Welcome to the HR Blog for SMEs!

Hello and welcome to my first HR blog! I thought an introductory blog might be a good idea before launching into what will hopefully be a useful, interesting and thought provoking read every other week. I know as small business owners you have to choose how you spend your time very carefully and that HR is not normally at the top of your agenda.

With that in mind I am planning to make my blogs short, snappy and to the point. They won’t give you chapter and verse on how to manage your people – they will raise a few key points, give you useful sources of information, and be thought provoking. You can then choose what you’d like to find out more about. They should only take 3 minutes to read – so why not grab a coffee every other week and expand your HR horizons. I’ll make sure it’s worth your while!

And so... for starters....I’d like to share some key principles that I advise my clients to use, which should make them good employers, with satisfied staff and keep them on the right side of the law! Keep these 4 points in mind when managing your people and you should be on to a winner:

1) Be reasonable and nice (until you need to be tough!)

2) Be consistent

3) Act immediately (if you’re not happy about certain behaviour/performance)

4) If you have policies or procedures – follow them

That’s it! Quite simple really – which is how New Forest HR likes to keep advice and support to SMEs, and how I plan to write my blogs. So I hope you find them worth a regular coffee break read.

Until next time...