News and analysis Leader
Editor’s letter
“Icried as soon as I opened the
door… There’s lots of emotions
but we’ve got to lock them all away just
so we can get through and give the
advice that we need to give.”
These are the words of Donna Jones,
former branch manager at Thomas
Cook, quoted in a BBC News story
about the pop-up shops set up by
redundant employees who nonetheless
wanted to help customers after the
178-year-old travel giant’s collapse.
Amid extensive coverage of what
went wrong and the fingers pointed (at
bosses, auditors, government…) this
was heart-warming – albeit also quite
heart-breaking – news. While the
bizarrely persistent popular wisdom is
that most want to work as little as
possible for maximum reward, here
was yet more evidence to the contrary.
Some might also point to this as
evidence that Thomas Cook, for all its
other possible failings, must have done
something right in creating a culture of
staff loyalty and genuine customer
care. But did it actually?
My deputy Rachel Sharp was
kind enough to share some of the
interviews for her great piece on
Thomas Cook’s demise (p10) that
she alas didn’t have space for. One
was with professor of organisational
psychology at Birkbeck University
of London Almuth McDowall, who
offered a more psychological,
individualistic explanation.
“If you’re working there it’s
probably because you like human
connection and helping people… and
that motivation’s not going to go away
overnight,” she pointed out.
Which brings me to this issue’s cover
story (p16) on how HR should respond
to new reporting requirements – such
as July 2018’s revised Corporate
Governance Code – on culture given
its complex nature.
You can well imagine the data point
‘staff regularly go above and beyond’
being used at Thomas Cook, or any
other organisation, as evidence of a
thriving culture. But, as McDowall
highlights, the reality is likely to be
much more complicated.
Thomas Cook’s collapse also
demonstrates another key issue at the
heart of this month’s cover piece: that
ensuring robust corporate governance,
and avoiding the kinds of governance
scandals and failures that seem to have
come thick and fast over recent years,
is a similarly complex matter.
Unpicking just ‘what went wrong’ at
Thomas Cook will – as with most
corporate failures – take some time.
There was certainly a heady mix of
external factors (weather issues, global
political unrest…), and internal
(failure to transform digitally and
quickly enough in the face of
competition from online travel agents
and low-cost airlines...)
And we should avoid unthinkingly
lumping a range of different instances
(BHS, #MeToo, Carillion…) under
the general banner of ‘corporate
governance failure,’ without paying
attention to the very different nature
of each.
So while culture’s now much more
prominent positioning within various
corporate governance regulations is
highly encouraging, we must be wary
of treating it as a silver bullet. Or
deploying culture, in the words of
professor of organisational psychology
at Queen Mary University of London
Rob Briner, with “strategic ambiguity”
to avoid granular scrutiny of
all factors.
Instead this is a huge opportunity
for HR to capitalise on attention for
something that typically hasn’t
received enough airtime at board level.
And to stress the importance of people
reporting more generally.
How to mesure and report on
culture meaningfully requires careful
thought. And there will always be
multiple factors contributing to
organisational success and failure,
some entirely beyond an employer’s
control. But a strong culture – created
by careful attention to staff
engagement and voice, and the right
culture at board level – can go a long
way in ensuring good governance.
In the words of McDowall: “Put it
this way, if there had been good
corporate governance at Thomas Cook
it wouldn’t have gone bust.” HR
Jenny Roper
Editor
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