Have you ever wondered quite what Katherine Kerswell does for her £192,474 per year salary as the council chief executive?
Vapid, patronising tripe: council CEO Katherine Kerswell’s regular email is a low-light of staff’s week
It’s something that often perplexes what remains of the borough’s front-line staff… KK’s ‘duties’, such as they are, include signing off a little morale-booster of an email to all staff each Friday. What some working in Fisher’s Folly call ‘the weekly waffle’.
Here, we reproduce the weekly waffle that Kerswell put her name to this morning. We solemnly promise that it is not an attempt at parodying Craig Brown’s regular Diary column from Private Eye: this vapid, patronising tripe is all Kerswell’s own work. Enjoy!
Dear all,
I hope that you’re enjoying the warmer weather this week and had a good bank holiday weekend.
It might be a slightly shorter week for some, but I know that doesn’t take away from how busy things are. Please keep in mind the message behind our Make Time to Take Time campaign – it is so important to put your wellbeing first. Whether that’s making sure you take regular breaks, setting aside time in your day to focus without digital distractions or getting outside for some fresh air.
Next week is Mental Health Awareness Week and we’ll be sharing the details of employee support services, ways to manage your wellbeing and where to access help when you need it. If you have any tips or advice that you’d like to share, even little things like the hobbies you like to do, or pictures of the places you visit to help you manage your mental health, then please send them in.
To start us off, Rebecca from internal comms says nothing calms her more than some quiet time with her cat, which can help slow things down after a busy day. I look forward to seeing what other people share next week.
Weekly waffle: council’s long-suffering staff have to put up with this every week
One of the avenues for supporting your wellbeing we have here at Croydon is our staff networks, and this week we marked Staff Network Day, a national initiative to recognise the value these groups add to the workplace. I’d like to personally thank colleagues who make the time to run our networks – the chairs, secretaries, steering group members and sponsors, without whom our networks wouldn’t be here. But they also can’t work without members, so do read the article in the newsletter below about the work they do in Croydon and how to join them. It’s an opportunity to connect with people you might not normally meet from across the organisation, access support and push for positive change at the council.
Another way to make change happen in the organisation is to fill in the staff survey. 692 people have taken part so far. Please take 10 minutes to fill it in, it’s completely anonymous so be honest – your views really matter.
Our shout out this week goes to the carpark cleansing team, who do a fantastic job of maintaining the council-owned car parks. It is essential but not necessarily glamorous work, and yet I have been told that they approach it in good spirits, whatever the weather, and are happy to pitch in and help with jobs outside of their normal day-to-day work. This has included supporting our blitz clean-ups in different areas of the borough, part of Mayor Perry’s commitment to work with residents and businesses to making our borough cleaner, and making sure Croydon’s big belly bins are in order. Thank you team, we are lucky to have you.
Have a lovely weekend all and thank you for the work that you do.
Katherine Kerswell (she/her)
Chief Executive
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