December 15, 2008
January
To get the year off to a puzzling start, the HR world was rocked by the news that the Ministry of Defence was mounting a strong... err... defence against the suggestion that it was targeting young children in its recruitment campaigns.
Picking up on the military theme, Guru noted that prime minister Gordon Brown also had it in for the youngsters, cruelly breaking the heart of a young lad by banning children from keeping elephants as pets and roping in a 'top boffin' to reliably inform the nation that "Elephants are very big animals". You don't say. Other big beasts in the HR news were the fatties of UK plc who will be helped to lose weight through a fat-fighting initiative.
February
Guru responded to the fat fight by calling for a Chip and Bun card to keep tabs on the nation's lard-arses, while simultaneously paying for fruit and vegetables for everyone - leaving the people with wads of cash to spend on cakes and beer. HR meanwhile was proved to be actually useful to business, yet Guru returned to the nature of his Teutonic cousins and their tendency to go naked at every opportunity. Sat on a beach in the Canary Islands, he was accosted by a delegation of Black Forest dwellers selling meatballs from a tray. But being short on uniforms and with the tray just below waist height, Yours Truly passed up the chance of biting into one of the salty balls.
March
March's big news was the launch of the 2008 Personnel Today Awards and the fact that private sector welfare-to-work specialists could be roped in to get the long-term unemployed off the sofa and into the workplace. Guru stuck to his visionary agenda, however, preferring to note that after only minutes in the big chair at the Home Office Jacqui Smith was showing signs of going mad as her mania for the national ID scheme took over her life.
April
While skills minister John Denham was distancing the government from its own idea of mandatory skills training, Yours Truly focused on the key subject of the year: surveys. Apparently research revealed that six in 10 people fall asleep at work. But it was not true, some only 'felt a bit sleepy'. But to Guru's mind the fact that 37% of workers have never felt sleepy at work was the surprise - what are they bionic? David Cameron? Yours Truly was also alerted to cat poo coffee for those with 'sophisticated tastes'.
May
Agency worker rights came to the fore in May, bad news for Guru's legions of Bulgarian workers, but undespondent Yours Truly was cheered by the news that around the world coppers are getting fatter and fatter. The toughest times are being had by the crimefighters down Mexico way, where the self-indulgent eat-to-the-beat (banana) peelers are being bribed to stop scoffing - presumably with cakes. Pretty much like the cops of Norfolk who had been "criming things that aren't necessarily crimes". Ignoring most of the crime happening in the area, the rozzers were able to spend more time down the 'donut' shop.
June
Like the quiet man of the Conservative Party (Iain Duncan Smith), Jackie Orme indicated, presumably through the medium of dance, that her actions would speak for themselves. Yours Truly, meanwhile focused on a top survey that noted that two-thirds of employers would not hire people with bad teeth.
July
As the government angered employers by moving the goalposts on the hoops to be jumped through to gain public contracts, Yours Truly had his mind on a much more pressing subject - pressed grapes. Apparently drunken mice have proved that drinking loads of wine gets rid of depression. The fact that you have to have it on tap 24/7 or hosed into you intravenously seem minor inconveniences. Guru questions the testing methods of the boffins, however, who 'floated' the sozzled rodents in cups of water, rating their level of depression by their swimming technique, or lack of it.
August
Silly season. Firms were told not to use the credit crunch as an excuse for cutting jobs. This clearly planted the seed in many minds and the jobs cull continues. Mice were still on Yours Truly's mind as even more boffins had found that force-feeding mice until they get really fat leads to them having fat babies - so it must be true of humans. Guru checked this out - after drinking three wine boxes and going for a swim first.
September
The (literally) big headline on Personnel Today's front page was that the unions had declared war on HR. Guru kept to the serious stuff, noting that the Queen could get a job at Google as they only work 70% of the time - although that might be tough for her.
October
The big news in the blue-faced arena came from Japan, where monkeys are being used as waiters, which is a step on from testing cosmetics with their eyes. However, equality only goes so far and when a primate took a train without buying a ticket he was so frightened by mad foaming-at-the-mouth ticket inspectors he was forced to flee to the roof of the ticket office.
November
When a giant Lego man washed up on Brighton beach, Guru observed, passers by thought it was just another British worker taking a nap after a night on the tiles. Meanwhile, in the real world Tory Alan Duncan put himself forward as the white knight of HR - only to be usurped by the news that the BNP had got there first.
December
As Alistair Darling tried to hide the fact that HR jobs were to go as the government pushed to cut costs, Guru published the top 10 signs that you're about to get the chop. He also noted that the man who has celebrated Christmas every day for 14 years is having to cut back due to the credit crunch.
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