Arranging childcare within the family is perfectly OK, but life will always throw a googly and things have a habit of coming unravelled. The family carer may get fed up with being a carer. She (it’s often though not always a female family member) may become unwell or go on an extended holiday.

A lack of sleep is not only distressing and unpleasant, it adversely affects performance. One of the reasons for poor sleep is night-time anxiety. What help can we offer our employees to prevent anxiety affecting their sleep?

If you want to vary terms of employment you should engage with employees in a meaningful way and explore alternatives to dismissal.

Good people really are your greatest asset. If you take the time to get your recruitment right, your business will perform far better and you are also likely to avoid future problems.

We are slowly returning to work and things will pick up eventually. For many small businesses, it’s still a real struggle and workload and revenue are still well below that of pre-pandemic levels. One of my clients, C Ltd, has recently had to reduce headcount.