Two overpaid, over-exposed celebrities play an offensive joke on one of the nation’s favourite old comics. In the furore that follows one resigns, another is suspended with the threat of being fired still hanging over him, and the woman in charge falls on her sword.
Cut to a few days later: news that a toddler has died in unthinkable circumstances. His mother was visited on 60 occasions and nothing was done. Legal evidence to take him into care was apparently too weak, despite police and some in the medical profession arguing his injuries were incompatible with claims that they were the result of accidents. No one resigns. One doctor who examined the toddler is censured. Most tellingly, the woman in charge refuses to take the blame.
I was struck by the similarities between these cases, not least that they are both in the public sector, both have been debated in the House of Commons with the inevitable inquiry resulting, and in both cases the nation’s rage has been vented post event after huge media exposure. But there is of course one major difference: one resulted in offence, the other in death.
This is not the place to go into the whys and wherefores of each of these cases. But it is worth exploring two HR issues that they raise: leadership and ‘the system’.
The difference in the reactions of the leaders could not be more marked. BBC Radio 2 controller Lesley Douglas resigned, saying she had to take the flak as it happened “on my watch”. Meanwhile, Haringey Council director of children's services, Sharon Shoesmith, has steadfastly refused to take the blame. There’s no question who has emerged with the greatest integrity.
Meanwhile, both bodies recently overhauled their systems: the BBC in light of the Hutton inquiry and Haringey social services after Lord Laming’s inquiry. In the former, it appears that there may indeed still be weakness in the system, as well as a great lack of judgment. In the latter, recent revelations about the timeline up to Baby P’s death seem to show that the system did indeed work. Everyone who should have been alerted was.
Many people are thwarted by their system, in particular I can think of the great work done by employees in the NHS despite poor conditions and pay. The system is just not an excuse.
Instead poor training, selection and communication are at the root of these terrible incidences. These are the areas that HR needs to concentrate on if certain parts of our public sector are to get back on track.
