For employers · Operational map · Frame, not advice
Independent. No referral fees. No financial interest in any treatment provider, broker or insurer. Author: James Roberts.
This page is for the person who has just been told. An HR Director, in-house counsel, a chief of staff, a managing partner, an occupational health lead, or the employment lawyer being briefed on a Sunday evening. It is not legal advice and it is not a clinical opinion. It is the moving parts on one page so that the calls you do make are made with the picture in front of you.
The 24-hour brief
What an HR Director, in-house counsel or chief of staff usually has to clarify within the first day:
- Who has been told what. Inside the firm. Outside the firm. In writing.
- Whether the employee is at work today. Driving. With clients. Holding regulated responsibilities.
- Whether anyone is at risk right now. Colleague, client, member of the public, the employee themselves.
- Whether the firm has an immediate notification duty. Regulator, insurer, board, audit committee.
- Who is the right internal owner. HR Director / People Partner / GC / Managing Partner.
- Whether occupational health has seen them in the last twelve months.
This is not a checklist to send to the employee. It is a checklist for the person making the call.
The evidence frame
Before any process starts, the firm's record of what is known and how it is known will matter more than people expect. Three habits, started early, save months later.
- Keep allegation, observation and opinion separate. "X said Y about Z" is not the same as "I saw Z slurring at the 3pm meeting" is not the same as "I think Z has a problem". Note which is which.
- Record dates, incidents, and who reported them. Time-stamped. By the person who saw it, where possible.
- Assume any note may later be disclosed. Internal email, Slack, Teams, WhatsApp, handwritten meeting notes — disclosable in a tribunal, a regulatory enquiry or a civil claim. Write accordingly. There is rarely a good reason to put speculation in writing.
This is not a substitute for legal advice on the firm's specific record-keeping duties. It is the operational habit a calm HR function adopts as a matter of course.
The legal frame
The page names the statutes and concepts that almost always sit underneath the decision. It does not give advice on any of them. Take the names to an employment lawyer.
- Equality Act 2010. Addiction to alcohol is excluded from the protected characteristic of disability (Schedule 1, Para 1, Reg 3 of the Equality Act 2010 (Disability) Regulations 2010). However, conditions caused by the addiction — liver disease, depression, anxiety — can themselves be disabilities. The exclusion is narrower than people assume.
- Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974. Section 2 covers the duty to colleagues. Section 3 covers the duty to people not employed by the firm — clients, members of the public. An employee impaired at work who harms a third party can put the firm in scope.
- Capability vs. conduct. The same behaviour — missed deadlines, slurred speech in a meeting, a missed flight — can be framed as a capability matter, which leads to support, occupational health and possible adjustment, or a conduct matter, which leads to a disciplinary process. How the matter is framed in the first 24 hours often shapes everything that follows. It is rarely a neutral choice.
- Suspension is a holding move, not a verdict. It buys the firm time to investigate without the employee being at work. It is also visible to colleagues and is therefore a reputation event in its own right. ACAS guidance on suspension applies.
One sentence in plain English: these sit on the same desk at the same time. An employment lawyer will help you decide which one is the right starting point for this case.
The clinical frame
A senior employee with a suspected alcohol problem is rarely the right person to assess their own drinking, and the firm is not the right body to do it either. Independent clinical assessment exists for this — usually a one-to-one consultation with an addiction physician or psychiatrist, paid for by the firm or the employee, that produces a written opinion the firm can act on without being accused of acting on rumour.
Examples of providers who do this kind of independent assessment in the UK include UKAT, Castle Craig, the Priory and Smarmore Castle. The point is not the brand. The point is that an independent clinical opinion can move the conversation from suspicion to evidence.
An independent assessment of this kind sits at the consultancy end of clinical work; residential admission, if it follows, is a separate question with its own cost band. Pricing confirmed at launch.
The treatment frame
If the employee accepts that they have a problem, the firm has a narrow set of options:
- Time off for treatment. Residential rehab is usually 28 days. Outpatient is longer and cheaper.
- Who pays. The firm, the employee, private medical insurance — sometimes; most policies have alcohol exclusions or sub-limits — or a partnership drawing.
- Return-to-work. Phased, supervised, with or without random testing, with or without role change. The terms are negotiated, not standard.
- Confidentiality inside the firm. Almost always imperfect. People notice 28 days of absence.
This page does not negotiate any of those for the firm. It names them so the right person can.
If the firm is paying for the admission and wants an independent shortlist before instructing, the Clinic Compare Brief is the cold-state equivalent of this page. Seventy-two hours, three to five UK clinics compared specifically against the employee's situation. Same independence rules: no broker fees, no commission, no clinic placement money. Pricing confirmed at launch.
When others may need to be told
Some of the duties on this desk are internal. A handful are external, time-bound, and not optional. The reportable thresholds people most often forget:
- FCA SMCR (financial services). Senior Manager fitness and propriety. SMF holders. Conduct rule breaches by certified staff. Regulatory references on exit. Notification windows are short.
- SRA (solicitors). Duty to report serious breaches. Duty of candour. The regulator's view of alcohol problems in fee-earners has shifted in the last five years and is no longer purely punitive, but the notification duty has not gone away.
- GMC (doctors), GDC (dentists), other professional regulators. Health procedures exist. They are slow and not always kind, but they exist, and the duty to refer rests with the firm as well as the practitioner.
- Professional Indemnity insurer. Most PI policies require notification of a "circumstance which may give rise to a claim". An impaired senior employee with client-facing work is often that circumstance. Late notification can void cover. Read the policy before assuming silence is safe.
- Audit committee / non-executive directors. Often have a standing right to be told about events involving senior people. A failure to brief them can become its own governance issue.
If any of these apply, the lawyer call is not optional and it is not next week.
The reputation frame
The reputation calculation — separate from the regulatory duties above — is the one HR cannot make alone. It usually involves the GC, the Managing Partner or CEO, sometimes the comms team, sometimes the board. There is no checklist for it. There is only the question of who in the firm has the standing to make it, and whether they have been told.
If they have not been told yet, that is the next call.
What this page won't do
- It will not tell you whether to suspend.
- It will not tell you whether to notify a regulator.
- It will not write the letter to the employee.
- It will not make the call to the partners' room.
- It will give you the moving parts on one page, in plain English, in twenty minutes, so the calls you do make are made with the picture in front of you.
Application only · 8–12 page PDF · Five working days · Pricing confirmed at launch
Confidential Containment Brief
A senior executive is drinking. You have been told.
You have a duty of care, a regulatory threshold, and a reputation to manage.
This is the written reconciliation: one briefing, three tracks, five days.
Independent, confidential containment for the firm's leadership.
The intake terminal above frames the next 72 hours and is the right starting point for most firms. For partnerships and HNW firms that need the same reconciliation work as a written, signed PDF — confidential, on letterhead, suitable for the partnership file or instructed counsel — the Confidential Containment Brief is application-only. Pricing confirmed at launch.
One firm, one affected party, one document. 8–12 pages. Five working days from acceptance. No retainer, no commission, no white-label arrangement with any EAP, insurer or law firm. Independence is the product.
Every brief carries a Page 1 validity header naming the date of preparation and stating that the brief expires as a basis for action ninety days from that date. There is no renewal product, no refresh tier, no annual subscription. The expiry is structural protection for both parties; if the matter persists past the window, the firm instructs fresh advice.
Sample brief — redacted
An anonymised but realistic fact pattern: Tier-1 City law firm, Equity Partner, alcohol pattern visible to junior staff, regulator named generically as the firm's regulator. Watermarked SAMPLE on every page. Source notes redacted to category. Real briefs name the regulator, threshold and citation directly.
Download the sample (PDF, 11 pages)What this brief is, and is not
- It is the written reconciliation between the firm's regulatory duty, disciplinary process, and clinical duty of care, on one PDF, with named hand-offs and a five-or-six-step sequence for the next 30 days.
- It is not legal advice, clinical advice, HR advice, or crisis communications. It is the operational map that lets instructed counsel, OH and the partnership work from the same picture.
- It will be declined and refunded before money changes hands if the affected party is in acute clinical risk; if the firm is asking the brief to ratify a decision already taken; if the matter is in active litigation; if the buyer is the affected party presented as the firm; or if the regulator has already been notified and the timeline is operational hours, not days. Expect a decline rate of 40–50%.
Apply for a Containment Brief
James reads every application personally within one working day. Successful applicants receive a Stripe Payment Link; declined applications receive a written decline-and-route note that names the network's intake terminal, NHS lines if acute, the firm's own occupational health provider and the firm's instructed counsel — no named private clinical units, by independence policy. Pricing confirmed at launch.
Author: James Roberts. Independent. No referral fees. No financial interest in any treatment provider, broker, insurer, EAP, or law firm. Same independence rules as Clinic Compare and editorial standards.
Retainer only · Application only · Tier 1 markets · UK · US · Australia · Canada · Ireland · New Zealand
Retained Executive Search and Interim Cover
A senior person is in treatment. The seat is empty, or about to be.
The clinic does not fill that seat. The EAP does not. HR cannot do it under the confidentiality the situation requires.
This is the search engagement that does: interim cover, or permanent replacement, retainer only, separately contracted.
For twenty years I have placed senior operations, commercial and board-level people under NDA across four continents. My home cluster is airlines, aviation, leisure, travel, tourism and hospitality. These are some of the lowest-paid, highest-pressure, highest-NDA operating environments in the global economy. People trained inside those margins, in front of the customer every day, tend to outperform when moved sideways into industries that pay better and tolerate more error — private equity portfolio operations, logistics, manufacturing, professional services, financial services.
The standard recruiter posture is "we place people with experience in your industry." I openly contradict it. If the firm insists on a recruiter who searches only inside its own sector, I am the wrong recruiter. If the firm wants a senior operator from a harder margin who will outperform inside the seat, I am usually the right one. The mistake my own sectors make — always hiring for sector familiarity rather than operating discipline — is the mistake I correct for clients who hire me.
Credentials
Twenty years, four continents. Placements have included senior operations and commercial leadership for hotel groups, airline carriers, leisure operators and tourism boards across UK, Continental Europe, Middle East, North America, Australia and Asia-Pacific. Every engagement was under NDA and no firm I have placed for is named on this network or on any other public surface. The credentials are deliberately bare on this page — the buyer who needs more talks to me on the first call.
The conflict wall
The Confidential Containment Brief above and this search engagement are kept structurally separate. A Containment Brief, where commissioned, must be finalised, delivered and invoiced before any conversation about an interim or permanent search retainer can begin. The brief's assessment of an executive's capacity to return to the seat is never coloured by an active search fee. Different mailbox, different contract, different signature.
Retainer only. No contingency work. No success-only assignments. No commission from candidates. No commission from clinics, brokers, insurers or EAPs. The buyer is the firm; the firm is the only party paying me. This is the same integrity wall that runs through the rest of the network and the reason a corporate buyer can trust both the brief and the search to be honest about each other.
Apply for a search engagement
By application only. Retainer terms agreed in writing before any work begins. I read every application personally and write back within one working day. If your situation is outside what I can credibly serve — sector, geography, seniority, timing — I will tell you on the first reply and route you to someone who can.
Author: James Roberts. Independent. No referral fees. No financial interest in any treatment provider, broker, insurer, EAP, or law firm. Same independence rules as the Confidential Containment Brief above, Clinic Compare and editorial standards.
Retainer only · Application only · UHNW estates and family offices · Tier 1 markets · International by arrangement
UHNW Household Continuity and Domestic Search
The clinical infrastructure treats the individual; the household infrastructure collapses under the weight of the disruption.
When a family member enters residential treatment, an ultra-high-net-worth home or estate faces an immediate operational breakdown.
This is the search engagement that holds the home together: discreet, retained, separately contracted.
Built on twenty years of senior placement under NDA for international hospitality founders and the institutional family offices that grew out of them, I recruit elite household professionals — estate managers, principal-side EAs, private chefs, heads of security, butlers, head housekeepers and dedicated support staff — to stabilise the home before, during and after treatment. The brief above protects the corporate asset; this engagement protects the domestic sanctuary while the person at the centre of it is in clinical hands.
"Discretion inside an estate facing a dependency crisis is an operational problem first. The emotional weight is real, but it is not what household staff fix. The right people in the right roles, contracted properly, on the principal's side and nobody else's, is what holds the house steady while the person at the centre of it gets well."
The domestic conflict wall and safeguarding clause
Different mailbox, different contract, different signature. Every candidate sourced through this desk is bound by a permanent NDA written specifically for UHNW domestic placement — they are legally barred from naming the principal, the estate, the family, the geography or any identifying assets in any future CV, recruitment cycle or public reference. The engagement is logged in their professional record as "Private Family Office mandate, The Operations Desk."
Where the principal is also the person in treatment, the desk requires a signature from the legal spouse, a designated power of attorney, or the executing trustee before any work begins. I will not initiate placement work on the basis of verbal instructions from inside a household in active crisis. This protects the principal from decisions taken without them, and protects me from acting on authority that may not survive contact with the principal's lawyer six months later.
Safeguarding clause. Where the household contains a minor alongside an adult in active, untreated dependency, this placement service is conditional on the family putting verified, professional safeguarding or clinical intervention steps in place. I do not recruit household staff to act as buffers for unmanaged domestic danger. If that is what the household needs, the search engagement is the wrong tool and I will say so on the first reply.
Retainer only. No contingency work. No success-only assignments. No commission from candidates. No commission from clinics, brokers, insurers, EAPs, agencies or estate-management platforms. The buyer is the principal or the family office; whoever signs is the only party paying me.
Channel A · Institutional family office
For CFOs, family office managing directors, principal advisors and professional trustees. Procurement-driven, structured engagement under formal terms. Use this channel where the engagement will be signed by a corporate officer of the family office entity, not by the principal personally.
Channel B · Private principal direct
For the principal, the legal spouse, the householder or the designated power of attorney. Discretion-led, immediate, no institutional layer between us. Use this channel when the engagement will be signed by an individual, not a corporate entity. If you are not sure which channel fits, use this one and I will route correctly on the first reply.
Author: James Roberts. Independent. No referral fees. No financial interest in any treatment provider, broker, insurer, EAP, agency or estate-management platform. Same independence rules as the Confidential Containment Brief and the Retained Executive Search above, Clinic Compare and editorial standards.