Royal Mail Bullying Boss

[TrueBlueTerrier]

It looks like the thing we can agree on is that the failings aren't that of praying muslims or smokers, but management to enforce agreements. May I suggest that non smoking non religious members who feel aggrieved at this then start the process for a claim of unfair discrimination, against management the real cause of the friction, rather than complaining about muslims, or muttering behind their back - in the end if you take no action you have no-one to blame but yourself, and you are making managements job easier by letting it slide.

My suggestions:
1. Find out how many are pissed of with the status quo.
2. Find out how many of them want to take combined action.
3. Ask for a Union meeting and air your concerns.
4. If nothing is done then enter a Group grievance.

There is nothing wrong in complaining about any group taking liberties with work time, be they smokers or devout believers, but to my mind if you really are upset by it then stand up and be counted and tackle it the right way, not by back biting and whispering in corners, that only aggravates the situation.

[2pints]

Saying anything against muslims or any other religion is not allowed in this country as freedom of speech went out the window a long time ago and political correctness is rampant.. so my advice would be the same as above,get together and sort it out with the union.

[Cyclopz]

Difficult to do.

Forty per cent of the work force are Islamic, if you start the ball rolling you may find intimidation will be used against you in a group way.

You may also find yourself the victim of a harassment accusation and lose your job.

If you go around asking people if they are p1ssed off and start creating a list you will be seen as attacking the religion of a certain group and probably be bullied because of it.
Your life could become very uncomfortable and quite scarey.

Safer just to keep your head down.

[TrueBlueTerrier]

Saying anything against muslims or any other religion is not allowed in this country as freedom of speech went out the window a long time ago and political correctness is rampant.. so my advice would be the same as above,get together and sort it out with the union.

Of course talking about your opinions about Islam is allowed, hopefully those opinions will be well formed and researched. But what you are not allowed to do is discriminate against anyone, and if we accept discrimination just because the sufferer is Muslim (and in this case the alleged perpetrator may be as well) then how long before it becomes acceptable to discriminate against anyone that is different to anyone else.

It is saddening though that this thread is concentrating on one particularly small aspect of the case, namely religion, when the alleged acts she is complaining about are discrimination not by sex or religion, but by being singled out and treated differently than others in the same situation. That's wrong and it should be challenged, that's all she is doing and she should be applauded for standing up to a bully, its a pity her religion seems to blind that aspect for others.

[bustedflush]

TBT, the voice of the idealist. Cyclopz, the voice of the realist.

[Cyclopz]

I have to say that I am all for unity.
I totally agree with Teebs on this but this is going to be tough.
The place has been designed to keep us all divided and uniting us all under one banner is going to be a major achievement.
I am doing my bit every day but we are working against a socially engineered place that has been designed to keep us all at each others throats.
This is going to be a tough one.
But one thing is guaranteed, I shall return with more info when I get it.
I am a lifer with no chance of parol.

[fishtank]

The place has been designed to keep us all divided and uniting us all under one banner is going to be a major achievement.

Royal Mail are good at that, If it isn't religious or racial it's part-timers and full-timers, juniors and seniors, men and women, rurals and towns walks, duty holders and reserves.
It's a business and management culture stuck in the stone age and to be honest we're our own worst enemy most of the time, they divide and conquer and we go along with it for some strange reason.

[baldrick]

I don't know if you guys saw a program called 'The Super Rich and Us' on BBC2 last night and last week.. It's worth watching if you can.
It reveals how all this dividing of workers was a result of economists' theories from the 80s, to enable the rich to divide and rule the majority of society while increasing their wealth. The personal wealth of the richest 1% has increased from 6% of total wealth in the 70s to 14% now, as a result, while living standards have declined or stagnated for the majority.

[Dorset Plodder]

Yep Fishtank beat me to it. Military strategy has always been to "Divide & Conquer". It certainly works well for Royal Mail, I've never know a more Divided workforce.

[Cyclopz]

Ok so it remains to be seen the outcome of this case.
Employment tribunals usually take a while before they release their results.
Information is sketchy at this stage.

You know the only way to make the union respond is to collectively withdraw all subs of a large number of people all at the same time
and then collectively say to the rep we will re-introduce the subs once we get a result, basically go work for your money you lazy C..t same as the rest of us.
This is a hard idea to communicate in 12 different languages.

Trust is a hard thing to come by these days.
You never know where peoples loyalties lie at HWDC.
So many languages spoken and so much confusion on the floor.
I still can't decide if the mix of people from so many countries on the floor is by design or accident.

Bullying is really something that needs watching as it can come at you in 12 different languages.
I can just about work out what's going on because I am born here and understand how the establishment works.
Imagine being a lost immigrant agency worker in this sea of confusion, it must be terrifying.
Who would you trust?

[indio]

Time out for prayers?? That's it, I'm converting to the prophet...

As far as I know islam is the only faith that stipulates what times of the day you should pray

Yes, I over heard a DIM say that the call to pray is always 30 seconds after the call to IPS.

[Radio]

There is a lot more to this story than mere prayer and multiculturalism etc. The main issue is the bullying management style rooted in stone-age management practices in a thoroughly modern workplace. International is Royal Mail's cash cow, it is the goose that lays the golden egg each day. Some products have profit margin of up to 1000% and it generates a lot of money. Nobody wants to mess with it as long as it is generating money. HR must be fed up with all the complaints concerning bullying and harrassment comingfrom this place. Staff are fed up as well and nobody wants to work. People try to get away with doing as little as possible. World Class Mail is still going strong in this office which has created a cadre of OPGs who do nothing all day and just make posters etc around the audit times. It is a place where too many people get away with doing squat all while others are pushed and shoved around by aggressive and ignorant managers.

Somebody mentioned smokers which is a very fair comment. We have a hardcore of smokers who have to go for a fag every hour come hell or high water. Smoking area is far and each fag break takes a minimum of 15 minutes. Nothing is professionally enforced, there is severe lack of professionalism. Senior managers are just bothered about promoting themselves and their cronies in ever higher positions. Bullies are promoted and it is common belief that higher management like and encourage bullies. Now the OPGs have learned to take out B&H cases against managers and some time they even win these cases but nothing is done against the offending managers. Cases are brushed under the carpet even when investigations find managers at fault. A night shift opg had a panic attack and a senior manager made fun of him. The guy took that manager to employmet tribunal and won the case still nothing happened to the manager. Managers have mistresses who get away with doing nothing. This case just shows the tip of the iceburg. People are really fed up of the way they are treated and managers are just not qualified to work in a place like this. Things are not getting better. The offending manager in this case was newly appointed. Who hands over their staff to someone with Gate Gourmet on their CV? Have we forgotten what happened at Gate Gourmet:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gate_Gourm ... ike_action

The place needs a complete and total overhaul from top to bottom otherwise we will hear more of such cases because now the staff have realised that they are caught up between an unprofessional management team and an inept union. They all talk about tribunals and courts.

[Dorset Plodder]

I've always said the lower and middle ranks of Management in this company are generally Incompetent, with a few exceptions. I have no experience of the Higher Echelons.
Any Low Level Managers that do show a bit of initiative, and appear to be getting their Offices sorted out, are inevitably shat on from a great height because they're paying out too much overtime to get the job done. Or aren't cracking the whip enough. They get demoralised and demotivated and leave the Business. Then they're replaced by idiots that the Middle Level Managers seem to prefer. Although we can see they're doing a worse job.

[Cyclopz]

The two last posts were brilliant but for me the winner is Radio, you have summed up HWDC to a T.
Rotten to the core.

Vultures and parasites always circulate when they sense the flesh of a corpse.
One human coming up with new ideas and being creative, ten parasites feeding.
Sums it up perfectly.

[DB1100]

Yep Fishtank beat me to it. Military strategy has always been to "Divide & Conquer". It certainly works well for Royal Mail, I've never know a more Divided workforce.

Used to be old boy,now it's hearts and minds in the military,something royal mail will never do,try and win our hearts and minds.