Requests to Refuse

Pressure to fix a labour shortage produces proposals. These are the ones to decline, with the reason and the alternative.

"Lower the standards and take whoever applies"

Why to refuse: the people taken this way leave fastest, and the cost of a first-fortnight leaver exceeds the cost of a vacancy for a week.

Offer instead: a faster process for the applicants you have, and a wider source mix.

"Stop telling candidates about the physical demand"

Why to refuse: they discover it on day two and leave, having consumed an induction. It also produces injuries and the accompanying obligations.

Offer instead: state it plainly and screen for it, which filters before the cost is incurred.

"Put the new starters on nights, nobody else wants it"

Why to refuse: the least experienced people on the shift with the least supervision and the worst facilities is the combination with the highest attrition and the highest incident rate.

Offer instead: a night premium that attracts volunteers, and experienced people on nights with new starters on days.

"Use the attendance data to manage individuals out"

Why to refuse: it converts an operational record into a disciplinary instrument, which people notice immediately and which stops them reporting anything.

Offer instead: the ordinary capability process, with the data as context rather than as evidence.

"Make overtime mandatory until we are up to strength"

Why to refuse: it produces departures among the people already there, which deepens the shortage it was meant to fix.

Offer instead: voluntary overtime at a rate that attracts takers, and agency cover for the remainder.

"Cut the induction to half a day, we need them on the floor"

Why to refuse: it is the intervention with the clearest link to first-week attrition, and the floor time saved is lost several times over.

Offer instead: a shorter first day with the rest spread across the week, which is better anyway.

"Run a retention bonus at six months"

Why to refuse: it pays people who were staying, does nothing for the first-fortnight group where the losses are, and creates a cliff at the payment date.

Offer instead: the same money spent on the first two weeks, where the curve says the problem is.

"Stop the exit calls, they are depressing"

Why to refuse: it is the only honest source of causes, and stopping it does not change the causes.

Offer instead: report them with a proposed action attached, so the reading is a decision rather than a complaint.

"Survey them to find out what is wrong"

Why to refuse: the survivors will answer, the leavers will not, and the result will arrive in six weeks describing a workforce that has changed.

Offer instead: twenty exit calls this week, which is faster, cheaper and more specific.

Recording it

What was proposed, by whom, why it was declined, what was offered instead.

Because the same proposals return every peak, and answering by reference to a prior decision is faster than re-arguing it.

And because where one is adopted over your objection, the record matters when the attrition figure moves the wrong way.

Having the answers ready

These arrive under pressure, usually in the same week.

Which is why the alternative matters more than the refusal: a no with a costed alternative is a decision, and a no alone is an obstacle.

How it fails in practice

The proposals arrive under pressure in the same week, each is reasonable in isolation, and the operation adopts two of them because refusing three times looks obstructive..

The check

Have the alternative ready before the proposal arrives.

A no with a costed alternative is a decision; a no alone is an obstacle.