And that’s not corporate buzzwords from a manager? Or “facilitate the team”rather than just simply help them.
No Jane, it is not corporate speak, it’s common sense, It’s a term that has been around for ever and can be applied to anything. For example a builder, a mechanic, the guy who’s trying to fix one of our aircon units ( the answer BTW is spend 8k to have it replaced 
).
Corporate speak is at a whole different level.
It’s a way of speaking that seems to be saying something. In that you’re famiiar with the individual words used but together they just don’t seem to add up to anything. That is, it’s meaningless, opaque. You get a vague sense of what’s being referred to without anything definitive. I think it’s deliberate, a way to suggest something without commiting. There’s an inbuilt get-out clause, a deniability…
… oh, we didn’t mean that when we said ‘customer interface experience’
Try it. Take a few random words and put them together. Your human brain will try to make sense of the outcome, perhaps even visualise what it might mean, but it remains gibberish.
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Yes, the classic ‘word salad’ approach. I loath it.
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Take back control!
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Yep yep yep. That’s a good one. Encapsulate a spirit without actually specifying what it means.
I have to say I have sat in meetings in financial institutions in the City of London where Compliance Officers raising perfectly legitimate concerns were effectively told to shut up in this kind of way “bring me solutions to meet our targets not problems”.
Though I know what Roger_Lapin means - I detest managing team members who won’t get off their butt and solve and do things. I don’t mind if I have a team member who’s stroppy peovided they want to do the job because I can harness their energy and turn them in the direction needed. But those that just moan or need a fire lit under them are just energy sappers.
I’ve probably mentioned before about how my brain works and my tendency to think through decision paths quite far ahead.
The “problem” with this is that I tend to see problems (though I prefer to say hurdles) from a long way off and a certain type of manager can see this as negativity when I’m actually saving their bacon. Sometimes I have the ability to fix it, so I do (or did 
) but if I don’t then I’m escalating it to the manager who does. Good managers appreciate it, poor ones shoot the messenger.
It was a particular problem with military officers as they often didn’t have the empowerment or resources to resolve an issue but also wouldn’t escalate because they didn’t have a solution that they could bring to their boss. So “bring me solutions not problems” ends up being counter-productive and drives an ineffective culture. Part of being a manager is guiding the team in solving thorny problems otherwise why were we getting the big bucks*?
*As a civil servant, big bucks in a very theoretical sense 
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Just to update you, my wife asked Newcastle for an S1 and they directed her to apply on-line. They sent us the S1 almost immediately and we now have to take it to CPAM in Angouleme. Not sure how to handle this but I think we will have to ask for an appointment via Ameli. Angouleme is an hour’s drive for us so don’t really want to go very early in the morning and then wait forever. We’re not going to rush to do it as it’s not urgent for us as we are covered by the French from my work in France. But I will let you know if CPAM just happily accept the S1 as I would hope. I don’t believe my wife would qualify for a French pension as she only turned over a few hundred Euros/year over 3 years. She’s not going to apply for it anyway unless perhaps CPAM refuse the S1, when there would be nothing to lose.
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Thanks for the update. And do let us know how you get on with the CPAM.
CPAM won’t refuse it. An S1 is basically the UK accepting to pay France all her health costs. They’ll just register it.
I can’t work out if this means you could also claim as her dependent when you retire, or if your own record in France would preclude that.
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I’ve already retired and I have UK and French pensions. I wouldn’t be allowed to have an S1 I believe.
I am reminded that if one previously worked in France and now receive a French pension one can obtain a CDS ‘retraite’, fairly easily I think - 5 year, then a 10 year one.
Just for info.
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Just to let you know CPAM did process my wife’s S1, so thanks very much for pointing out this should work. We did it by sending the S1 by recorded delivery post to Angouleme, Then she was later asked to “mise a jour” her carte vitale. So next year on my tax return I’ll put her pension as not being liable to social charges, whereas mine continues to pay social charges as I get a French pension as well as my English pension..
Similar thing happened to me but unfortunately nobody noticed and brought it to my attention. By then it was assumed to be an evasion, rather than an honest error and the subsequent interchange was quite rude.
Don’t forget that next year as well as ticking 8SI (assuming your wife is Declarant 2, otherwise tick 8SH), you can also use box 8RC to report your wife’s share of any “revenus de capitaux mobiliers” (such as bank interest) that has NOT already been subjected to CSG/CRDS. That way the only social charge she’ll pay on it is the 7.5% prélèvement de solidarité.
I did this in May for myself, using 8RC to indicate my share of our UK bank interest. And sure enough when I checked the avis d’imposition in August, the only social charge applied to that income was the solidarity charge.
Unfortunately there’s no box for reporting your wife’s share of revenus de capitaux mobiliers that have already had CSG/CRDS deducted at source, eg French bank interest. A friend contacted the tax office and sent them French bank statements and proof of her healthcare arrangements and was reimbursed without any problem.
I have been told by someone on this forum - sorry, can’t remember who - that all this only works if you’ve opted to have your savings and investments taxed à la barème. Rather than opting for the flat tax (PFU).
That is correct if you have more than 10-years of total contributions, France plus the UK as EU pension aggregation applies; the UK continued to a signatory to the agreement after Brexit.
No, I " worked" for one year, as a student, in a French school, as part of my degree course. I received an S1 when I reached UK pensionable age in 2012 and then was amazed to automatically receive a French pension ( of €12.50 per month) four years later. I have only just discovered that this caused my S1 to be revoked in 2016, after querying my social charges at the Hôtel des Impôts, which sometimes we have been charged and sometimes not. After an investigation, I learned that I am liable due to my French pension but my partner (Pacsé) with his S1 is not.
The French pension was just paid automatically, without you having to claim it?
Does that happen often, I wonder?