Backing singers

As BBC HR boss Valerie Hughes D'Aeth storms the organisation with her Terms & Conditions Roadshow (think Adele with a little less swearing and no songs), observers have noted a gap at her side.

Orla Tierney, Val's Head of Employee Relations and Reward for the past two years, is now on a "sabbatical" until August, according to her Linkedin page. Presumably she's exhausted after delivering the BBC six market-aligned broad bands with market-focussed job pay ranges across 25 job families. (Cynics, however, suggest the scheme looks very much like the old "MyPay" project, put in the too-difficult box by former Director General Mark Thompson, as he ducked anything that might look bad on his CV til he secured the New York Times gig.)

Orla's absence might mean we'll never know where her salary landed in the new structure. Her consulting company, Mind The Gap, has last-reported assets of £300k. Will she feature in the forthcoming Annual Report on the list of talent-paid-more-than-£150k ?

In the world of HR silver linings, Orla's absence seems to mean further preferment for Dale Haddon, formerly of the Post Office and BBC News, already on £191k.