Canadian HR Reporter

CANADIAN HR REPORTER June 1, 2015 18 INSIGHT GO BIG OR GO HOME PARIS — A large group of workers from China — 6,400 to be exact — enjoyed a free trip to Paris recently when their boss treated them to a holiday. e billionaire CEO of the Chinese conglomerate Tiens gave his best salespeople a vacation that started in the French capital and ended with a parade on the Côte d'Azur, according to the Associated Press. Li Jinyuan wanted to reward staff in celebrating his company's 20th anniversary. Making the trip even more unique was the CEO's desire to break a world record by spelling out a phrase in human bodies. e employees gathered on the coastal promenade in Nice, dressed in blue hats and T-shirts, to spell out the words "TIENS' DREAM IS NICE IN THE CÔTE D'AZUR." It's estimated the trip cost somewhere between $17 and $26 million. LIGHTS OUT, PEOPLE RIO DE JANEIRO — The high cost of overtime can be a problem for employers. But many employ- ees are happy to put in the time if it means extra pay. at's not ac- ceptable for the debt-burdened Oi SA, a Brazilian telecom company, according to Reuters. As part of a rigorous cost-cutting program, the company is enforcing a strict 7 p.m. policy to switch off the air conditioning and the lights at its offi ces, leaving 17,000 employees sweltering in the dark if they stay after hours. The move is about power savings and cracking down on overtime, according to CEO Bayard Gontijo. " e fi rst time we turned off the lights, people wanted to stay — they were trying to work with lighters. Now they realize: e lights are turned off because you guys have to do your work in the regular shift and then you have to leave." e Brazilian constitution says employees should receive 50 per cent more pay when they work more than eight hours a day. NO TIME FOR A DOUBLE DOUBLE NEW PORT RICHEY, FLA. — Two hearse drivers found them- selves in a sticky situation recently when they were caught grabbing a coff ee and doughnut on the job, according to the Associated Press. eir big mistake? Leaving the cur- tains open in their vehicle so the coffi n was clearly visible. Making the matter worse? e coffi n was draped with the American fl ag as the body of 84-year-old Lt. Col. Jesse Coleman — a decorated soldier who served in Korea and Vietnam — was inside, on the way to his funeral from Veterans Fu- neral Care. A passerby spotted the hearse in the parking lot at a local Dunkin' Donuts in Florida and sent a video and images of the hearse to a local veterans group, which post- ed them to Facebook. e two men were subsequently fi red. TURN THAT FROWN UPSIDE DOWN COPENHAGEN — Traffi c war- dens don't exactly win popularity contests but Denmark is hoping to change that. Authorities in Co- penhagen are asking the wardens to also act as tour guides, accord- ing to the Copenhagen Post. "We would like to give tourists an even better service when they visit Copenhagen," said omas Jako- bsen, head of the municipality's culture and leisure management. "It should be easy for tourists to get the information they need, so we have asked traffi c wardens to share their knowledge of the city and its attractions or just to help out lost tourists." "Ask Me" badges are being given to 11 war- dens to start, to make them more approachable, and more will be involved if the project is success- ful. " e attendants are a group of professionals who are not always greeted with smiles," said Jes Øk- snebjerg, managing director at Center Parkering. "So when there is a chance for a diff erent type of citizen contact, employees re- spond positively." W EIRD ORKPLACE THE Vol. 28 No. 10 – June 1, 2015 PUBLISHED BY Thomson Reuters Canada Ltd. One Corporate Plaza 2075 Kennedy Rd. 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Todd Humber EDitor's Notes Shoot fi rst, ask questions later I t's hard to feel a lot of sym- pathy for Shawn Simoes, the Hydro One worker fi red from his six-figure job after making derogatory comments in front of Shauna Hunt, a re- porter for CityNews, outside a Toronto FC soccer game in May. He may not have been the one to shout out "F— her right in the p—" — the vulgar phrase that emerged as an Internet hoax and has turned into the bane of fe- male TV journalists everywhere — but he didn't back down when confronted by Hunt and went on to make his own comments on camera, including one involving a vibrator. He made his bed, he has to lie in it. He did off er a written apology to Hunt after the fact (which she graciously accepted), so there's some credit for remorse, albeit a little late. It certainly moves the sympathy needle a bit — nobody likes to see someone have his ca- reer and life ruined over juvenile behaviour. But what's fascinating from an HR perspective was the lightning fast decision made by Hydro One to cut ties with Simoes. Termi- nation is often referred to as the capital punishment of employ- ment law. ere isn't a more se- vere penalty when it comes to the employment relationship. One can just imagine the fl urry of activity that went on in the halls of Hydro One as the story broke — a confl uence of lawyers, HR professionals and senior execu- tives meeting and acting so deci- sively. e video was fi lmed on a Sunday. e story didn't really go viral until the following day. By Tuesday, Simoes was persona non grata at his workplace. Anyone who has been involved in a termination knows the needle almost never moves that fast. Part of a trend? I'm not sure I'd call it a trend yet, but there seems to be a mental- ity developing among employers that perhaps it's easiest to mete out the maximum allowable pun- ishment when bad behaviour hits the evening news, and then to scale it back on appeal. I'll call it the social media eff ect — because news travels so fast now, and pub- lic outrage grows even quicker, sometimes the easiest thing to do is cut ties with the employee mak- ing headlines. A third party can fi gure out lat- er if it was the right decision. At least in the meantime the beast has been fed — and the public will move on to another target. Ground zero for this employer behaviour was the Ray Rice saga in the National Football League last year. Rice, you may recall, knocked his wife unconscious in the elevator of a hotel. e NFL's initial discipline was a two-game suspension for Rice, a star run- ning back for the Baltimore Ra- vens. After that slap on the wrist, the Internet exploded and the sto- ry hit mainstream media. When the dust settled, Rice's temporary ban had been substituted with an indefi nite one, and the NFL's reputation had been left in tatters. Fast forward to 2015, and the NFL appears to have adopted that "take the severe road" punishment philosophy for its players. Tom Brady, the Super Bowl-winning quarterback of the New England Patriots, was accused of defl ating footballs during last year's play- off s. (Well, he wasn't accused of doing it directly. It's a complicat- ed story, but staff members were accused of doing it under his di- rection or, at a minimum, he was likely aware they were doing it.) ere was no smoking gun, but despite that lack of solid evidence, the NFL suspended Brady for four games, took two draft picks from the team and fi ned it a record US$1 million. In other high-profi le dismissals, the "shoot fi rst and ask questions later" philosophy has appeared to varying degrees. e CBC acted relatively quickly in terminating Jian Ghomeshi, who has yet to be convicted of any wrongdoing. e BBC turfed one of its biggest stars, Top Gear host Jeremy Clark- son, after he punched a producer in the face. While discussing the Hydro One incident, a colleague stopped by my offi ce and asked, "Can you really be fi red for doing what he did?" e short answer is yes, you can. At the end of the day, the employer may not have just cause — which means it will have to pay the worker an amount equal to the notice he should have received. If the employee is a union member covered by a collective agreement, the rules are slightly diff erent. An arbitrator could award the worker his job back, substituting the dis- missal for a lower penalty such as a suspension without pay. If the termination gets over- turned, then the employer can still say, "Hey, we tried. But our hands are tied." If the judgment results in a big payout, it's probably still less of a headache than the PR night- mare alternative. If you're sitting in the C-suite and you're watching the name of your fi rm being dragged through the mud on the evening news or on social media, it is going to be tempting to pull out the strongest tool at your disposal to make the story go away: Fire the worker, ASAP. It may not be the best decision, but it sure will feel like the right one at the time. RISE OF THE ROBOTS LOS ANGELES — At least eight career fi elds are "ripe for disruption" in the next 10 or 20 years as robots and other forms of futuristic tech- nology take over, according to a presentation by Amy Webb, founder of Webbmedia Group, in CNN coverage. e eight careers? Toll booth op- erators and cashiers, thanks to the rise of wearable technology and mobile payment systems; marketers, as tools allow brands to deliver messages to customers with precision accuracy; customer service, with new technolo- gies such as predictive analytics; factory workers, in stealing more manu- facturing jobs at a cheaper price; fi nancial middle-men, with the underlying technology behind Bitcoin; journalists, as algorithms allow news outlets to auto- matically create stories; lawyers, with non-litigation ones being replaced by online form-based services; and phone workers, as many millennials don't have landline phones. " ere are a bunch of jobs that don't really need to exist," Webb said. "I don't see our technological future as a dystopian one, I just see it as diff erent." At least eight career fi elds are "ripe for disruption" in the next 10 or 20 years as robots and other forms of futuristic tech- nology take over, according to a presentation by Amy Webb, founder of Webbmedia Group, in CNN coverage. e eight careers? Toll booth op- erators and cashiers, thanks to the rise of wearable technology and mobile payment systems; marketers, as tools allow brands to deliver messages to customers with precision accuracy; customer service, with new technolo- gies such as predictive analytics; factory workers, in stealing more manu- facturing jobs at a cheaper price; fi nancial middle-men, with the underlying technology behind Bitcoin; journalists, as algorithms allow news outlets to auto- matically create stories; lawyers, with non-litigation ones being replaced by online form-based services; and phone workers, as many millennials don't have landline phones. " ere are a bunch of jobs that don't really need to exist," Webb said. "I don't see our technological future as a dystopian one, I just see it as diff erent." Credit: Ociacia/Shutterstock

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