Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Wellbeing
    • Recruitment & retention
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • Brightmine
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Free trial
    • Request a quote
  • Webinars
  • Advertise
  • OHW+

Personnel Today

Register
Log in
Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Wellbeing
    • Recruitment & retention
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • Brightmine
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Free trial
    • Request a quote
  • Webinars
  • Advertise
  • OHW+

Latest NewsProductivityWorkplace cultureSevere weather

Hey HR, don’t blame it on the sunshine

by Adam McCulloch 2 May 2025
by Adam McCulloch 2 May 2025 The beer garden may be a suitable place to work on a warm day
Photograph: Shutterstock
The beer garden may be a suitable place to work on a warm day
Photograph: Shutterstock

A mini-heatwave has enveloped the UK and HR has come up with another word in its unceasing battle with low productivity. Are the two developments linked?

The changeable British weather is the source of a lot of rose-tinted recall errors. “It was like this last year,” people will say of a sunny spell, plucking a vague memory out of their frontal lobe. “No, I remember it being really windy and cold,” someone – often the office pessimist – will inevitably chime in. You wouldn’t think there were ways of checking these things, but we prefer our fuzzy blather to hard facts.

A lighthearted take on HR

Are the Brits too polite to discuss salary?

’Task masking’ – the trend you didn’t need to know existed

What does Severance tell us about work-life balance

HR likes to join in with daft weather conversations, especially when a warm spell comes along in spring and we all go slightly ga-ga having endured months of gloom.

It often reminds us there is no official temperature below or above which we should all stop working and jump in a lake or sauna. And now, with the much trumpeted “mini-heatwave” (with apologies to those in parts of the UK that have not experienced this), Personnel Today has been contacted by researchers at USDT Casino warning that one in three of us, while seduced by sunshine, have pulled a sickie, worked from a pub garden or had a tipple before 3pm.

Apparently the online survey of 2,000 adults found that 12% admitted calling in sick today to enjoy the weather, 14% said they worked remotely, from a pub garden, rooftop bar or outdoor café, and 8% confessed to having an alcoholic drink before 3pm.

At Personnel Today we tried to verify the poll with our own research, but there were too few present in the office to test its statistical veracity.

The nation seemed divided on whether this was OK: 49% said yes, working from a beer garden is no different to working from a coffee shop, but 36% think it’s unprofessional. Fifteen per cent said they’ve done it but wouldn’t admit it to their manager.

James Fletcher, head of HR at USDT Casino, said: “We’ve entered the season where productivity and pub culture go head-to-head. If someone can do their job well from a beer garden, why not? The key is trust, not location.” (“What about a casino?” an office wag piped up at this point.)

The poll also found that 36% think employers should introduce summer hours or half-days when the weather hits 25C and, disgracefully, one in five have faked wi-fi issues to sign off early during previous heatwaves.

‘Fauxductivity’ is the new task-masking

What a fab new buzzword! And nothing to do with air conditioning.

The weather may be a source of productivity issues, but for Marta Říhová, HR expert at Kickresume, “fauxductivity” is the greater sin.

This term (interchangeable with ‘task masking’) describes people who pretend to be busier than they are at work, she says, putting on a performance to show everyone just how swamped they are. This usually involves typing loudly, walking briskly around the office, or scheduling unnecessary meetings. It can also refer to people filling their day with surface-level work, like answering emails, to make themselves look busy.

Marta says: “This phenomenon has often been linked to return-to-office mandates. If people feel like they are being judged by their presence in the office and online rather than by the results they’re producing, it could lead to them feeling they have to task-mask to make a good impression at work.”

Woe betide anyone at Kickresume engaged in a spot of fauxductivity – Marta sees you.

Best thing to do is to get out and enjoy the sun – no one can accuse you of fauxductivity in the beer garden.

Latest HR job opportunities on Personnel Today

Sign up to our weekly round-up of HR news and guidance

Receive the Personnel Today Direct e-newsletter every Wednesday

OptOut
This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.


Browse more human resources jobs

 

Adam McCulloch

Adam McCulloch first worked for Personnel Today magazine in the early 1990s as a sub editor. He rejoined Personnel Today as a writer in 2017, covering all aspects of HR but with a special interest in diversity, social mobility and industrial relations. He has ventured beyond the HR realm to work as a freelance writer and production editor in sectors including travel (The Guardian), aviation (Flight International), agriculture (Farmers' Weekly), music (Jazzwise), theatre (The Stage) and social work (Community Care). He is also the author of KentWalksNearLondon. Adam first became interested in industrial relations after witnessing an exchange between Arthur Scargill and National Coal Board chairman Ian McGregor in 1984, while working as a temp in facilities at the NCB, carrying extra chairs into a conference room!

previous post
NHS Lothian review finds ‘toxic’ work environment
next post
Resident doctors to ballot for strike action

You may also like

Workplace stress: Why it’s time to rebrand resilience

22 May 2025

Public sector needs 92,000 more workers to remain...

19 May 2025

Half of workers waste two hours a day...

6 May 2025

Google concerned by slow AI take-up in UK

25 Apr 2025

Four ways HR can maintain trust in uncertain...

23 Apr 2025

How to build a commercially-minded workforce

3 Apr 2025

Civil servants say three days in office reduces...

25 Feb 2025

How HR can help to rebuild routine

24 Feb 2025

How to find the perfect balance of accountability

31 Jan 2025

Government to ease DB pension surplus release restrictions

28 Jan 2025

  • 2025 Employee Communications Report PROMOTED | HR and leadership...Read more
  • The Majority of Employees Have Their Eyes on Their Next Move PROMOTED | A staggering 65%...Read more
  • Prioritising performance management: Strategies for success (webinar) WEBINAR | In today’s fast-paced...Read more
  • Self-Leadership: The Key to Successful Organisations PROMOTED | Eletive is helping businesses...Read more
  • Retaining Female Talent: Four Ways to Reduce Workplace Drop Out PROMOTED | International Women’s Day...Read more

Personnel Today Jobs
 

Search Jobs

PERSONNEL TODAY

About us
Contact us
Browse all HR topics
Email newsletters
Content feeds
Cookies policy
Privacy policy
Terms and conditions

JOBS

Personnel Today Jobs
Post a job
Why advertise with us?

EVENTS & PRODUCTS

The Personnel Today Awards
The RAD Awards
Employee Benefits
Forum for Expatriate Management
OHW+
Whatmedia

ADVERTISING & PR

Advertising opportunities
Features list 2025

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • Linkedin


© 2011 - 2025 DVV Media International Ltd

Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Wellbeing
    • Recruitment & retention
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • Brightmine
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Free trial
    • Request a quote
  • Webinars
  • Advertise
  • OHW+