Workplace romance happens.  Nice or nightmare?  Heaven or hell?  If two colleagues are smitten with each other things may get hot under the collar.  Can anything be done to prevent the temperature from rising to fever pitch?

Advice For The Boss

Do

• Accept that (according to The Guardian last year) around one in five people marry a co-worker.
• Remember that half of all work-place romances end within three months.
• Exercise control by having good, clear, documented and circulated policies for all workers on issues such as equality, equal opportunity, dignity & diversity, bullying & harassment, and confidentiality.
• Expect all of your workers to always abide by the code of conduct outlined in these and in other company policies and guidelines.
• If you really feel the need, have a Guideline for Workplace Relationships which deals with specific issues such as manager/subordinate relationships; inappropriate physical contact or language; relationships within teams
• Keep an eye on everyone – workplace relationships may sometimes impact co-workers negatively

Don’t:

• Panic. Office romances are normal and can be a sign of a happy and positive organisational culture.
• Try to ban or prevent workplace liaisons entirely, you’ll just drive them underground where you may have little chance of controlling them.
• Tolerate unacceptable or inappropriate workplace behaviour.
• Ever wait until the annual or quarterly performance review meeting to implement your staff policies or address misconduct – do this immediately if and when the need arises.
• Allow workers in a relationship to interview, promote, performance-manage or dismiss each-other.

Advice for the Couple

Do

• Find out if your employer has a code of conduct, policy or guideline relating to co-worker relationships (and abide by them obviously!).
• Understand that if you do breach company policy you may suffer consequences.
• Consider being honest with your boss and colleagues about your relationship – otherwise you may risk losing their trust.
• Remember that employers keep records (think IT and telephone systems!).
• Be aware and prepared that eventually you’ll probably be the subject of some office gossip.

Don’t

• Be overtly demonstrative with, or embarrass your partner at work.
• Use nick-names, pet-names or terms of endearment for each other in front of colleagues
• Exchange personal emails or phone calls using office technology.
• Wash your dirty laundry in public – always keep your personal and work lives separate.
• Be surprised at the mixed reactions of your colleagues to your relationship
• Forget to be careful what you say or display on social media platforms if you are friends with, connected to, following or followed by work-colleagues.

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STATE bodies buy about €15 billion worth of goods and services every year and significant savings could be made by tighter management of state purchasing. This was the key message at the Forum on Public Procurement (FPP) Conference held in Dublin this week.

Last year most policy focus was on cutting the €20bn state pay bill and introducing a pensions-related levy but little attention has been paid to securing value for money in purchases apart from the general imposition of an 8% claw-back on professional services tenders.

The embargo on public appointments has limited the availability of procurement expertise in many state-funded organisations and inhibits supply-chain management according to some participants at the conference.

Vincent Campbell, director of the new National Public Procurement Operations Unit detailed plans to launch a new version of the government’s E-tenders website before the end of this year. It will include new standardised terms and documentation for procurement by all government departments, local authorities, and the health services.

18% of Irish public service contracts go to Overseas Suppliers

In an overview of European Union procurement practices, Niall Bohan of the EU Commission pointed out that the number of contracts awarded to companies based in other member states is only 3.4% of the 150,000 tenders advertised. Yet nearly 18% of Irish public service contracts go to overseas suppliers reflecting an openness far exceeding that of any other EU state.

Various service providers highlighted the imbalance between price and quality considerations when assessing tender bids but welcomed the increased provision of detailed assessment and marking scores for unsuccessful bidders. In a dialogue, Cecil Ryan of OCS Ireland and Tony Redmond of the Rail Procurement Agency discussed the merits of having a Procurement Ombudsman to handle appeals or complaints by unsuccessful bidders and to monitor standards in the tendering process.

‘Daft’ ideas

Dr. Peter Brennan of Bid Management presented a rapid-fire 15 suggestions on handling significant infrastructural projects in imaginative ways of international tenders for investors who, in turn, subcontract parts of the national projects. These ranged from offshore wind farms, a national waste treatment facility, to a single contact phone number for essential services. Other suggestions included the provision of three or four national retrofitting contracts for energy savings and also provision of the much-discussed electronic delivery of welfare payments as well as an imaginative invitation to develop electric cars and batteries on a research project basis using Ireland as an international test laboratory.

Dr Brennan’s thought-provoking ideas came under the title of “Daft or Doable” inviting conference participants to think imaginatively about efficient tendering for large-scale  projects.

Better Procurement is a Key Component in Expenditure Control

UCD economist, Colm McCarthy noted that “better procurement is a key component in expenditure control” and added that much more outsourcing and use of shared-services  should be adopted in the public sector. He said that state agencies and semi-state companies had a passive attitude to their assets and need to review and sell properties which are no longer being utilised.

He warned against ambitions to return to the economic position of 2006 with ‘bubble’ valuations of property assets. Instead we need to rebalance the economy and must accept that recovering from a ‘bubble’ is more demanding than a cyclical recovery and will demand significant cuts in domestic costs for water, waste, energy, rents and government or local authority levies and not just wage rates.

Public Procurement Supports 250,000 Irish Jobs

FPP chief executive, Lionel McCarthy said that significant changes in the public procurement process can assist in restoring economic confidence, generate economic activity and offer innovative solutions benefitting the procurement professionals, Irish suppliers and ultimately the taxpayer.

Public procurement supports up to 250,000 jobs in Ireland, making it an integral and vital component of our society.  Mr. McCarthy added that some buyers may be over-relying on guidelines rather than adapting procedures to ensure value for money and minimize bureaucratic hurdles through, for example, settling a project price or budget in advance of an invitation for tenders.

For further information on FPP 2010 contact Gerald Flynn. Mob: 087 223 8562

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Dublin City Enterprise Board

LINK! Start-up Business Network – March Event

You are advised to book early to secure your attendance at this event

Email your booking to link@dceb.ie

Clarion Hotel, IFSC

Tuesday 30th March 2010, 6.00pm – 8.30pm

How to Exploit Your PC’s/MAC’s to Get Them Really Working For Your Business!

Guest Speaker:Christian Kortenhorst, CK Computer Solutions

Every business, big or small, is totally reliant on technology.   At this event LINK! member, Christian Kortenhorst, will talk about some simple, cheap and easy IT solutions for small/medium size companies like ours to use in their every-day business.  He will introduce us to some useful and cost-effective applications.  He will also show us how to spend less time on our computers trying to solve those frustrating recurring problems that annoy us so much!

Some of the topics Christian will explore:

• Email, IMAP VS Pop3
• Online services VS Desktop applications
• Document-sharing
• Dropbox
• Calendars
• Multiple computer setup
• Using what you have
• Mobile devices
• Hardware recommendations
• Online backups
• Open source software

If you have a specific IT topic that you would like Christian to address, you can email your request to Christian@cksolutions.ie .

After the session you should have a better understanding of how a small to medium size business should ideally be set-up for managing files and documents, coordinating email and backing up your data.

Christian Kortenhorst is based in Dublin, Ireland.  He has over 8 years’ broad-ranging technical experience, for example in setting up servers, network environments, and backup systems.  Christian offers consulting and hands-on solutions in these and many other technical areas. He set up his business –  CK Computer Solutions –  in 2008 having completed 4 years in Computer Science in DIT.

Christian’s mission is to provide a quality and creative IT service to small and medium sized businesses. “We strive to advise and provide the best product and services that fits a company’s needs. With our constant research and testing of products and services we are able to keep our clients up-to-date with the best possible products and services that are tried and tested. We select products and services objectively based on a company’s needs and wants.”

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