start somewhere. My own view is that a good place is to look at personal responsibility. Human beings are influenced by many factors. Before we even start to think about our working environments, we are shaped and forged by the circumstances in which we live, our family, education, economic backgrounds, our friendships, and our cultures etc. In the world of work, we are further influenced by leadership, reward systems, peer pressure etc.

That is a complicated set of influences and it is inevitable that during our lives we may well feel overwhelmed by these. We are (mostly) an enlightened society and It is absolutely right that we find ways to support intervene and encourage people who are struggling. But increasingly I take the view that we must not inadvertently enable poor behaviour by making excuses for it.

I can relate to a real-life example. Last year, as you may remember, I was doing a lot of work on domestic abuse and what an employer response should be. Charities we spent time with very clearly advocated for employers to provide support for abusers – and some employers are doing that very successfully. However, the majority of employers took the view that an abuser should face punitive action. Employers have a huge obligation to role model the behaviours that it values – and society is, I think, taking a harder view about personal responsibility (or the lack thereof).

It is safe to say that there is a whole continuum between supporting perpetrators and punishing them. And there is no question that it is our job to get caught up in the serious debate about which part of the continuum is most effective for our organisations overall.

Reflecting on #PPMAHR19, we can clearly see the importance of Professor Beverley Alimo-Metcalfe, Maria Paviour, Shonette Bason-Wood and Jamil Qureshi’s work. My take from Maria’s input to conference is that individuals can change their emotions and behaviour by having a better and more conscious understanding of how our brains function. Jamil and Shonette also talked to this in different ways. Beverley was also profoundly passionate about the critical role of leadership in organisations. There was a clear understanding that neuroscience influences behaviour, leadership influences engagement and wellbeing. An increased understanding of this is critical to our success as a HR & OD Profession. It’s no accident that the World Bank is increasing its focus on the #HumanCapital index. And New Zealand’s finance Minister, Grant Robertson suggested that at the World Bank’s spring meeting in April that countries should assess human wellbeing instead of GDP.

We can’t just rely on leaders to fix the scourge of bullying – we have to have a laser like focus on the behaviours that we want to support and those we want to make clear are totally unacceptable.  And as individuals we also need to play our part in that.

We must prioritise the taking of personal responsibility.

Many clinical rehabilitation programmes do emphasise this, e.g., Alcoholic Anonymous’ 12 Steps programme. However, much of the behaviour that people experience as bullying does not rise to the level where employers will send a perpetrator to rehab. A victim of bullying will struggle with feelings of shame, fear, loss of confidence, self-blame and so on – and if an organisation fails to hold a bully to account, they will also feel powerless, ignored, resentful, and lose confidence in authority. Bullies unchallenged will feel empowered and enabled. And colleagues and others will see that this behaviour is acceptable, lose the courage to challenge and speak truth to power. That is never acceptable.

For a long time, positive psychology, self-development, spirituality, new-age fields have increased focus on the power of the individual. Marianne Williamson, Oriah Mountain Dreamer, Louise Hay and many others have been pioneers in this field. Taking control of our own behaviours, emotions, intentions, ambitions etc offer productive approaches to positive well-being and productivity.

But our desire to change ourselves can only be effective if we truly acknowledge our feelings with honesty and if we whole heartedly participate in our lives. What is inspiring about Brene’s work is that there is a deep evidence base – over 20 years worth – much of that from workplaces. So we can have confidence that it works and delivers sustainable change.

There is a beautiful simplicity about some of her conclusions. In a 2019 Netflix Original on The Call to Courage, she talks about “not working your shit out on other people”. I love this as it’s that call to take personal responsibility. Abdicating responsibility means you are failing to fully participate in your life – and you give up your own power to be yourself.

Bullies, it seems to me, do just that. The general view that a bully is coward resonates with me, but bullies are also very manipulative, intelligent, selfish, sometimes amoral, sometimes bored, often jealous and envious. We know from neuroscience that we can change this – if, of course, we’re willing to do the work necessary to acknowledge our shadows.

I believe passionately that in our workplaces, HR & OD professionals have a unique contribution to make. We should be championing personal responsibility, the power to change and so on. And yes of course, we are challenged by work pressures and so on – but if we do not relentlessly focus on creating positive and productive workplaces, then we should just go home.

Relentless championing means we have to do our own work as a community. We need to make sure we are focusing on our own professional and personal development. Because if we don’t, we are letting ourselves down and we are holding back our organisations. And this is inexcusable.

So, for this first Out of the Shadows blog, I leave you with these thoughts. Our profession needs courage, empathy, vulnerability, integrity, compassion and love.

If, as a HR & OD professional:

• you are trying to prove yourself at the expense of someone else,
• you are accusing people of doing to you what you are actually doing to them
• you are belittling someone to make you feel better about yourself
• you aren’t being honest about what someone did because you are not ready to take responsibility for your own actions
• you are shit stirring because you just can
• you are competing because you want to be seen as ‘better than’ …. And
• if you are standing by and not speaking up when you clearly see behaviour that should be challenged, even if there is a risk to speaking out ……..

Then

….. Do as Brene says and stop working your shit out on other people.

If you aren’t willing to do that, go and do something else. You’re not welcome because you are not upholding our professional duty, which as CIPD reminds us, is to be purpose led, evidence based and outcomes driven.

We’ll be hearing from plenty of other amazing people during the next 12 months on this topic. We have to get involved in this debate, or the best efforts of #Metoo and the whistleblowers who have spoken out before will be wasted. And that will not do.