By Tom Hadley

So there I was, rolling into the BBC’s shiny new mother-ship in Portland Place on a fast and fluid Friday night after three pints of Belgian lager and an impromptu briefing session with some old friends from the green pastures of Sussex University.

The opportunity came up to do an interview for BBC World on the back of changes to employment law in Germany and how this compared to other countries. The press team said “you’d be on about 9.30pm GMT, what do you reckon”? I said “kein problem, das ist in Ordnung mit mir”!

I get to Broadcasting House – a shimmering West End space-ship that was radically revamped at an estimated coast of £990 million – nice and early via a sobering double espresso pit-stop in Leon’s on Regent’s Street. Haven’t done an interview here for a while, love what they’ve done to the place. I am shown to the waiting room by a knackered young researcher at the tail-end of a 14 hour shift.

BBC World News is watched in over 100 countries with a worldwide audience of 100 million plus. It certainly seems to have been available in every overseas hotel I have ever stayed in. As I am escorted to the set, I suddenly get visions of people watching in their underwear in hotel rooms around the world. Distracting…

The presenter is the jovial Jamie Robertson who gives me a quick hello before wrapping up a piece on escalating onion prices in India. We’re up next. The story is essentially about a new law in Germany making prohibiting employers from contacting staff by phone or by email after 9pm in the evening. The angle they are looking for comment on is why such restrictions are deemed necessary and whether we likely to see similar developments in other countries.

The introductory ‘montage’ fades out, Jamie turns to another guest being beamed in by satellite from New York (this is BBC World after all, just the one guest from High Barnet just wouldn’t cut it!). The feedback from the US is that the kind of regulatory response seen in Germany would be greeted with as much bemusement in the US as cricket in Central Park.

My turn now, the theme is different working cultures and how workplace dynamics have evolved over the years. I make a few well rehearsed points about how traditional time and location boundaries have disappeared and about how people choose work ‘rythms’ that suit them best. I also throw in a few ramblings about people taking pride in their work and about how corporate culture – not just national cultures – plays a major role.

The reality is that different sectors and employers will have a different approach to working arrangements and the way people are managed. This brought me onto the main point I was trying to get across – that a rigid regulatory response as seen in Germany would be unthinkable in many other countries and that good management (and self-management) were the key factors at play.Jamie finishes with a humorous flurry about it already being way past 9pm here in the UK and yet we’re both still at it. I say “yes, and I’m expecting a call from my boss any minute”. We chortle a little before Jamie moves onto a piece about the US open and I’m ushered off the set.

I emerge into the night time throng. People scurry around in their Friday night fineries, heading to pubs and clubs seemingly oblivious to the employment law changes in Germany. What can you do? Over a recuperative Guinness at ‘The George’ on Great Titchfield Street (decent pint) I reflect on what I said and what I should have said. Got a few decent points over I guess, good to fling some messages out over the global airwaves.

Job done, time to head back to the high life of High Barnet. That’s one way to spend a Friday night…

 

For more on this story go to:

http://tomhadley.wordpress.com/2013/09/05/bbc-world/