Employee Relations and Grievances
Maintaining positive employee relations is vitally important to the smooth running of, and the ability to achieve successful outcomes within, all education establishments. 'Employee relations' defines the employee-employer relationship and can be just as much about the informal climate in the workplace as formal consultation mechanisms through representative groups and unions.
Working with a range of unions is an everyday reality in the education sector, where their purpose is partly industrial (protecting the rights and living standards of their members) and partly political (as a consultation partner of the government over education policy, as campaigners and lobbyists).
Employee relations is also about the employment relationship with individuals, however. Where problems at work are not dealt with quickly and effectively, they will often result in grievances being raised or staff reporting concerns about the suspected wrongdoing of others (whistleblowing).
What's in this topic collection
This topic collection contains guidance, information and resources on various aspects of managing employee relations, including union recognition and collective bargaining, industrial action, employee grievances and whistleblowing. It also includes a number of template policies and other useful documents. It also covers the legal requirement to report annually on trade union facility time which applies to most publicly-funded education establishments that employ more than 49 FTE employees.