Every company—from the smallest start-up to the largest firm—needs to be agile in today's market to respond to changing dynamics and new competition. But these days it's often the smaller companies who are better positioned to adapt: as the barriers to entry have decreased, emerging companies now have access to data streams—and techniques for analyzing them—that used to be the exclusive province of the largest companies. At the same time, the CIOs of larger organizations now find themselves as much bound by their legacy systems and data as they are empowered by them. The costs of managing these legacy systems are getting in the way: too much of the budget goes to maintenance, and not enough is left over for new development and technologies.

Nowhere is this dynamic more apparent than with Business Intelligence (BI). As BI once again rises to the top of priority and wish lists, CIOs are struggling with the costs of meeting internal demands while keeping within their budgets, and still finding time for innovation. The costs of proprietary servers and storage devices, as well as the space and energy to manage them, are off the charts and highly visible to every CFO, CTO and procurement professional. Proliferating copies of data into multiple one-off analytical systems—seemingly one for every question to be asked—only adds to the costs, and even new "data appliances" can cost in the tens of millions to scale up as requirements grow.

Clearly, new approaches are needed to cost-effectively scale BI systems while meeting the demand for information on the front lines. Here are some examples of how forward-looking organizations are doing large-scale analytics in the cloud to break the logjam. (For more background on the cloud technology being discussed here, see CIO.com's recent article, "Greenplum Spins 'Enterprise Data Cloud' Vision".)

1. Hold the line with commodity hardware.

2. Buy capacity when you need it, not according to a closed appliance size

3. Unused server power is a priceless resource -- use it.

4. Keep asking, keep changing -- and keep the data.

By shifting their data warehouse into an agile, virtualized infrastructure, T-Mobile now has flexible access to more data and can analyze and rethink at will. Like Fox, they're able to build analytical "sandboxes" on-demand to discover new questions. Grab data to explore those questions. Tear it down, and do it again. Data is the other element of the "cloud;" keep it where you need it, and use as appropriate.

5. Run programs "close to the data."

Exploiting information has become an imperative for all businesses, and this continues to become even more important as data growth accelerates and new streams of precious information emerge. Supporting the teams who will provide agile response is a competitive necessity.

Merv Adrian is principal at consulting firm IT Market Strategy.

Source: http://www.cio.com/article/495019/Analytics_in_the_Cloud_Lessons_Learned_

Web-based applications are not uncommon any more. Due to its easy access, many people are now moving towards these applications. Doc Verse is such an easy web-based application that enables users to work on group power point presentations. The best thing about DocVerse is that this software would not create any problem with the existing software on your computer. The software developed by DocVerse is a plug-in software that syncs with your MS Office (any office version starting from 2003). You would not need to buy any extra-software. Though in the testing phase, the software is very easy to install and use. If you have a group power-point assignment and it is hard for group members to sit together to work on it, then download DocVerse, install it on your computers and start working immediately from your homes.

I came to know about DocVerse from a report of Tech Crunch and then I became interested to do an interview. I contacted them by email and Shan Sinha (CEO/Founder) was kind enough to answer all my questions. Here is the interview for the readers:

Razib Ahmed: The economic recession is going strong and all business organizations, big and small, are desperate to save money and cut-costs. Now, is the best time to start-up your own web-based applications because people would look into them. In such a situation, you went after developing plug-in for Microsoft. Why did you go for developing a plug-in application?

Shan Sinha: To be clear, our product includes a plug-in as a means to an end. It’s important to realize that whether your application is a desktop application or a web-based application is less important than focusing on building a great product that people will use. In our particular case, the problem with most collaboration software is that they don’t adapt to how people work and instead ask people to adapt to the software. Most people start by creating documents on their desktop. As soon as they have to take an extra step to “put” the document somewhere else on the web, you’ve lost them.

Integrating into Microsoft Office lets our users seamlessly take advantage of web-based functionality without having to change how they work.

Razib Ahmed: Do you have any plans to start-up your own web-based application in near future?

Shan Sinha: We already have a web-based tool that people can use to view, share and provide feedback on their documents. We view our product as harmonizing the benefits of web-based applications with software that 90% of people have on their desktop.

Razib Ahmed: Some people are saying that online office suits would replace Microsoft office software. Is it possible? What do you think about it?

Shan Sinha: I view web-based Office applications as a complement to desktop applications. People should be able to share, edit and access their documents however they like. If that means someone needs to share and edit their document on their desktop, they should be able to do that. If someone needs to share and edit their document through the browser, they should be able to do that. Regardless of where those edits are made or who makes those edits, they should be able to get the latest version of their document any time, by simply opening it.
Think of it like email. Sometimes I access my email using Outlook or any other client on my desktop (for example, on a plane). Sometimes I access my email through a web browser. But I haven’t completely thrown away either one.. I use both, whenever it makes sense to do so.

Razib Ahmed: Do you think that the high demand of web-based applications will only stay throughout the recession? Will the demand of web-based applications drop after the recession ends?

Shan Sinha: I think you are creating a false choice between web-based applications and desktop applications. What people care about is whether a product solves their problems or not. What IT managers care about is reducing their cost and management overhead.
The web is simply a software distribution mechanism. The applications that people demand are those that provide the maximal benefits by solving their problems in the best way possible while minimizing the difficulty and cost of using the application.
As a thought experiment.. I assure you that a web based application that requires you to fill out 10 pages of forms to register will have worse usage than a product that requires a very light weight install and no registration process.
People don’t care about whether something is coming from the web or is on the desktop. All they care about is whether it’s easy to use and does something that makes their lives better.

Razib Ahmed: Currently, you are working on developing plug-in applications for MS Powerpoint. Do you have any plans extend the function of this plug in to support other MS office programs?

Shan Sinha: We will be releasing support for the entire Office 2007 suite (Word & Excel) later this spring and will also be expanding support to Office 2003 soon after.

Razib Ahmed: In third world countries, many people use the pirated version of MS office. If they install the DocVerse plug-in, will it create any problem for them?

Shan Sinha: Our licensing agreements remain separate from the licensing agreements for Microsoft software. We are not sure if unlicensed Microsoft software supports our plug-in.

Razib Ahmed: When are you going to release the fully developed DocVerse?

Shan Sinha: As I mentioned, we will be releasing support for the rest of Office 2007 and Office 2003 in the coming months. We will make our product generally available when we feel that it is ready for general usage.

Razib Ahmed: One of the major applicants and beneficiaries of such web-based applications are school and university level students? Do you have any plans to develop web-based software targeting the student community?

Shan Sinha: Our product is very well suited to be used by students. We already have students in several campuses using our product. One great example includes how MBA students at HarvardBusiness School and University of Michigan School of Business have already begun using our product in a significant way.

Razib Ahmed: Currently, Microsoft office is also used in mobile phones. Do you have any plans to develop a version of DocVerse for Office mobile?

Shan Sinha: We have no immediate plans to support Windows Mobile but would be open to hearing customer demand for it, and if it is large enough, we will build it.

Razib Ahmed: Can you tell us a bit about your background and about your company?

Shan Sinha: My co-founder and I left Microsoft in October of 2007 to start DocVerse after recognizing an opportunity to change the way people work with each other. We ended up raising our first round of funding in the summer of 2008. We released our first product in Feb of 2009 and are now growing quickly.
Before DocVerse, my co-founder and I were both at Microsoft, doing product strategy for SharePoint and SQL Server. Prior to Microsoft, I started a mobile enterprise applications company, which we successfully sold in 2001. And before that, I started my career at another health care, dot com start up. I did my undergrad and master’s degrees in Computer Science at MIT. I was born and raised in the US and currently live in San Francisco.

Source: http://www.southasiablog.com/2009/06/interview-of-shan-sinha-ceo-and-founder.html

That seems to be the question these days in the age of Twitter. Because Twitter only allows 140 characters per tweet, it is a good idea to use an URL shortener to save as much space as possible.

And there are a lot of good services out there that will not only allow you to shorten your URL, but even track how many clicks came through the shortened web address. TinyURL and bit.ly are among the best URL shorteners. And if you really want to get fancy, you can use awe.sm to customize your shortened URL, though it will set you back $99 a year.

One important but often overlooked feature of these services is the type of redirect. The 301 redirect tells Google the page has moved permanently, which means Google will count the link as pointing to the actual destination. This is important if you are posting a link to an article as it effects search engine optimization (SEO).

Perhaps the best question is whether or not you should be shortening the URL in the first place. Using one of these services is great for posting links on Twitter. After all, the standard URL will take up most of your message if not shortened. And they can be great for sending a link through email when the full URL might get cut off. They are perfect for Facebook updates and instant messages.

But that's about where they should stop. Occassionally, I'll see a blog or an article use a shortened URL as a link rather than the full web address. Heck, I've even seen this done on the New York Times website.

Here's the problem: there is no guarantee that a year from now that URL shortener is going to be around. Right now, they are all the rage with Twitter's popularity going through the roof, but don't expect all of them to be around for years and years. And what's going to happen to all of those links when the company is no longer around? Those 301 redirects turn into 404 page not founds.

So if you are writing a tweet, go for it. But for blog posts, articles and basic web content, stick with the full web address.

Source:  http://webtrends.about.com/b/2009/06/11/to-url-shorten-or-not-to-url-shorten.htm

Yesterday's Buzz article featured the results of the survey by Fenwick & West entitled "Trends in Terms of Venture Financings In Silicon Valley (First Quarter 2009)" by Barry Kramer and Michael Patrick.  Today we are pleased to be joined by Michael Patrick, Partner at Fenwick & West.  Along with co-authoring his firm's quarterly survey, Michael focuses on venture capital financings representing both companies and venture capital firms, mergers and acquisitions and general corporate representation for a broad array of high technology companies in the information technology, life science and medical device industries. To view the entire Fenwick & West survey, or to sign up to receive the survey on a quarterly basis when published, please go to www.fenwick.com/vctrends.htm.

Michael, your recently released venture financings survey results offer both optimism and gloom. Will you give us your overall impression of the results of this survey?

The first quarter of 2009 was probably the worst quarter for the VC environment in a long time. It's the first time since the fourth quarter of 2003 that we've seen down rounds exceed up rounds and the first time since we started tracking valuation change data in 2004 that we've seen a decrease in the average change in valuations for companies receiving financing compared to their prior financing round. Having said that, there were some rays of hope. We saw that the percentage of up rounds did increase month by month over the first quarter. But it's too early to tell if this will continue.

The Silicon Valley Venture Capitalists Confidence Index reports the confidence level of Silicon Valley VCs at 3.03 on a 5 point scale, indicating an increase from 4Q08's reading of 2.77. As this is the first increase in the index in six quarters, should this number give us confidence that we are starting to see a turnaround in the VC industry?

It's hard to tell. As I noted earlier, there have been a few rays of hope in the venture financing numbers. But the increase in confidence levels in the VC survey may primarily be a reaction to macroeconomic developments. Major banks appear to have stabilized and the Nasdaq seems to be improving. This increased confidence may be more the result of people concluding that the general economy has finally hit the bottom and won't get worse, rather than concluding that the recovery is imminent. It could still be quite some time before the economy starts to recover.

We are hearing a lot these days about declining valuations, and your survey confirms this notion with down rounds exceeding up rounds 46% to 25%. This was the first time since 4Q03 that down rounds exceeded up rounds, and the largest amount by which down rounds exceeded up rounds since 1Q03. Do you feel that lower valuations are being driven by lack of competition among VCs, declining public company comparables, lack of an IPO exit option or all of the above?

I don't think there's a lack of competition among VCs. There are plenty of VCs in the market with money to invest in the right opportunities. But valuations have been driven down by macroeconomic concerns, reduced public company comparables and probably also by soft messages from limited partners to the VCs asking them not to be aggressive in making investments and capital calls right now. Certainly, a lack of liquidity events is an important factor in valuations. It means that VCs have to hold more of their funds in reserve for their companies that can't get liquid and because those companies can't get liquid the VC's have less time and resources to focus on earlier stage and new companies. Outside of life science companies, I think much of the focus right now has to do with who a company's customers are and whether, because of current economic conditions, the risks of those customers not buying a new company's products have gone up.

The Fenwick & West Venture Capital Barometer showed an average price decrease of 3% for companies receiving venture capital in 1Q09 compared to such companies' prior financing round, the first decrease since you began reporting the Barometer in 1Q04. Do you feel that there is a lag between corrections in the economy and private company valuations?

There probably is some lag. As the economy contracts, there are consequences that follow that take a bit of time to be felt, kind of like falling dominos. Banking crises trigger stock market drops, that affect consumer spending, that lead to reduced demand, that lead to layoffs, thus triggering further reductions in consumer spending, and so on. As I described earlier, venture valuations are influenced by these factors, albeit indirectly, and so it makes sense that there's a lag effect between general economic conditions and valuations.

Do you believe your survey results confirm the theory that the current lack of competition among investors gives VCs the ability to demand more favorable terms on their investments?

As I said before, I don't think there's a lack of competition. But it is true that VCs are being careful in how they invest their money right now. Their existing portfolio companies need more money to get through the bad times and the limited partners are likely encouraging the VCs to limit the size and frequency of capital calls right now. The bar has definitely been raised and it is certainly harder for companies to raise money. So it's not surprising that terms of investments are also getting a little more protective of the investors.

Your prior surveys have indicated the significant quarterly losses and gains in particular industries. Such specific industry information is not mentioned in your latest survey results other than to say that "the decline in investment was across all industries." Can you shed any light on trends that you are seeing in specific industries?

While the main trend was that all industries are down, it appears that in the last quarter cleantech companies were particularly hard hit, maybe because those companies are in a relatively new space where it's harder to predict future demand and there have already been significant amounts of investment in them. VCs may want to wait for awhile to see how economic conditions develop before investing significant additional amounts in cleantech. Life science companies seemed to be the least affected, which may be in part due to the fact that demand for their products, when they come to market, aren't as affected by gyrations in the overall economy. In addition, outside of life science companies, our anecdotal information suggests that those businesses that need less cash and are closer to break even have better chances of getting funded, presumably because they demand less of a VC's available funds and they represent less of a risk of needing more later.

Your report reminds us that there were no IPOs of venture-backed companies in the U. S. in 1Q09 while there have been two venture-backed IPOs to date in 2Q09. Your survey also points out that Nasdaq was down 3% in 1Q09 but is up over 10% in 2Q09 through May 26, 2009. Can we read any kind of trend or indication of a turnaround in these numbers?

Given the depth and breadth of the overall downturn in our economy, I think it's early to read too much into an upturn in Nasdaq and two IPOs. Solar Wind, one of the two companies that went public, is a 10-year-old company and profitable. Open Table, which was the other, is a relatively mature company that has been in business for eleven years and, although it had a loss in the fourth quarter, did report a swing to profitability in the first quarter. So it's not clear that the IPO market is likely to open to a broader array of companies. But these IPOs and the lift in the Nasdaq are positive signs and do make it easier for acquirers to consider increasing acquisition activities and for consumers to spend more.

As has been noted in your previous survey results, the downturn in the economy has shaped venture financing terms. It is becoming more common to see downside protection such as multiple liquidation preference, redemption rights, more aggressive anti-dilution rights and 'pay-to-play' provisions. Will you comment on the trends you are seeing in this area and how it is affecting VCs as well as founders and management?

Clearly, deal terms have gotten tougher in this downturn. But they aren't nearly as tough as the terms we saw after the dot. com bubble burst. After that bubble burst, lots of hard terms had to be imposed to correct for the excesses of the boom. The good news is that the VC and entrepreneur communities learned from that experience and so didn't repeat many of the excesses of the dot. com era. As a result, the corrections we're seeing now are much less dramatic. I don't think the downside protections we're now seeing dramatically change the risks and rewards for VCs, founders or management. The most important determinant of the outcomes of VC investments for all parties continues to be what the company achieves, not what downside protection terms are negotiated in the financing.

Michael, we thank you for your time and for sharing your insight into the survey results.

Source: http://vcexperts.com/vce/news/buzz/archive_view.asp?id=680&referrer=rss

(Newswire.net -- February 20, 2013) Milton Keynes, UK -- Employment compromise agreements are in the main legal documents for the benefit of the employer since they serve as a safeguard that the employee will not sue the employer at the end of the contract.

That being the case, it is in the employees interest to ensure that they negotiate a decent settlement since they will be giving up certain employment rights by entering into an employment compromise agreement.

With that in mind here are some of cogent factors that may be used when coming up with persuasive arguments to negotiate a better severance deal.


Is There a Dismissal Without Notice?

An employer may dismiss an employee without notice if there are strong grounds to do so, such as in circumstances of gross misconduct.

An employer may also bring a contract to an end where the contract of employment expressly permits a termination of the contract without notice, allowing the employer instead to pay a sum in lieu of the notice period.

If the contract of employment is silent on the point, an employer that seeks to dismiss without notice will in effect be in breach of contract. However, since the loss to the employee is the salary that they would have earned during the notice period, the employer may simply remedy this breach by paying the employer for the notice period.

The end result is the same for the employer, however from a tax point of view the payment in the latter case is defined as a "compensation payment" from a HM Revenue & Customs perspective on compromise agreements and is subject to the £30,000 tax exemption.

Are There Restrictive Covenants?

Many employment compromise agreements contain post termination restrictions such as a non-competition clause to prevent an employee from directly or indirectly setting up business in competition with the employer. Or to prevent an employee from working directly with a competitor, whether in an employed or self-employed capacity.

If the restrictive covenant simply restates what is already contained in the employee's contract of employment, then there is little leverage that can be used here for negotiating better terms.

If however, the employer is seeking to either extend the restriction in some way beyond what is currently in the employment contract or to include a restriction that is not covered by the contract of employment, an employee will have a good case to argue for an increase to the severance package on offer.

For more senior employees, such restrictions may present more of a restraint on that employee's ability to find alternative employment and with that being the case have more room to argue for a higher level of compensation.

Agreeing a Written Employment Reference

There is no legal requirement for an employer to give a reference and if one is provided it need only be factual in nature.

In circumstances where the relationship between the employer and employee are not at their best or where the employee has some concern, either that the employer won't give a good reference, or refuse it give any reference at all, it would be sensible for the employee to request that the wording of a written reference be agreed as part of the terms of the compromise agreement.

Often overlooked in compromise agreements, written references can be the difference between getting selected for that next employment opportunity or not. So if an employees has any concerns about this, then its best to err on the side of caution and include it within the terms of the compromise agreement.

Dismissal without notice, adding restrictive covenants beyond current employment contract terms and obtaining an agreeable reference are three of the most common negotiating terms in compromise agreements.

If you are interested in finding out some more persuasive arguments to negotiating better terms of compromise agreement, you can read our editorial entitled Compromise Agreement Legal Advice - 3 More Persuasive Arguments.

For more on compromise agreement legal advice, including answers to some of the most commonly asked questions on employment compromise agreements, you can go over to www.cardonaandco.co.uk/compromiseagreement or contact the writer using the contact details below.

(Newswire.net -- February 20, 2013) Milton Keynes, UK -- In the previous part 2 to this Compromise Agreement Legal Advice editorial series, we revealed three common factors and arguments that are frequently used to negotiate more favourable terms to a compromise agreement.

In this final editorial we take a look at 3 more highly persuasive factors that can assist employees to negotiate better compromise agreement terms.

Employee's Existing Contractual Benefits

Employees that have generous employment benefits tied into their contracts of employment, will want to receive fair compensation for the loss of these benefits on the termination of contract.

Employees will want to ensure that they are at least receiving fair monetary compensation for these additional fringe benefits up to the date of termination and covering the notice period.

And if the employment is being terminated under dubious circumstances, for example, the employer has tenuous grounds for dismissal, then an employee should certainly factor into the negotiations, not just compensation for loss of future earnings while they look for a replacement job, but also the loss of contractual fringe benefits, as these can quickly add up, not least of which are contractual bonus payments.

Also consider whether the employer is prepared to offer outplacement support which are specialist support services designed to help you move from your existing role into finding a new job role. This can certainly be helpful in speeding up the processing in finding a new position as these support services tend to be tailored around an individual employee's specific needs.


The Existence of a Potential Employment Claim

For a dismissal to be lawful the dismiss must be for one of 6 "fair reasons" as specified in section 98 of the Employment Rights Act 1996.

Where an employer seeks to terminate an employment contract in breach of UK employment laws and regulations, or where a compromise agreement is being used by an employer to settle an ongoing dispute with an employee, an employee will often find that there is more room for negotiation to obtain better terms of severance.

Many employees will often allow for some flexibility in their negotiations on the severance package offered if only to path the way for a smoother exist of that employee.


Tax Liability

Severance packages up to £30,000 are potentially exempt from income tax.

However, only payments that relate to "compensation for loss of employment" are included within this tax exemption.

Any payments made by an employer to comply with an employee's contractual entitlements such as notice pay, bonus pay, monies for accrued holiday, are not "compensatory" in nature and are therefore treated by HM Revenue & Customs as income subject to tax.

If the circumstances allow it, an employee may seek to bundle more of the severance pay as "compensation" in order to use up more of the tax exemption. In a previous editorial we looked in detail at compromise agreement tax liability, which would be a good place to start if you need more information on this.

Use as many of the 6 factors that are relevant and that we outlined in this compromise agreement legal advice editorial series to negotiate with your employer an improvement in the financial terms of severance.

If you're looking for more on compromise agreement legal advice, including answers to some of the most commonly asked questions on employment compromise agreements, you can go over to the writer's website at http://www.cardonaandco.co.uk/compromiseagreement or you can contact the writer, who is a specialist employment compromise agreement solicitor, by using the contact information below.

(Newswire.net via Emailwire.com -- February 22, 2013) Las Vegas, NV -- Pain management physicians take care of people that are in acute or chronic pain.

In a recent interview, Dr. Alain Coppel, MD, chairman of the Nevada Comprehensive Pain Center in Las Vegas, explained the difference between them this way:

“Acute pain may be anything from post-surgical pain to an acute injury on a soccer field, at work or with a motor vehicle accident. Chronic pain is defined as pain that lasts several months or more. It may crop up as persistent pain after an injury heals, or arise as a debilitating symptom of long-term diseases like arthritis, diabetes or cancer”.

Often, Dr. Coppel said, primary care physicians can prescribe medications but when it gets to a certain dose or a certain frequency they may leave it up to pain management physicians to actually incorporate the medication management. The reason for this is that high dose medication management or frequent medication management can lead to significant side effects as well as to the potential for addiction and dependence on the medications. "We as pain management physicians are better trained to be able to manage the medications and to be able to look for somebody with risk factors or the red flags that may be associated with a dependency on the medications or an addiction to the medications".

 According to statistics there are 116 million U.S. chronic pain sufferers.

Pain specialists have traditionally treated symptoms as individual units that are not talking to each other.

"We look at the whole person because there are a lot of the things that sometimes can prevent someone from getting better. Those things could be poor muscle strength posture, for instance smoking, uncontrolled diabetes that can lead to less than optimal outcomes in terms of pain management. So we just don't address the specific thing that may be causing the pain but other factors that may be contributing to the sensation of pain and the sensation of suffering as well", said Dr. Coppell.

He continued saying: "I think the comprehensive approach comes from being trained at a large University like Johns Hopkins. At Johns Hopkins we incorporated psychological care, surgical care, medication management with pharmacists, social workers and things like that and we noticed that the best outcomes in every patient were when this whole comprehensive model was actually utilized".

Dr. Coppel also noted that physical therapy can help pain because oftentimes the pain itself can lead to range of motion abnormalities and that can also translate into more pain and more suffering and more limitations in the things that patients may want to be able to do. "By incorporating physical therapy we are able to bring in some of the range of motion we are able to re-program the spinal cord we are also able to program the muscles to be able to function better", said Dr. Coppel.

You can see the full interview segments here:

www.youtube.com/user/nvcpc/videos?view=0

You can visit Dr. Coppel on the web at:

www.nvcpc.com

Nevada Comprehensive Pain Center has the following Pain management clinics in Las Vegas, NV

Article posted by Sergio Chavez

(Newswire.net -- February, 27  2013) Milton Keynes, UK -- Employees facing the prospect of an uncertain period of unemployment when presented with an employment compromise agreement will frequently have one core concern, how much?

However, from this 3 questions frequently emerge:

1. How much am I entitled to?
2. How much will it cost to obtain legal advice?
3. How much tax will I need to pay on the severance package?

We'll take a look at each of these in turn so that an employee faced with impending loss of employment may have a better understanding of where he or she stands financially.

1. Compromise Agreement - How Much Am I Entitled To?

How much an employee is financially entitled to depends on the circumstances and reasons for the proposed termination of the employment contract.

As with many employment law related issues, there is no one answer fits all and this editorial is intended to simply give some guidance on the potential values of severance pay.

Broadly speaking, the amount that an employee may be legally entitled to depends on 2 broad factors regarding the termination.

i. Was the dismissal for a "fair reason", or
ii. Was the dismissal for an "unfair reason"

Examples of fair reasons are redundancy, a lack of capability to do one's job, serious misconduct or an accumulation of instances of bad behaviour, organisational restructuring, a fundamental breach of an employer's terms and conditions of employment such as criminal activity and many more.

Unfair reason include such things as selecting a person for redundancy using unfair or subjective selection criteria; deciding to end a person's contract in breach of discrimination laws; ending a contract for conduct or capability without any formal disciplinary procedures excluding acts that may amount to gross misconduct; and many other situations.

The distinction is important from a negotiating perspective since an employee facing loss of employment for unfair reasons, will have a stronger negotiating position than an employee who is dismissed for a fair reason, for example redundancy.

Generally, employees being dismissed for a fair reason will only be entitled to pay and other contractual benefits up to the end of their notice period. How much notice will vary from employee to employee.

The law prescribes a minimum amount of notice of 1 week if the employee has been employed for at least 4 weeks and an additional week's notice for each year after the second year of employment, with a maximum of 12 weeks notice for employment of 12 years or more.

However, employees should review their own contractual terms as these may provide a more generous period of notice than the statutory minimum prescribed by law.

There are however, two exceptions to the general rule that employees dismissed for a fair reason are only entitled to notice and pay (plus any other contractual entitlements) during the notice period.

1. Gross Misconduct

In circumstances of dismissal for gross misconduct an employee is not entitled to any notice as he is deemed to be in serious breach of contract.

2. Redundancy

The second exception relates to redundancy, which whilst a fair reason for dismissal, the law provides additional protection by prescribing a minimum amount of redundancy pay in addition to notice and pay during notice.

To calculate statutory redundancy pay, rather than set out here the mathematical formula for working out basic redundancy pay, since it will depend on a number of employee specific factors, simply head over to the Government's website, where you will find a simple 4-step process for calculating statutory minimum redundancy pay.

However, an employee should check with the employee to see if it operates its own contractual redundancy scheme. Company redundancy schemes tend to be more generous than the statutory redundancy and in such circumstances, the employee would be entitled to the enhanced benefit of a company run redundancy scheme.

Compromise Agreement Pay & Unfair Reasons for Dismissal

As a general rule, if an employee suspects that the reason for dismissal are not fair and there is strong documentary evidence to support a potential claim for unfair dismissal, in these circumstances an employee is more likely to have a stronger negotiating hand.

Potential Value in Instances of Unfair Reasons for Dismissal?

To assess the potential value, a solicitor will treat the case similar to a claim for damages for unfair dismissal, which is made up of a basic award and a compensatory award.

The basic award is simply the equivalent of basic statutory redundancy pay.

The compensatory award is an approximation of actual loss and future loss of income of the employee caused by the unfair termination of employment. And as a general rule compensation equivalent to 4-6 months pay is considered a decent settlement for loss of employment.

In addition to this an employee will also be entitled to notice pay and all other contractual entitlements to the end of the notice period.

In part 2, we take a look at 2 more frequently asked questions:

1. How much will it cost to get legal help with a compromise agreement; and

2. How much tax is due on a compromise agreement settlement?

In the meantime, you can find more information and answers to frequently asked question on employment compromise agreements at http://www.cardonaandco.co.uk/compromiseagreement.