In July’s HR clinic, Claire Houston and Susi O’Brien (HR Help advisor) explored how to address performance issues within general practice.

Here is a summary of the questions we received and the answers given.

How can you structure a discussion around performance management?

Start off by remembering that this process is about IMPROVING PERFORMANCE, not punishing people for not doing something right. The aim should be to get the employee up to the required standard. We want staff to do well and excel in their jobs, so go into it trying to think positively.

You need to start by identifying the issues and giving specific examples. Don’t be woolly or cagey about the problem as the employee won’t be able to do anything about it. So, for example, you might say: “I’ve noticed that your activity in the team is quite a bit less than your colleagues’ activity. On average, they process about ten documents an hour, but on doing an audit, your average is around five.” Avoid comments like: “You’re just slower than everyone else.”

Once identified, ask the employee why they think this is happening. They may need a bit of prodding if they’re not very forthcoming; ask questions like do they enjoy the job, whether they feel they need any training, do they understand the process, do they feel they need additional support and so on. Listen to their answers and take these on board.

Try to come up with a plan of action for both of you to implement. That might be your agreeing to arrange some additional training or mentoring, or investing in some equipment. They need to commit to what they’re willing to do to improve – be that attending the training or using the tools provided.

Then you set the expectations, and you need to be clear on these. They need to understand what ‘good’ looks like, and what you’ll be measuring their performance against. Finish the conversation with this, but also make it clear that should the expectation not be met within a defined time period, you may need to move to the next stage of your performance management policy.

No matter what stage you’re at, this is a good structure for those conversations.

I also recommend that you check out my previous Practice Index blog about how to give negative feedback. There are further tips given in there.

One key thing is to remember you’re ‘selling’ your feedback to the employee; you want them to buy it. This is an exercise in persuasion. You want them to listen to your feedback about their performance and think, “That’s right, I need to improve.” If they don’t believe you, they’re unlikely to turn things around.

How do you move from informal discussions with employees about performance to formal processes?

Check your practice’s policy and follow it carefully. The formal part of the process needs to be treated as exactly that – not a brief conversation but with a formal invitation to a meeting to discuss the performance issues. This should not have come out of the blue, however. During your informal discussions, you should have made it clear that if performance did not improve, then a formal process may need to commence. At a formal meeting, staff should be offered the opportunity to be represented by a colleague or trade union rep as well. The invitation to the meeting should be made in writing, giving appropriate notice, and should make reference to your practice policy (ideally enclosing a copy with the letter).

The formal meeting will include a discussion of any previous targets, action plans, training or other support given. The employee has a chance to have their say, and, at the end, a decision is made as to what, if any, warning is given. Be guided by your practice’s policy when deciding on this. The warning is confirmed in writing following the meeting, and a right to appeal is set out. Practice Index has a selection of template invite and outcome letters for formal and informal performance situations.

I just want to add on this question, well done for progressing through to formal stages here. If I were to think of the most common thing that I see going wrong with performance management processes, it’s that the informal process goes on too long and the formal process starts too late.

Sometimes I’m asked to advise on a case where the employer has been informally managing some quite serious problems with performance for, say, nine months. The manager is frustrated and doesn’t feel any improvement is likely to happen so they want to move things to a formal process, thinking that will allow them to dismiss the employee quite quickly. But if the employee has over two years of service, or their performance issues are connected to a health problem, the formal process is not a magic button enabling you to dismiss someone.

The purpose of the formal process is just the same as the informal process – to support and enable the employee to meet expected standards. Therefore, from the point of arranging a first formal hearing, issuing a written warning, allowing time and support for improvement, then arranging a second formal hearing, issuing a final written warning, allowing further time for support and improvement, arranging a final hearing, potentially dealing with adjustments and Occupational Health referrals – and appeals – you’re easily looking at five or six months! Could well be longer! This is not a quick fix. Therefore, if you’ve been managing serious performance concerns informally for, say, two or three months, maybe even less, I’d be moving over to a formal process at that point BEFORE you feel that all hope is gone regarding this person’s suitability for the job. That way, the formal process still has purpose and you won’t feel so frustrated as a manager.

Our disciplinary policy says it covers performance management, but I know lots of practices have a separate performance management policy. Is this important? Do I need separate policies? We prefer to have as few policies as possible overall because it makes life simpler.

Aha! Older disciplinary policies do tend to cover performance management because people used to think that was simpler, but take it from me – it really isn’t when you’re trying to manage something! I’m very much in favour of having separate policies for disciplinary and performance management (or capability, which is the same thing as performance management).

The reason is that managing poor conduct – such as someone consciously breaking rules, harassing people, stealing stuff or whatever – is a totally different kettle of fish to managing someone who tries reasonably hard but just isn’t meeting targets, makes mistakes, is slower than their colleagues and so on. The tone of these processes is different. In conduct situations, you’re telling someone off and laying down the law. In capability/performance situations, you’re supporting the employee and collaborating with them to drive improvement.

Under unfair dismissal legislation, an employer must identify if a reason for dismissal was for conduct OR capability. You can’t fudge it and say it was sort of both. Therefore, honestly, having separate policies for each category makes things much easier to manage and clearer for everyone involved. Practice Index has a template policy for performance/capability and we’ll put a link to it up in the chat.

How do I know whether to use my performance management policy or my disciplinary policy when problems arise with a staff member?

We’re talking here about the ‘can’t do’ versus the ‘won’t do’. If the employee has all the skills and abilities necessary to do the job but is just choosing not to do it, then it’s a conduct issue and should fall under your disciplinary policy. However, if there’s an element of being unable to – i.e., not having received the right training or lacking the skills or ability to do the role – then it’s performance and should be managed as such.

An example I sometimes see is managers wanting to performance manage staff for lateness. Being on time isn’t a skill; you don’t need training to be shown how to turn up on time. There may be some instances where problems with time management are connected to a disability such as ADHD, but they’re relatively unusual. Lateness is normally a conduct issue, whereas struggling to follow a procedure or protocol, for example, due to a lack of understanding would be a performance issue.

How you evidence it would revolve mostly around the discussions you have with the employee – you need to ask them why they aren’t performing at the appropriate level. If they highlight something like a lack of training, or not feeling they have the skills, then it’s performance. If they don’t know why and give you the impression that it’s of their own choosing, then you can explain that you feel this is a conduct issue.

If in doubt, I usually start with the performance management policy, and if it becomes clear that this is more of a ‘won’t do’ than a ‘can’t do’ situation, I move things over to disciplinary.

I have several staff who are underperformers, and I hate trying to give feedback to them. It feels like I’m pulling them down, and it makes no difference to their performance anyway. Do you have any advice?

I know where you’re coming from; it can be really demoralising for us if we feel like we’re chipping away at people. But you have to remember the bigger picture – practices and those who manage them are paid with public money and therefore have a duty to ensure that the money is being spent wisely. Every mistake potentially has an impact on patients – and in this industry, that can have really big consequences. So even if we don’t like it, we have to do it. That is what we’re paid for as managers – well, part of it anyway!

You just have to persevere with it – make it more emphatic. Meet with them individually and privately, highlight the problem, confirm your expectations, offer support and then make it clear about the consequences of failing to improve. Once they realise you’re serious, you might see a change!

Saying all this, I want to pose a different question as well. It’s a challenging one, but worth thinking about. That is, have you invested sufficiently in relationships with staff members to ‘earn the right’ to criticise them? I mean this as in an emotional right, rather than a business right – because, of course, you have the latter.

What I mean is (and this is a silly example, I know), if I buy a new expensive dress but it’s completely the wrong colour for me and I’d be better exchanging it for another, who is better placed to tell me that? Is it my sister-in-law who I have a great relationship with, who really gets my style and has been so positive about my wardrobe choices in the past, or is it my grumpy aunt who only ever speaks to me to complain about something, and who’s never done anything other than criticise my sense of style? I don’t know about you, but I’d probably take the feedback much more seriously if it came from the former rather than the latter.

As managers, we have the privilege of being allowed to give negative feedback, but in order to make it effective, we need our staff to respect and trust us in the first place. Therefore, consider how often you praise staff or recognise achievements. How much interest do you show in them on a day-to-day basis? What have you done to earn their trust and respect prior to criticising them? My blog about how to give negative feedback has more detail and suggestions about this. I also wrote another blog a few years ago about the power of compliments in keeping staff engaged and listening.

How do you deal with underperforming in areas where it cannot be specifically measured – you just ‘know’ that some staff are not pulling their weight?

As I said previously, get in there and find out the answer! This is the job of a manager. Spend time working alongside the team, talking to people, getting feedback from patients, and looking at metrics and records. If you’re doing all of this and still not being able to evidence a problem, then consider if there is a problem at all.

Evidence doesn’t have to be stuff that would stand up in a criminal court. You’re a manager rather than a prosecutor. It can be based on what you or others see, hear and experience. But if you’re going to get anywhere in a performance management situation, some evidence is needed.

If you’ve had an informal performance meeting, then you follow up with one-on-ones with improvement, but then six months down the line the problems start again, do you go in again with informal / first formal?

Good question. I would begin with informal management again, but make it a much shorter informal process. During that time, what you want to do is raise the employee’s awareness of the problems (maybe they can pull it back together again straight away?), try to identify what the causes of the issues are (health?), and establish if this is really a capability matter or if the employee is just being careless or negligent. The latter would be a conduct rather than a performance management matter.

If an underperforming employee has been employed for less than two years but passed the initial six-month probationary review, are we required to carry out a full work performance process, i.e. informal meeting then move to formal, or can their employment be terminated without this process?

This obviously veers into the territory of employment rights – which only kick in after two years’ service currently, though the new Labour Government intend to change that in future. Stay tuned for future HR Alerts [PLUS] on this topic. Thinking about the legal situation as it stands now, though, there are a few things to consider here. First off, to dismiss without following a proper process or policy, you need to be 100% confident there’s no chance of a discrimination claim. Is there any chance that a disability is impacting on their performance? If English isn’t their first language, is this potentially causing an issue? Has there ever been a precedent set for another employee who might be of a different gender / race / religion / sexuality than this person? Protected characteristics trump length of service every time – so you’ve got to be confident you could defend a challenge.

My other thought is, if you’re managing performance in the true spirit of why it’s there, you’d want to follow the proper process because the employee might actually be able to turn things around. Why spend time and money on recruitment and induction unless it’s definitely needed?

If it really doesn’t look like improvement is possible, whatever you do, then you need to ensure there’s a provision in your policy that states a shorter process may be implemented for staff with less than two years’ service. This can help you refute any potential legal challenge that might arise. But as I say, the legal rules may change in the next 12 months or so, so watch out!

How is it best to approach legacy staff who aren’t pulling their weight compared to their counterparts, but yet always seem to be busy? Newer staff are asking for work to do, yet one individual never does. Instead, they will critique others about what they are not doing. We’ve given them projects to do, as we feel this will empower them, but although they were happy to do this, it’s not always forthcoming. I want to develop and support staff so they have job satisfaction, but this staff member is happy to do the bare minimum, and this is regularly fed back from others; I’ve never had the opportunity to see this.”

This is another hard situation. The first thing I’d think about is, what are the standards that are required? Is this person really doing the bare minimum, or are they underperforming? What’s the impact of their interactions with the team, such as the criticism you mention? If they’re meeting minimum standards but not doing much else, it’s probably not a performance management issue but it could be an engagement one. That falls a little outside the remit of this clinic, but I suggest you look up advice on ‘quiet quitting’ and how to manage it. There was a Practice Index podcast all about the subject last year. Listen to the employee to see what’s going on from their perspective and see if there’s anything you can do.

Ultimately, you may need to accept that they’re never going to be your brightest star in the team. Some people go through their entire working lives achieving the essentials but not aiming for anything higher and this may be one of them. Focus your praise and development challenges on other staff members instead. But if this employee isn’t meeting basic standards or they’re creating problems in the team, investigate and manage further using a performance management process.

If you’re not seeing the evidence to identify exactly what, if any, problems exist, get into the team and find it out. Spend time with them, look at metrics or do whatever you need to do to find out what’s going on.

The bit I find hardest about performance management is protecting the confidentiality of the staff member – they have to continue to work alongside their colleagues who may have flagged the issue.

I agree this is hard. Being performance managed is one of the hardest things that can happen to you at work in my opinion. Many years ago, I even experienced this myself. Working alongside colleagues who know about and have reported performance concerns relating to you is excruciating. If you have a staff member who is in this position and is still turning up for work every day, working alongside those colleagues and doing their best, they deserve respect and recognition, even if the actual performance issues haven’t been fully resolved yet.

So, how do we make this situation easier as managers? Respect is the key word. When colleagues report concerns, talk to them about how the employee will know this has been said and who said it, and discuss how they will all remain professional at work despite this. Set out some clear expectations for everyone concerned about confidentiality and also professional cooperation and relationships. Be honest that you know this might be hard. There’s no need to treat the issue as the elephant in the room. Keep everyone focussed on the outcome you want – that the underperformer is able to improve standards and either build or retain a solid relationship with the team. In my experience, most colleagues are quite considerate and want to help the underperformer along the way.

What would you class as appropriate notice for a formal performance meeting?

As with any other formal meeting, I recommend seven days’ notice. This enables the staff member time to arrange representation, if they want to.

How can I be sure it’s a performance management issue and not just an accumulation of small, petty mistakes?

Really, this comes down to your judgement as a manager. If the mistakes are frequent and causing problems for the practice, then performance management may be appropriate even if each mistake is petty or minor in nature.

On the other hand, all of us drop the ball from time to time, so if it’s just the occasional error, patience is probably best.

Can you manage performance as part of the appraisal process?

The appraisal isn’t about managing poor performance if a process hasn’t already been started. Once you notice someone underperforming, you need to start managing it right away – not leaving it until the appraisal. This is why 1:1s are so important; the appraisal should be like a summing-up of all the 1:1s you’ve had in the year, coupled with looking forward and setting objectives for the next year. If you’ve started on a management process, you can review the progress in the appraisal, but I wouldn’t start one at the appraisal meeting.

Can you please advise how you can start the difficult conversation about age and capability without discrimination when the employee is not aware there is a problem and there is no mention of retiring when they are over retirement age and still working full-time?

Firstly, it’s never too late to start performance management. But you need to start at the beginning of the process – so, informally having a chat with the employee about your concerns as we’ve outlined previously. Then follow your process as you would for any other member of staff with potential health issues. Don’t treat this person differently just because they’re older. You should avoid making any reference yourself to age being a factor in their underperformance – quite often you’ll find the employee makes that link themselves! You don’t even have to agree with them – just ask them how they think that impacts on their ability to do the job and whether there is anything the practice can do to help them improve.

And definitely don’t just come out with a suggestion that they retire!

As an example of what NOT to do… there was a tribunal case in 2022 called Hutchison v Asda, where an older employee was in the early stages of dementia. She regularly forgot things, lost things or became confused at work. Managers and colleagues were concerned about her and repeatedly encouraged her to retire – which she did not want to do. Despite her setting out her views, further suggestions about retirement were made. Eventually she resigned, claiming she had been forced out of her job. She won her tribunal claims for constructive dismissal, age and disability discrimination because the way she’d been treated at Asda, whilst well meant, had the effect of violating her dignity. Had the managers instead run a sympathetic, fair, performance management process which explained their concerns clearly (rather than just hinting at them) and included consideration of reasonable adjustments, the employee might have been fairly dismissed – or decided on the facts of it to resign before that.

We have a member of staff in her 60s who’s very hardworking and eager to please. But they are constantly making mistakes, which they say is because of their memory. The mistakes have an impact on the wider team. There have been lots of reminders, training and even a team meeting where we all set standards to support each other. We’ve just invited them to an informal performance meeting to start the ball rolling. We do not have Occupational Health. Is there anything we can do regarding memory issues?

The removal of the ability to enforce retirement at a particular age has left some employers in this situation. Whilst it should never be assumed that anyone close to, or over, 65 should be ‘put out to pasture’, so to speak, as many over 65s are still fully capable of working and have excellent skills and experience to offer, it did remove the ‘easy way out’ for situations such as these. Performance management then became the standard way to manage people whose performance was declining as a result of their age. And I totally understand how uncomfortable it can feel.

You’re therefore quite right to use a performance management process to progress this issue, and to let the staff member know about the concerns you have. Whilst age is a protected characteristic in terms of discrimination, you are not discriminating against a staff member by performance managing them, provided there’s evidence to demonstrate that their performance is not up to par. As long as you’re offering them support to improve, as we have outlined, you’re acting reasonably.

As there are likely to be health issues affecting this employee’s performance, an Occupational Health assessment is essential. You may not have access to an NHS service where you are, but remember that non-NHS employers across the country don’t have that either! They’re expected to use private Occupational Health providers, and this is what you must do too.

There may well be adjustments you can make to support this staff member at work, including technological ones perhaps. For example, you may be able set this individual up with electronic prompts and reminders throughout the day to support her with her memory issues. Best of luck in exploring these options, and I hope it goes well.

How do you manage performance if the staff member has health issues?

It’s more common than you think for a performance issue to be caused by a health problem. Whether that’s a receptionist struggling on the phones due to anxiety, or a nurse struggling with dressings due to a back problem, the reasons can be wide-ranging. However, you still need to manage the issue. The job still needs doing.

Often, there are a lot more things you can do to support a staff member with a health problem compared to just a lack of ability. So, I’d strongly encourage you to talk to them as early as possible and discuss what can be done to help them. It might be that the receptionist can do more prescription admin to have less exposure on the phones, or the nurse can have some equipment to make it easier to do dressings without bending or kneeling down so often. But you won’t know until you ask!

You also need to remember that a health problem may be classed as a disability, depending on how long it’s been a problem or the severity of the issue. You therefore have a legal obligation to make reasonable adjustments for that employee – so you may have to go further in supporting the employee than you would another staff member, and you may even have to accept a drop in performance to a certain degree (for example, giving some tasks to another member of staff and simply not expecting the employee to do them might be deemed a reasonable adjustment if the practice could accommodate it). You would also look to extend the timescales of the review period to allow increased time for improvement.

The most important thing to do is to have the employee assessed by Occupational Health – and don’t be afraid to ask direct questions! Send a copy of the job description with your referral so the Occupational Health clinician knows what’s expected of the role. Ask them directly if there are any elements of it that the employee needs support to complete. Highlight where the areas of concern around underperformance are. Occupational Health can be really helpful at times in recommending things you could do to help the employee improve their performance. There’s an Occupational health referral questions guidance for manager document [PLUS] available from Practice Index about suggested questions to ask Occupational Health in any situation.

If there’s nothing you can do, or you’ve implemented all that you can, and the employee still cannot perform, then you would still need to follow your policy through to completion. You just need to ensure that you’ve done what you can, sought medical advice via Occupational Health and given the employee the opportunity to improve with support put in place where appropriate. Ensure everything is documented for evidence.

Here’s another tribunal tale… in a case called Sinclair v Bishop of Llandaff Church in Wales High School, a former teacher was awarded £346,175 in 2017 after being performance managed out of her job whilst suffering mental health problems. The tribunal was very critical about the school’s lack of support. It was clear that they simply wanted her gone. The tone of the performance management process was harsh and had a huge effect on her ongoing mental health. The tribunal’s opinion was that had this teacher been encouraged and managed more supportively, she would most likely have improved her performance and retained her career.

I was starting to performance manage a staff member but they then went off sick with work-related stress. What do I do now?

Sadly, this can happen quite a lot. I mean, being performance managed IS genuinely stressful! As I mentioned earlier, it’s one of the hardest things you can go through as an employee in my opinion. In these circumstances, the performance management process would be paused and your absence management process would take over. A stress risk assessment is also a good idea for any absence involving work-related stress. You should ask the employee what the exact triggers are for that stress, and how they suggest these triggers could be reduced or removed. Sometimes this helps the employee to process and adjust their own expectations. They realise that suggesting ‘I want to continue making mistakes at work’ just isn’t a realistic option.

It’s worthwhile explaining to the employee that the performance management process is not going away, and will resume on their return to work. Remind them that the aim of the process is not to punish them for underperforming, but to seek to help them to improve their performance and reach the required standard for their role. If they’re able to do this, then the process goes away. Reinforce that you want to know what can be done to help them and you can’t do this unless they’re able to meet you, discuss what’s available and set a plan in action for them to achieve. Generally, once they know you won’t just drop it, they return to work. If they don’t, then following your absence management process either leads to them returning or… well, not!

I wrote a blog earlier this year about the varied ways in which employees react to being performance managed, and this might be useful to have a look at. Good luck!

How do we know if a condition is a protected characteristic or something that should have allowances?

When it comes to disability, the best way to find out is via an Occupational Health referral. An employee is considered to be disabled if they have a condition that is long-term (i.e., has lasted, or is likely to last, at least 12 months) and has a significant (i.e., not trivial) impact on their ability to undertake day-to-day tasks (which include work tasks). The legal obligation to make reasonable adjustments applies specifically to disability as a protected characteristic, but you’d be silly not to make adjustments around other protected characteristics when performance is an issue; otherwise, it might still be indirect discrimination. So, for example, if English is a second language, can you give employees more time to process information / requests before deeming their work unsatisfactory? If you have an employee fasting during a religious festival, can you put support in place to ensure their performance doesn’t drop or instead give them some leeway in your expectations. If you’re ever not sure, seek HR advice.

How do you best manage performance of staff who have a disability? Reasonable adjustments have been made, but performance and absence are still a major concern. It’s a long-term issue that has never been addressed by the business.

It’s never too late to start managing problems. You just have to be explicitly clear about what the issue is, and what the required level of performance should be. If their reply is that it hasn’t been a problem before, then the simple fact of the matter is that things change, workload picks up and we need to be able to move with the times. Nobody should ever think that their job will be the same up until the point they retire – the NHS landscape changes too frequently for that. Provided that you’re not expecting the staff member to do something completely outside the scope of their role, but within the competency you should be able to expect from them, then you’re OK to start the process. But be considerate that if this has been a long-term issue, it may take some management skill to persuade the employee why you’re dealing with the problem now. Think about how you’re going to attempt that persuasion before you start.

There are two issues mentioned here – performance and absence. I recommend that separate processes are used and the two don’t get mixed up. Look up our previous HR Clinic on managing short-term or persistent absences for advice about that side of things. For the work performance aspects, though, use a standard performance management process. You must make adjustments for disability, but those adjustments should be reasonable. Accepting performance that damages the business is not a reasonable adjustment so you have the right to intervene.

I’ll give you an example of when I’ve dealt with something similar. Many years ago, I supported managers who had serious performance and absence concerns about an employee who had a mental health-related disability. Performance and absence issues were dealt with separately. Regarding the performance concerns, managers had many meetings and discussions to explain and evidence problems. Occupational Health advice was sought more than once, and various adjustments were made to support the individual at work. An action plan was created to set out targets, support and expected timescales so everything was clear. But the problems continued. Eventually, we felt it was reasonable to hold a formal hearing where a first written warning for capability was issued. The union rep wasn’t happy at first – there was an appeal, I think – but they eventually accepted that this was a fair process.

I’ll skip forward to the end of that story. Following the written warning, performance concerns continued, as did the absence ones. Before the next formal stage happened, a genuine redundancy situation arose in the department – we needed one person to exit. As the rest of the team were high performers, it was pretty obvious who would come bottom of any redundancy selection exercise, so rather than go through that painful process, we met the employee and, using a careful and correct legal process, offered them a settlement agreement to exit the organisation with a small extra payment on top of usual redundancy pay to say thank you for their cooperation and agreement. Their union rep and solicitor thought this was fair and advised them to accept, which they did, and that was the end of that.

I have a receptionist on probation who’s not meeting the performance standards needed. I want to dismiss her, but she’s pregnant. Can I still dismiss her in this situation?

Provided the underperformance isn’t linked to the pregnancy in ANY POSSIBLE WAY, then yes. However, I would encourage getting an Occupational Health opinion before deciding to go down this route. Pregnancy can affect people’s performance in some very unexpected ways. Tiredness, prenatal depression, nausea, pregnancy brain, they’re all real things! Don’t assume the pregnancy and performance are completely unrelated unless you have a clear evidence trail demonstrating that is the case. It’s better to be safe than sorry because any discrimination on grounds of pregnancy is unlawful.

Useful resources

Management by objectives policy [PLUS]
Performance management – Capability procedure [PLUS]
Disciplinary policy and procedure [PLUS]
Retirement policy [PLUS]
Probationary review policy and procedure [PLUS]
Performance management meeting letter templates [PLUS]
Staff occupational health policy [PLUS]
Occupational health referral questions guidance for managers [PLUS]
Sickness absence management policy [PLUS]
HR Masterclass – Performance Management [Learning Package]
Managing Poor Performance [Practice Index Training]

Future HR Clinics

Managing Persistent Short-Term Absence – Wednesday 11th September at 12.30pm – Book here

How frustrating is it when staff are regularly off sick for small bouts of really trivial things? The disruption it causes to the service, the impact on other staff, and the ability to arrange cover… all of these are major headaches for practice managers everywhere. Join Robyn Clark (aka JacksonR) and Susi O’Brien, an HR consultant who specialises in employment law, as we explore the issues of managing persistent short-term absence – from implementing your policy to Bradford Factors and other tools – we’re here to help!

Managing Different Types of Leave – Tuesday 15th October at 12.30pm – Book here

Is it annual leave? Is it unpaid leave? What’s this I hear about parental leave? The different types of leave that staff are entitled to can be an absolute minefield for managers to navigate. What’s a legal entitlement and what isn’t? How do I manage when staff all want to be off at the same time? What’s reasonable to expect in the requesting process? This HR Clinic will focus on the different types of leave, guided by you and your questions.  Join Robyn Clark and Susi O’Brien, an HR consultant who specialises in employment law, as we explore how to navigate the complexities of this everyday issue!