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• How to select redundancy candidates

  The credit crunch is forcing everyone to make touch decisions; there's a risk that we might need to lay off Andre... Guru notes that the HR manager is the only one sitting down - must be exhausted. Read More... Posted May 13 2009, 09:33 AM by Guru Filed under: human resources, credit crunch, redundancy

• Close encounters of the City kind

  The credit crunch is providing an unexpected boost in membership for one business, as there seems to be a direct correlation between stockmarket performance and the number of men and women seeking affairs, according to website illicitencounters.com. The aim of the site is to create "a safe and nonjudgmental environment, where married men and women... Posted May 07 2009, 04:48 PM by Guru Filed under: credit crunch, internet, website, illicitencounters, stock market, financial services

• TV chef tastes defeat as restaurants close

  The credit crunch has finally succeeded where Gordon Ramsay, Jamie Oliver and other celebrity chefs have failed. Celebrity chef Antony Worrall Thompson, he of Ready Steady Cook and Saturday Kitchen fame, has been forced to close four of his restaurants after his business AWT Restaurants went into administration. As ever there is a human cost to this... Posted Feb 12 2009, 08:43 AM by Guru Filed under: entertainment, credit crunch, waiter, restaurant, celebrity, chefs

• Meet the new year, same as the old year

  Ah a new year. All those old problems put behind us, a brand new start to embrace. Or maybe not. A rather chill wind of reality swept across the UK yesterday, blowing aside all too easily that cosy, sleepy Christmas break. Suddenly Guru was back on the streets at 7am, in minus temperatures, reading newspapers filled with doom and gloom about job prospects... Posted Jan 07 2009, 07:59 AM by Guru Filed under: leisure, credit crunch, job prospects, 2009, summer holidays, winter

• What is 'Christmas' if we can't be rude and obnoxious?

  Guru was charmed by the news that 33% of Brits are ruder at this time of year, 11% argue with fellow passengers and 23% drink more alcohol - according to a survey by Tripadvisor . As a likely participant of the survey, the blue-headed wise man was touched that perhaps there were more people like him out there than he originally thought. But the travel... Posted Dec 24 2008, 10:22 AM by Guru Filed under: stress, office antics, credit crunch, swearing, Christmas, rude, tough year, trains, commuters

• Top ten tunes Woolworths staff are listening to

  Music, they say, is the food of love. But this is the credit crunch and music has far more important roles to play. Guru has been sent a superb email trail from disgruntled Woolworths head office staff - some already made redundant, others merely awaiting the inevitable axe - selecting suitable tunes for their iPods. All the raw emotions that redundancy... Posted Dec 11 2008, 10:42 AM by Guru Filed under: office antics, credit crunch, redundancy, Woolworths, top ten tunes, iPod

• Christmas party fighting shocker

  This credit crunch really does threaten to ruin Guru's Christmas. Yours Truly had already been forced to promised Her Indoors he will halve his mince pie budget to £100, and only attend three Midnight Masses to cut down on petrol, and now those killjoy lawyers have made the annual office parties almost pointless. Read More... Posted Dec 01 2008, 11:23 AM by Guru Filed under: credit crunch, employment law, Christmas party, office party, Christmas, fighting, misdemeanours, Midnight Mass

• Credit crunch - condoms hold solution

  Those Masai tribesmen are very well respected in UK business circles these days, and Guru wonders whether they just might have the solution to the credit crunch. With the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development warning that up to half a million jobs could go in the next year or so, Yours Truly thinks the answer lies in Kenya. Read More... Posted Oct 07 2008, 08:10 AM by Guru Filed under: office antics, CIPD, unemployment, credit crunch, condoms, Maasi, goats

• Unlikely times call for unlikely superheroes

  Things have been looking pretty bad of late, what with Northern Rock, Lehman Brothers and HBOS all falling victim to the knee-jerk boys working down in the stock market panic station. And as that sweaty monkey over the pond tries to juggle the half-eaten bag beans that are the American fiscal system - while simultaneously eating a banana - as the world's... Posted Oct 01 2008, 05:02 PM by Guru Filed under: politics, CIPD, credit crunch, hbos, lehman brothers, northern rock, george bush, superhero

• The paint stripper

  Doing household chores in the nude is nothing new to Guru, although climbing the ladder when cleaning the windows at the front of his house has caused a few raised eyebrows among the local neighbourhood watch. Guru finds vacuuming, washing up and ironing... Posted Aug 27 2008, 09:49 AM by Guru Filed under: HR, workers, employee relations, decorator, clothes, naked, staff, credit crunch, tradesmen