5 Foolproof Secrets to Prevent a Catastrophic Business Scandal!

Hello and welcome to Working It.

Two dear colleagues left the FT this week and reminded me of the importance of marking those occasions. We celebrate your time here with drinks and warm words.

Ritual is just as important at work as it is in the rest of our lives, even though we often forget it. After leaving a long-term employer, we enter a period of transition. is a way of pity and it’s okay to acknowledge loss. Marking the occasion helps process that, and it also helps those left behind (i.e. people like me, with a crying story on these occasions) to embrace change and move on.

So here it is for Esterto Renee — and everyone else embarking on new challenges this summer 🍾.

Read on to learn why boards and executives need to monitor corporate culture as well as profit and loss, and at Office Therapy I advise a childless worker to cover heavily for the moms on her team.

Leaders must embrace the ‘dark side’ to avoid scandal 👥

While researching this week’s episode of the Working It podcast about the depressingly persistent problem of sexual harassment and assault in the workplace (more on that below), I realized that we hear very little about the role of boards. and senior leaders in overseeing corporate culture. Why not? Where are these guys (still mostly guys) when the 💩 arrives?

After the scandals at (to name just three) Odey Asset Management, the British employers’ organization CBI and, more recently, mcdonald’sI asked one of my podcast guests, FT business columnist Helen Thomas, if there is evidence that boards are demanding to know more about the culture and people in your businesses?

“I think it varies enormously,” he told me. “One of the things with the CBI was that the board did not have the head of human resources[on it]. . . And that is something that has changed. You have to believe the way the news flow has gone, that every corporate board on earth has turned around and said, ‘what are we doing on this? What are our policies?’”

Well, you’d think so, and I later spoke with Cath Bishop, a former Olympic rower and conflict diplomat (yes, seriously), now a leadership and organizing consultant. She confirmed that the leaders and boards she works with are addressing this issue, but many are at the beginning of a long learning process. As Cath points out, people get promoted “for doing things: there is this world of ‘action’. . . and the culture is completely different than that, you can’t handle it the same way.”

So there’s a chasm between the “fix that and we’ll be sorted” job most leaders and boards are used to, and the amorphous and tricky aspects of gauging human sentiments and attitudes, including the vital job of detecting organizational problems and dishonest staff. – before things escalate.

There is also the fact that “most people have never heard of this,” as Cath puts it: “this” is the human disorder that leaders are not trained to notice but that, in extremes, has the potential to become a reputation issue. disaster. Cath memorably describes this type of human-centered oversight as “the dark side.” Leaders, he says, should also ask how overworked, goal-obsessed processes and short-term metrics have potentially harmed people.

At this point, you may be saying “oh, but we have an employee engagement survey.” Stop right there ✋🏽. This “is the tip of the iceberg,” says Cath. It’s better to ditch goals like higher staff engagement numbers and ask more helpful questions instead. Examples may include: “How does it feel if you make a mistake? Is it easy to challenge the status quo or the opinion of the majority in a meeting?

Other ways to initiate active monitoring of the “dark side” include regular management development conversations and removing the layers that prevent staff from telling the truth to leaders – focus groups can help here.

Cath also mentions the work of Amy Edmondson of Harvard Business School in creating the concept of “psychological safety”. amy’s website has very good resourcesand Cath suggests that a measure of “psychological safety” could be a way to measure how staff feel.

Finally, he cites an old practice, and one too often forgotten in a world of hybrid/digital governance. “Board members need to go and see things. Workplace walk 🚶. You notice the body language. Do people talk to each other? Do they look stressed?

Has your organization found effective ways to monitor and direct corporate culture? Is there a possibility of a backlash from “anti-wake” activists? let me know in isabel.berwick@ft.com.

This week on the Working It podcast

The FT’s investigation into allegations of serial sexual misconduct by Crispin Odey ran to around 8,000 words — one of the longest articles the newspaper has ever published. Special investigations editor Madison Marriage was able to tell the stories of 13 women who came forward (more have since). This week on the Working It podcastI tell him about Odey’s research and broader common patterns he sees in his work, which focuses on exposing abuse of power.

What would prevent this from happening in the future? And what can you do if you see, or experience, bullying at work? My other guests, FT business columnist Helen Thomas and NYU psychology professor and workplace conflict specialist Tessa West, help answer this.

The FT is about to publish an in-depth video on the Odey investigation tomorrow. Keep an eye on FT.com..

office therapy

The problem: In our women’s team I am the only one without children. I never have time off in the summer and I make up work that colleagues lose due to children’s illness, school strikes, etc. Are there ways to a) reduce the impact on me and b) reduce my resentment of being the “default” worker? ? I like my colleagues and I don’t want this to fester.

Elizabeth’s advice: Harmonious teams often have “fair share” deals in which each person with children gets (say) half a quarter off per year, and longer vacations are divided up with scrupulous equity. If you want or need to leave in July and August, you should bring this up openly with your colleagues and request to be “in” on that assignment 🙋🏽.

I sent your dilemma to Jane Johnson, founder of race to motherhood whose organization provides online training and coaching. How would she approach this? First, he suggests, call a meeting to plan time off fairly, perhaps with an impartial facilitator. “Each team member must be paired with an ‘Annual Leave Buddy’ – each pair is responsible for ensuring that while one person is on leave, the other acts as the primary point of contact. That person’s name appears on her away message, her phone is diverted to her friend, and she does a full transfer before she goes on leave. Everyone needs to let internal stakeholders and external customers know when they will be away and who to contact in their absence.”

Becoming a person’s “buddy” should (in theory) save you from having to fill in for the whole team: you hope other couples will support each other in the future. Good luck!

Do you have a question, problem or dilemma for Office Therapy? Do you think you have better advice for our readers? Send it to me: isabel.berwick@ft.com. We anonymize everything. His boss, colleagues or his subordinates will never know.

Five outstanding stories from the world of work

1. Only say no if you work as a woman: Pilita Clark tackles how hard it is to say “no” at work, with a particular focus on the controversial topic of office chores, or “non-promotable tasks” (NPT). Multiple books promise to help women say no to more of these burdens, but will things ever change?

2. Budding Women CEOs: The FT’s Emma Jacobs dives into data that shows why companies need to expand their searches and pipelines if they want more women to reach the CEO level. Most existing leaders come from a financial and operational background. Most senior women are in human resources or marketing.

3. Why childhood is getting longer: There are so many contradictions about how old young people need to be to be able to vote, drink, get married, etc., and Stephen Bush breaks them down here with some thoughts on youth in the workplace, and why we want to pamper our own children, even when it’s not in your best interest.

4. How much does it cost to retain a star CEO? Disney’s Bob Iger has just received a huge bonus package, and William Cohan questions why companies offer already very wealthy leaders even more financial incentives just to do their real work.

5. The perspective of the city without children: Family-free urban centers will change everything about how we live, work and play, and it’s already starting to happen as unaffordable housing and a pandemic exodus unfold in many communities, as Emma Jacobs reports.

One more thing

The whoosh! The Netflix documentary is a walk through ’80s culture, but it also celebrates friendship. It chronicles, in particular, the role of Andrew Ridgeley in the creation of the successful Wham! — By co-writing the first songs, creating the aesthetic for himself, and supporting his shy classmate Georgios Panayiotou to become global superstar George Michael. Everyone should have a best friend like Andrew, and the couple stayed together until George’s death in 2016. Danny Leigh of The FT gives it three stars — I’m a solid five, because this kind of emotional uplift is a rare gift.

And finally: work trend of the week 😎

The deluge of newly coined words to describe the things that happen in the workplace, and our conflicting emotions about the job itself, has reached such epic proportions that we’ve decided to highlight a few of these gems. I have a team of Gen Zers (OK, my kids) who comb TikTok for emerging trends, and submit their own ideas.

“Delulu”: Adjective which means delusional but well aware of it. As in, it can be good to be less self-aware. Often used around dating, but now it’s making an appearance at work. Sometimes it can help to be a little “delulu” when starting a job you’re not qualified for. Deception can, in fact, get us through.

💁‍♀️ Next week we’ll be back on the topic of supporting older workers, and keep sending in your thoughts on this, photos of furry WFH coworkers, and anything else you think we should cover. Email me at isabel.berwick@ft.com or find me on Linkedin.