Lucy and I were sitting outside a little corner cafe (Cafe Gena, pictured right) in the eastern backstreets of Florence, Italy on 6th August. Elated at our purchase of a day-old copy of The Guardian, we were both eager to digest as much news as the flimsy international edition could feed us. Typical then, that we should settle upon a small news item on the front page to debate for hours upon end, leaving little time in the day of two busy tourists for all that news.
Katie Allen’s article of 5th August 2006 announced the intentions of the Trade Union Congress (TUC) to publish details of boardroom salaries and bonuses on a new website, allowing employees to compare their below-inflation pay rises to some of the 25%-plus salary hikes experienced by their bosses. Lucy sparked our lunchtime conversation by asking how one could possibly justify the expansive difference between boardroom salaries, and the salary suffered by the bottom rung employees. Never one to shrink from such a challenge, I suggested the responsibilities of a manager were so much heavier than those placed upon the shoulders of the average employee, and the influence she could have on the fortunes of the company though poor performance so much more significant. Poor management can lead a store into the ground within weeks, but a poor till clerk is replaced without any real impact upon the branch performance.