The Background
One of the realities of management is that there are very few new ideas.
Top managers in organisations either bring with them what they learned (good and bad) in other organisations, such as offshoring and outsourcing, or re-hash other people’s ideas, however discredited. In this way people, who after all have to find something to do to justify their sometimes staggeringly high remuneration packages, will apply simplistic solutions to complex problems.
In this way Lloyds has now set off on a process that is going to do very little to improve real performance. The share price has moved but not to the extent that the market is going wild about Lloyds and there seems little idea of how revenue can be grown. So the focus is on the easy option; cost reduction with the branch network being gutted and the offshoring of thousands of valuable IT jobs, the sort that should be kept firmly in the UK, by a company that has the hypocrisy to trumpet its support for Britain!
A key part of the background to this offensive will be Lloyds aim of reducing staff numbers without paying severance payments. That has everything to do with money and nothing to do with fairness.
I don’t doubt that at the top of Lloyds the need for change has been characterised as a cultural problem but one should not forget that the current Chief Executive has been in post since mid-2021 so he presided over the creation or perpetuation of a series of HR policies that could never last. No business was ever going to be able to sustain the sort of smorgasbord of staff policies in which people were, more or less, encouraged to choose what they did, when they did it and where and there was bound to be an adjustment. But like most adjustments in most areas of society, Lloyds’ offensive against poor performance is going to go too far, too fast. Unless they are protected, innocent people will suffer.
What To Expect
My colleague Mark Brown has pointed out that Lloyds’ policy will be to identify allegedly weaker performers and mount an offensive to try to get them out of the business as quickly and cheaply as possible, whilst driving up output generally.
To help achieve that, line management and HR will be targeted to implement as many performance plans as the Bank’s top management decree.
It all sounds fairly straightforward and who can object to the idea that everyone should do a fair day’s work for a fair day’s pay?
But reality will cut in at even this early stage. Lloyds will lack the ability to identify true under-performers and massive amounts of management time will be spent harassing staff whose dismissals would never stand up to the scrutiny of Employment Tribunals and who are simply going to have their focus diverted from work, to playing the HR ‘game’. And their managers will be diverted badly too. Lloyds simply doesn’t have the tools (and neither does anyone else) to decide conclusively whether most people in complex jobs are bad performers. Having a feeling, based on superficial analysis and sometimes prejudice, cuts no mustard at the Employment Tribunal and when dismissing managers find themselves under cross examination weak cases will collapse.
Line managers, who have a hard enough job anyway, are going to appear to be the villains of the piece when all concerned know that they are being told they have to implement plans to satisfy the demands of Gresham Street, whether they want to start those plans or not. When the dust settles and the staff who have been performance managed are still in their jobs but are thoroughly hacked off with the treatment they’ve received, their line managers will have to pick up the pieces. That is not our problem directly but the damage to relationships that is going to be done will be considerable.
Identifying Under Performers
Every organisation has employees who swing the lead to see what they can get away with and Lloyds is no exception. Whether it has more or less than any other large organisation is hard to form a view on but it has some particular problems, many of its own creation – see my comments earlier.
Either way, identifying conscious under-performers is easier in relatively simple jobs but not at all easy in jobs with complex inputs that line managers themselves may not understand fully. So a widget maker who produces 10 a day against a target of 15 may be seen to be operating below par, although even in that simple case there will be all sorts of complicating factors: does the equipment work, are the raw materials delivered on time, are other people part of the cause and is there sickness or disability involved?
But in complex roles, say the jobs of lawyers, it’s often very hard to decide objectively whether someone is a good, bad or indifferent performer and even harder to prove it!
If You Are A Member Of BTU
You should start now producing a more or less daily diary of anything significant that happens or is said or done that could be relevant to a future performance case. The list of possible diary entries is infinitely long of course but possibilities would be recording any lack of resources, training or necessary guidance or the absence of clear objectives.
This is of course a diversion in itself and a tedious thing to have to do but your job security could depend on it so no matter how senior you are and no matter how good a performer you think you are, you should start scribbling! This will help us give you the best possible support if push comes to shove on performance.
If you get any hint that you might be the subject of any sort of performance plan (the name of the plan is not really important) please email us (ideally) or ring so we can get the analysis of your case moving. There will be a good deal of work to do but effective legal representation (even before a case gets anywhere near a Tribunal) is always about perspiration rather than inspiration.
Don’t be misled by the use of the word ‘informal’. There is nothing informal in employment law and indeed the very use of the word should be enough to put anyone on notice!
Following Reasonable Instructions and Sticking To The Rules
No trade union is going to be able to save someone who refuses to follow reasonable, lawful instructions or who consciously breaches clear company rules.
In those cases the bar Lloyds would need to jump over at the Employment Tribunal would be low so in the current climate someone playing fast and loose should expect to be dismissed.
Most cases are much more complex or nuanced of course but this warning is needed.
Remember that if an employer wants to get rid of someone on a salary of £60,000 and has a redundancy policy that would pay out 2 years’ pay, that represents a hefty cost and a long payback period. With dismissal the savings are immediate.
Dodgy Disciplinaries
I will deal with this subject in more detail in a further newsletter but members should be aware, if they are not already, that using purported breaches of rules or allegations of dubious conduct gives an employer that is so-minded the perfect opportunity to get rid of a member of staff someone has decided he or she would like to see the back of.
Once the Lloyds HR machine (which is there to implement central policy) decides it wants someone out it will direct itself to achieving that end. Fairness is not going to come into that decision.
Lloyds has just reinstated a member of staff, represented by us, who was sacked completely unfairly. That she was reinstated was again not about fairness but was down to the effectiveness of our representation and the fact that we would have one her Tribunal case.
But what should be a concern was that a Halifax hearing manager decided to dismiss her when all the facts pointed the other way. If it can happen in that sort of case it can happen to anyone, at any level. Indeed people in the higher bands are the most vulnerable!
If You Are Not A Member Of BTU
To be blunt you’re on your own.
Accord, the only other union of any size in Lloyds, has already come out in support of the Bank and with its heritage and its dependence on Lloyds Banking Group for support, it’s not going to rock any boats. Accord was set up under the auspices of HBOS because that Bank wanted to prevent genuinely independent representation and nothing has changed.
Accord is simply an apologist/facilitator of Bank policy and a virtual extension of HR.
MEMBERS SHOULD PASS THIS NEWSLETTER ON TO THEIR COLLEAGUES IN HALIFAX & LLOYDS SO THEY TOO CAN BENEFIT FROM THE ONLY INDEPENDENT TRADE UNION IN LLOYDS BANKING GROUP.