This is a new segment we thought we’d introduce to our newsletter – each month we’ll pick out the most common (or problematic) people related question that we’re getting, and share some insights. For our farming clients, there are often ‘themes’ in the questions that tend to follow the season.
So what are we getting asked at the moment? One thing that we are coming across a lot lately is a whole lot of rhetoric and questions around ‘renewing contracts’ for dairy farm employees for the coming season. A couple of examples from the past week…
“Our current Herd Manager isn’t any good, so we’re not going to renew his employment contract for next season, can you help us recruit a new one?”
“I asked my Farm Manager in December if he was staying on next season (1 June) and he said he yes, now (in March) he’s turned around and resigned, he can’t do that can he?”
While these are two different scenarios, the underlying problem in both is the same – an assumption that the employment agreement somehow lines up with the dairy farming season – and it simply does not.
So in the first example above, as the employer you don’t get to ‘choose’ to ‘renew’ your team members’ contracts or not – they don’t have an expiration or rollover date, they can only come to an end when one or other party terminates them.
And in the second example…the Farm Manager absolutely has the right to resign at any time in his employment – again, the employment relationship is not linked to the dairy season.
If this sounds familiar to you or you have any other 'people' related questions, give our team a call on 07 870 4901 today!