Staff Forum

Bails reminded me today that I used to be on the staff forum (she is now representing her department on this body). I had completely forgotten. But I was there at its inception. With its mission to give staff a voice and a forum to raise their greatest concerns, influence management and fight for their rights.

Reps from every department met termly to discuss, well mostly, the toilets. Big feature. Every meeting. For over half the meeting. Great swathes of paid staff time. Discussion centred as to their modernity, suitability, cleanliness, number of cubicles, type of lavatory paper, whether there should be separate provision for staff or just sharing with students (who were incidentally all adults). Pity the poor minute taker - never has so much hot air been gassed on such minutiae of detail, outside a toilet design factory.

I was a little embarrassed feeding back to my department colleagues. It became quite a running joke. Over time I sat by the same chap each meeting (creatures of habit these staff forum reps) and made bets as to the length of the debate. We made a pact that should the toilets not come up one of us would throw in a toilet-based issue, we never had to induce the pact.

So, in time, I left that workplace and went on to pastures new, left behind the memory of the staff forum and its endless toilet-based debate. Bails says its still the same. Most energy is expended on the, obviously, never-ending concern over facilities. Still I think the staff there are happier than in my current workplace - they have longer service and better benefits. We have one toilet for ladies (2 cubicles), one for the gents (no idea whats inside) and a disabled facility on the ground floor. Maybe if workplaces could crack the toilet issue they would pave the way for the happy, engaged and content workforce that they ought to be aspiring to.