What is the role of HR in a situation like this? Not easy, is the answer that immediately springs to mind. Yes, HR will be involved in the dispute resolution process and may act in a mediation capacity, attempting to bring the two sides together. Alternatively, HR may take the side of the employer; after all, it is the employer that pays their salaries.
Perhaps a different way of looking at the role of HR in an industrial dispute is to ask if HR could have played a part in avoiding the dispute in the first place. Could a dispute have been anticipated?
If you accept, for the sake of this argument, that the economic shock that occurred at about this time last year should be viewed as something equivalent to a major personal trauma, then the route towards a winter of discontent had already been set.
By trauma I mean the emotional trauma that many people experienced as the news media brought us stories of a 1930s style depression, which commentators and politicians believe we are reliving in this current economic downturn. Are they therefore surprised that people feel so miserable?
I would argue that HR professionals could, by looking closely at the emotional impact of last year's calamitous events, have anticipated how people would eventually respond.
After a person suffers a trauma, and they survive, they go through various recognised stages of emotions.
The first stage is one of shock. This can sometimes be likened to a rabbit in the headlights. Having realised they have not been hit by the car, they scramble for safety - the second stage. In this case, we all stopped spending and did our very best to avoid redundancy.
Stage three is when we stop panicking and realise we have survived - at least for now. We still have our home and we have not been made redundant. Relief becomes palpable and eventually we start to feel euphoric. You only have to see what has happened to the world's stock markets and the UK housing market to see that we went into this stage in the spring of this year.
During these first stages, the Dunkirk spirit kicks in and, bizarrely, it becomes almost fun being one of the survivors. But there is a menace lurking just ahead of us. That menace is called retribution, we become tired of working harder just to stand still and to survive. We are also probably working harder for less pay. It is time to project our increasing anger and discontent on to someone or something else. After all it is not our fault.
We need to find someone to hold accountable and to punish for what we went through. We seek retribution.
And so we target those we work for because it must be their fault - mustn't it? So intense are our feelings that we lose sight of the fact our actions may actually lead to the demise of the organisation for which we work. This would appear to be happening with British Airways whose financial woes and consequential job cuts and pay freezes have ended in the need for employees to break out and strike - therefore giving the airline's rivals just what they want: new customers.
So if we had the foresight to see this coming, what could we do about it? Well, the answer is incredibly simple. Ask people how they are feeling and help them to understand that their feelings are entirely legitimate and quite normal given what the world has been through. Tell them you really care about how they are feeling (and mean it) and that you want to maintain open and honest communication. Tell them you want to work with them to get through this difficult time. And tell them how you are feeling as well.
Invite your colleagues to tell you what they would do differently. Ask them to look towards a brighter future that you can all share and ask them how, collectively, you will get there. You will then have a common context for what each individual is doing. There will be a common goal and if people feel cared for and they feel that their opinion counts, you will have to force them out of the door come the end of the working day.
And what if you didn't see it coming and are now faced with industrial action? Well, be honest and say that you didn't see it coming. Then ask people how they are feeling. Keep communication open and honest.
Interestingly, Willie Walsh, chief executive of British Airways, was quoted in the newspapers today saying that: "This just proves to me that the unions just don't understand how difficult things are". Better communication may help but I suspect that it comes down to feelings. And by the way, Walsh needs to hold someone accountable too - the unions in this instance.
Kevin Dougall is managing director of APHR Solutions
