Posts by Ben Austin
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Rather sad news, I was hoping that the show would still be running when I return next year.
Remind me again why we have a public broadcaster and funding body? I mean I think I get the theory of it, but the practice seems to not work as I thought it would.
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Hard News: The shaky ground of…, in reply to Rich Lock,
Golly Rich, that sounds quite awful. I don't think I've come across such a thing before, happily. I must admit to being a little nervous as to whenever it is I move back to NZ and have to reacquaint myself to NZ agencies/HR, given how annoying it was to do the same moving to London. I don't know if either are better or worse, more just the need to adjust.
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Hard News: The shaky ground of…, in reply to Rich Lock,
There is always that. From my point of view, I often end up saying things like "This whole process would be a lot easier if you had documented anything or had some sort of system in place to measure or assess staff". Obviously I'll hate myself for saying that a little, but redundancies are awkward like that.
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It may be a rather obvious point, but I've come to the conclusion that often these systems are reactive, they've been sought out, developed and implemented because of some disaster unknown to the applicant. Sometime in the past a terrible hiring decision was made and now the management of the company is hunting desperately for a solution to the age old problem of making the wrong decision.
I can't imagine many people would, without any sort of similar spur, one day decide to implement a complex, no doubt expensive vetting system without something lurking behind that.
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Surely the Syrian dispersal plans are more for attack by an external power in a classic style attack, rather than during a deep insurgency, where their dispersal bases/sites/etc may be rather compromised or of uncertain loyalty.
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I don't think psychometric testing is unlawful in the UK unless it is used in such a way that could support a discriminatory outcome, which certainly is possible. Or perhaps if the testing incorporated some sort of pre contract health questionnaire (which are illegal). There are a few cases that go either way really.
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Hard News: The shaky ground of…, in reply to Lucy Stewart,
In which case it is a pretty good way of dealing with that particular problem, plus it gives the rest of us a good laugh.
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Hard News: The shaky ground of…, in reply to SteveH,
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I thought it was in part (the moral panic argument sounds right too) to later provide an excuse to withdraw permission, residency or citizenship to entrants/applicants who had lied on the form. I'm thinking here about the various European migrants to the US after the war who later turn out to have been war criminals.
When I've gone through immigration forms in the UK, they always make it quite clear on this kind of question that lying could later result in such an outcome.
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While I am rather surprised that anyone would think it a good idea to use personality/psych testing as part of a selection process, I would note that in the vast majority of the redundancy process I've consulted on, the employer/management team are absolutely stuck as to how to appropriately and fairly access staff.It can take quite some mucking about before something is found and I guess on that basis, the temptation to use psych testing must be rather strong as it appears like a sound methodology.
It is rather hard for most employers because the kind of information or records one keeps on file is not necessarily going to be useful in making that kind of selection. The only people who find this easy would be those who are well organised, who make a deliberate effort to conduct focused appraisals, who keep detailed employment files. So, usually those with HR teams.
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The Irish, it seems are to be voting in a referendum soon to abolish their Senate, which requires a constitutional amendment.
This is of interest to this thread as their Senate seems to have some interesting ways of electing members, including members elected by university graduates, appointed by the Taosiach (PM), members elected from vocational panels (seems to be by sector - agriculture, labour etc).
It seems that the criticisms are, in part, that the latter category, elected by the MPs/councilors, making up the majority of senators, end up being party candidates who are ex candidates for elected office. So the Senate ends up being filled with the friends and comrades of the national parties with elected representatives. Almost a sinecure.