He Says She Says 24/06/10

This week: Is Martin the football grinch?

He Says:

I should start by saying I’m not really a football fan. If the truth be known I’m not a huge fan of work either (after all, I didn’t become a radio presenter to work for a living… as my dad used to say, ‘that’s not a proper job’)

However,  if I was an employer and you asked me for half the day off for the football my first question would be, ‘are you playing for England’, because if you’re not then it’s a no! After all, if you had wanted the day off and you were a true football fan you would have known the dates months go and could have booked the time off as holiday.

As for the schools allowing children home early - that’s just absurd. By all means, let the kids watch the football and follow the World Cup but in a way that makes it educational. How many children or adults could tell you where any of the countries playing are on a map of the world - or know anything about those countries? What a potentially great opportunity to engage the kids in school whilst letting them follow the soccer.

I’ll be honest, if I was in a work environment that allowed football fans to clock out early I would be down to Sports Direct to purchase England shirt and vuvuzela so quickly my feet wouldn’t touch the ground shouting - but that’s the problem - the number of fair-weather fans that are just out to pull a fast one.

Our national team may not be up to much, but if we had to take on the world in ways of getting out of work it would be a nail-biting final between us and the French!


She Says:

It happens every four years and last anything from two to four weeks depending on how well our national team does. In the grand scheme of things, it’s not really a big deal. I’m talking of course about the World Cup.

I’m not a follower of football, I don’t chase a league team around the country every weekend, but I do like the big games and have so far enjoyed the tournament, so much so that I have even watched a few games that didn’t involve England (most of which were more entertaining!).

So I don’t think I’m alone in enjoying it and therefore if I did work in a job that was 9 til 5 I would like to think that my boss, like many others this week, would have given me a bit of time off to watch the 3 o’clock game.

In some cases it would not be possible, but for those workplaces were it was, it has to be a wise move on the employer’s part. Let’s face it - for the last eighteen months or so, all people have heard is, ‘we need you to work a little longer’ or ‘we need you to take on this extra responsibility’, as well as. ‘sorry no pay rise this year’ - so how nice would it be if for once the staff got something back? After all, it is only for a couple of hours, for one occasion during the tournament.

Think what a good mood the staff will be in, especially if we win, and it will be because the boss gave them just a couple of hours off, a small price to pay for happy employees.

It really is only miserable football haters that think that it’s a bad idea to let people have a bit of time off during the World Cup, but I’m sure they have at sometime asked for an hour off here or an hour off there to go to an appointment and been granted the time off without booking it as holiday.

In my view, it is all about give and take and in the case of the World Cup letting people be a bit patriotic for a change.

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