Comments by Nigel DuPree

Nigel DuPree
Member - 60 posts

Forgot to add in savings resulting from reduced errors in time and money let alone sick leave from stress or slip and trip injury because suffering fatigue and not as vigilant so bound to have had a slip, trip or other mishap along the way.

Better and better I'll have a look on the web to see if can find a good cruise deal now.

Nigel DuPree
Member - 60 posts

VD (Vigilance Decremation) or any other physiological impairment to an individuals finctionality whether through feeling unwell, eye or headache founded in screen fatigue, hangover whatever fundamentaly increases the inherent risk of omission, error and misjudgement.

If screen fatigue results in a drop in performance of around 20% and is reported y 58% of DSE operators that has to dwarf the 13 billion pounds in lost productivity due to sickies.

A 20% drop in performance in a net 6 hour working day equates to approx 1 hour per day or 33 days per annum and if we were to assume a similar loss of production due to self-medication of one type or another then employers could quite easily justify the cost/benefit of giving everyone a two holiday in the Bahamas and still be in profit.

i wish i had thought of that before I think I'll try that on my boss....lol

Nigel DuPree
Member - 60 posts

Yaa, making it a thought police problem could end getting very messy in terms of diversity and whilst many employees already suspect their employer may benefit from a visit to Dr Zucky in his metal helmit they also have to acknowledge that they did employ them in the first place..... .

Still leaves matter of whether or not the employee performed their duties sufficiently well to be described as completed safely and compitently ?

If found so, then that leaves the claim for unfair dismissal to be assessed.

I think that is why it is called an employment tribunal rather than, for example, Relate who tend to, as it says on the tin, offer interpersonal 'relationship' breakdown mediation services.

Whilst sure no one should get the two, public and private life, mixed up perhaps in todays hot-seat workplace it would be a good idea to expand occupational health care a little to include a wider interpretation of pastoral or palliative care in the workplace.

I seam to remember an experiment where a community of rats was put under increasing 'pressure' by adding more and more individuals to what were originally very spacious accommodations until they noticed that the once pro-social individuals became a little agitated and more anti-social.

To the point where disturbed behaviours and aggression was normal just before they started reducing their numbers themselves...............

Perhaps the Alpha rat viewed this as a little 'friendly fire' and the collateral damage to community numbers was only to ensure health and safety of the others.

Ho hum I know "no comparison here" but, occupational health is a question of "peer approval" if comunities or societies are going to ensure internal or external CRM (customer relationship management) doesn't turn into a customer / employee retention problem.

Nigel DuPree
Member - 60 posts

The law states that if an individual "feels" that they have been discriminated against because they are or are not 'eye candy', are or are not vertically or horizontally challenged or disabled and have been judged other than on their qualifications and/or compitencies to perform whatever task required of them as an employee then their complaint is valid and will have to be defended by or justified by the individual or employer.

Just the same as if someone "feels" put-down or deminished by threatening, harrassing, teasing banter or bullying behaviour has the right to feel that they have been victimised or unjustly dealt with in some way and does not mean that they are over sensitive or silly and should not take action.

CRB checks are primarily there to ensure the person is the person they say they are and provide information on their criminal record, if any, in the last five years and only discloses offences of a sexual nature (List 99 Sex offenders register) should you ask for an 'enhanced' CRB check where the individual may or will be in contact with vulnerable people especially children.

In addition, should people be working with or handling information subject to the Data Protection Act 1998 it would be reasonable for an employer as part of their risk assessment , if not wishing to be found negligent for employing someone with a history of credit card fraud or particularly poor finacial record in terms of having more county court judgements than hot meals.

Therefore if you are "looking into" CRB & finacial screening checks it would and should be a good idea for management to consult with employees if not already part of an existing recruitment policy and clearance process as this may in affect be a change to terms and conditions of employment.

Nigel DuPree
Member - 60 posts

"Behavioural Apardhied" manifested in 'approval deprivation' biggest cultural risk to UK psycho-social and econimic well-being as 'if no one cares about me why should i care about anyone else'.

Maybe part of plan to make us all compliant drones - increased fear provides call for more and more police to police behaviour and fixed penalties reduces sense of equity in general populus increasing fear and sense of hopelessness - job done police state and you will be compliant........

In the mean time 'I want and I want it now' from money and thrills on the street to better performance in employees no wonder no one feels secure anymore.

Bring back the class system at least it offered opportunity for social mobility that was not solely dependent on having loads of dosh and was a meritocresy based on manners and courtious caring behaviour to one another.........

Nigel DuPree
Member - 60 posts

The real shame is you don't need to be pregnant to be branded a useless waste of space, chocolate tea pot, numpty, airhead, an accident looking for somewhere to happen etc. etc.

No wonder the government can't achieve health and wealth let alone productivity targets (25% improvement needed to carch up with others) for 2010 and is introducing more and more legislation to try and enforce failures to comply with existing legisaltion.

Human Rights people must be pulling their hair out as UK inc systemically fails to step up to the plate and take repsonsibility for omissions in it's Duty of Care across the board from education to social wellfare and corporate Friendly Fire that continues to impair performance, kill and seriously injure UK Human Resources.

I think it is a chicken and egg situation where the less people sorry human resources "feel valued" the less they can be 'bothered', can i be bothered, to be driven by increasingly bigger sticks to meet those meaningless tick-box targets so might as well sort of just tick the boxes, whatever, as it seams to keep "them" happy.

They don't really care about me so why should i really care about them......

Therefore legislation and Collateral Damage is growing exponentially and is going to reach critial mass soon unless we start actually looking after and truly valuing HR interpersonal relationship management as an asset.

Be nice to someone today as "approval deprivation" biggest risk to healthy dividends.

Nigel DuPree
Member - 60 posts

Welcome Wendy,

With increased mobility and transferable skills along side e-commerce in the Global Village workers may become potentially ever more remote from head offices that now could be almost anywhere.

However, even if your HR was still on site you may not be able to have an instant appointment for a 'one to one' in person on-demand with your HR contact so if company IT based thay may be more accessable via intranet messanger anyway?

If you have a problem there is no doubt a good practice guide or policy and/or requirement to raise any issues with line management in the first instance before working your way up the hierarchy should you not be satisfied with local outcome.

As an alternative you may also have a workers safety representative and/or work collegues to talk to if feeling isolated who may be more than happy if also away from home to provide a little social support in terms of discussing things - perhaps you might suggest an employees virtual "Staff Club" and or forum much like this one for employees to keep in contact.

Or is there a specific problem or concern underlying your question?

Nigel DuPree
Member - 60 posts

Dear Kuang Lim,

Discrimination 'is in the eye of the beholder' or victim in this as well as any other case where an individual "feels" discriminated against in terms of being treated unfairly or judgmentally with less than equally opportunity regardless of looks, colour, creed, being vertically or horizontally challenged, wairing glasses, having a bad hair day, poor choice of tie or handbag that day whas-eveeeer.

Hiring staff requires a professional balanced non-judgmental approach and the days of the local public house landlord with a roving eye or anyone else selecting staff on the basis that the wench is well built and has the biggest arms for pulling pints consistantly over a long shift is no longer acceptable.

However, that may have to be balanced with health and safety and the above staff member may be safer traveling home late at night no don't go there just book a taxi.....

Nigel DuPree
Member - 60 posts

If broken at work, the disposable worker, bye bye and good luck, may not want to be 'retained' and join the others 'turning over' who can't wait to get out from under management who who have improved at "talking the talk" in terms of politically correct in accordance with policy are still useless at "walking the walk"

Being made to stay, sorry being offered the opportunity of having adjustments made, may just increase the stressors for many where the underlying cause of their illness, impairment or disability might be work in the first place.

Robertsons quote a bit alarming too as if you need to introduce more legislation to enforce compliance with the first legislation why is anyone going to comply with second if not complying with the first - DOH

Nigel DuPree
Member - 60 posts

Don't forget all drivers eyes, very handy for judging speed and distance on the road, as well as in the car park at the end of a long day infront of display screen when fatigue is going to result in a degree of VD (Vigilance Decremation)

As an aside Post Office vehicles seam to be pretty poorly maintained ( and not sure they need an MOT like recovery, MOD or Police vehicles ) our local driver has needed assistance a couple of times over the last three months from helping him change a scuffed tyre with seriously damaged sidewall to supplying a couple of cable ties to hold the broken seat in place.

Nigel DuPree
Member - 60 posts

Telephones, door handles, hand rails, push buttons for the lift let alone photocopiers and other common equipment or areas all need constant vigilance if transmission of disease by hand.......

If even cruise liners that are cleaner than most peoples homes and a lot cleaner than hospitals can not contain every illness people bring aboard with them then no wonder there are so many sick workplaces.

How many people go to work with just a ' cold ' and a little cough or sneeze then give it to everyone else when we also know how quickly our children spread something through a school......

Going to be easy for that dreaded pandemic when it hits.

Nigel DuPree
Member - 60 posts

Stupid of employees to think that their health and safety should matter to any employer so long as they performing productively regardless of risk as after all just disposable human resources - shame on them if they find themselves a no-win no fee lawyer having been broken along the way silly people !!!!!

Nigel DuPree
Member - 60 posts

With 7 million functionally illiterate and 58% of those employed as DSE users reporting Screen Fatigue let alone MSD's we may have to address the risks associated with visual stress resulting in VD (Vigilance Decremation) before worrying about more than just basic skills in the workplace.

Digital literacy will need to be significantly improved first in order to support the studying of higher level skills in a text based environment even if reinforced with practical or experiencial training as few with a reading rate of less than 180 words per minute have the confidence to overcome a lifetime of approval deprivation when it comes to anything perceived as 'educational'.

The memory associated with underperformance at school tends to present as 'Performance Anxiety' on the scale of a relatively mild PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) that nevertheless has the affect of 'aversion therapy' when personally tasked to do anything involving reading and writing especially forms.

Reducing Screen Fatigue would improve digital literacy and thereby performance or productivity by 15 to 25 percentage points on it's own even before improving skills and will have a direct affect on productivity by reducing headaches etc. that result in so many, less than three day self-cert, sort of absenteeism.

If we are to avoid putting the cart before the horse yet again and then wondering why so little impact when spending so much time and money on tick-box driven delivery of training cources where only real outcome is down time while individual participating in the course......!.

"Access to Text" enables greater capacity and confidence to actively engage or participate in the learning experience as an alternative to just attending..

Eye Tests and glasses 'may' aid those with refractive problems but visual fatigue 'will' affect those with 20/20 vision and remains undetected in up to 48% of population in addition to the 10% charactorised as Dyslexic.

Not a 1 in 10 problem but a nearly 6 out of 10 problem in DSE users and that now means most of us who become a little frustrated at not being able to fulfil our potential when we know we could do better but can't quite figure out what is slowing us down -

SCREEN FATIGUE should no longer be dismissed as insignificant or temporary.

Nigel DuPree
Member - 60 posts

Collateral Damage to UK human resources reaching critical mass where constantly required to achieve ever increasing tick-box outcomes regardless of the level of self-deception and/or misfeasance needed to be compliant by ticking that box.......

Self fulfilling prophecy as work becomes less and less "meaningful" removing any sense of self-worth or pride in the "purpose" of doing a good job so long as the only outcomes required remain 'ticking the box'.

Depressing really..................

Perhaps time for a revolution where people take back their jobs so they can do them properly and get back the meaning & purpose to their work/lives.

Lets back the nurses to start with and give them the power to deliver caring through dignity for their patients restoring some degree of job satisfaction.

Nigel DuPree
Member - 60 posts

"Performance Anxiety" affects all levels of higherarchy in an increasingly tokenistic tick-box driven outcome based measurement of productivity.

Whether the pressure to be compliant and meet perceived demands is actually real or imaginary soon becomes academic as any sense of purpose or meaning undermines feelings of value and fatigue manifests in errors founded in symptomatic 'vigilance decremation' that will over time erode the capacity to perform well anyway.

Absenteeism will then replace presenteeism in the foreseeable downward spiral of dysfunction leading to 'approval deprivation' and 'stress related' ill health.....

Perhaps the joined-up thinking thing that morphed into an ethos of being good neighbours got lost in translation somewhere along the way with internal 'customer care' in employee relationship management as they became solely human resources that should look after themselves?

Inanimate objects from buildings to machinery seam get more maintenance in terms of asset management designed to mitigate breakdowns quite depressing really...............

Nigel DuPree
Member - 60 posts

An end to 'delegation' of H&S responsibility could be good for all as whilst only 10% of people injured ultimately make a claim (TUC Disposable Work Force) the powers that be must be anxious that more and more are going to as injuries in transition from physical to physiological and psychological and the human spirit just does not knit together as quickly as broken bones..............

As some smarty-pants said "with rights come responsibilities" and if delegation is truly going to be on the wain then everyone is going to have to take more responsibility for THEIR OWN and OTHERS health and safety.

Perhaps the age of "Positive Regard" for all has arrived where the omission in duty of care is going to be viewed as the friendly fire responsible for the increased collateral damage in UK HR.

Makes you wonder how Schools, Social Services and secure facilities are going to deal with that one where behavioural apardhied is rife - difficult individuals who may present as EBD (Emotion Behavioural Disturbed) are marginalised in favour of easier targets across the educational estate.

Unfortunately difficult people where ever they may be also have rights.....

Nigel DuPree
Member - 60 posts

And the PARENTS might learn 'sumfink' from their Kids apart from fostering a 'positive regard' for health and safety based in reality rather than solely social mythology and/or as a purely emotional response to tabloid headline driven sense of danger unrelated to the risk or hazard.

Pubescent children are, of course, bullet proof as it ain't not never gonna appen to dem whatever and anyway school pants and gonna "live hard and die young" cause who in der right mind wants to be an old like the teacher or parents.

Perhaps then we may start improving the chances of 'breaking the cycle' of collateral damage to future human resources who grow up risk averse and disaffected without actually knowing what they should be anxious of.

Football has more paraplegics with neck broken than rugby and boxing safer than gymnastics let alone more Kids in A & E's due to alcohol abuse than all the pedestrian and road traffic accidents put together.

Great timing for a "reality check" and an opportunity to dispel the myths.

Nigel DuPree
Member - 60 posts

UK only really has a minmum temp of 16 degrees 'C' but ideally should also have airflow between 7.5 to 15 centimetres per second with a humidity of 30 to 70% to avoid or mitigate the affects of 'sick building syndrome' where employees may be at risk of increased incidents of conditions like 'dry eye' or other generic eye, ear, nose or throat and respitory infections.

Hope helpfull or at least point in right direction as increased discomfort will affect levels of fatigue and/or VD ( Vigilance Decremation).

Nigel DuPree
Member - 60 posts

"Performance Anxiety" might be a good name for non-clinical depression in the workplace as demands increase and any perceptions of control or any real sense of value that may support 'meaning and purpose' are eroded to the point where many "feel" more like wage earning machines.

If we are going to redefine "reasonably practicable" in terms of health and safety response to "foreseeable" hazards perhaps it's time to redefine "demand" in terms of increased "risk" to performance and productivity where attention or "VD" (Vigilance Decrmation) results in increased risk of harm or injury to the individual.

The risks associated with visual and/or physical fatigue may be temporary but significant in terms of maintaining attention or vigilance in any occupation that could be charactorised as safety critical.

The current focus may be on machinery operaters especially those behind a wheel but there are many more people behind a display screen who are equally at risk of making significant errors when VD takes affect.

"Given" conditions in working environment and culture can no longer be dismissed as wolly nanny state principals if CSR is to improve asset management of human resources in order to address performance, productivity and retention of functional human resources.