So how do you enhance your impact on your firm’s strategy?

Managers we come across in our work who are involved in the strategy process of their organisations are often curious to know whether their own approach is sufficiently ‘strategic’ and whether they could or should be doing it differently. This curiosity reveals a lack of awareness of how strategy is done elsewhere, something Gary Hamel […]

Putting employees in control of their personal development

Organisations invest enormous amounts of time, effort and money in the personal development of employees, yet results are patchy at best. Is it time to hand control back to the employees themselves? The process of personal development, with its objectives, support structures, training tools, feedback sessions and reviews can be painful. Even mature businesses with […]

Leadership development is not working. Here’s why…

If your reaction to my rather controversial title was to want to close the internet page and go do something else you are probably having an avoidance reaction! Your brain experienced the title as a threat. You probably felt you really don’t want to read about this but as a professional you decided to scan the […]

Employment law timeline and changes 2013 and 2014

In the past couple of years we have witnessed a sea-change in UK employment law, for example the increase in the qualifying period of continuous employment to claim unfair dismissal to two years,  the introduction of fees for the first time in the employment tribunal and the new concept of settlement agreements which have replaced […]

Six steps to build cast-iron resilience

Personal resilience – simply expressed as our ability to deal with everyday challenges and maintain a positive state of resourcefulness – is influenced by two factors: how we feel physically and how we feel mentally. The issue for many people is that their approach to maintaining a resilient state is reactive rather than proactive. We’re […]

The Age of Individualism – meeting the 21st century’s big HR challenge

The world of work is evolving rapidly and the companies that understand the changes that this brings will be the winners of the future.  The way organisations think about how employees are engaged with the aims of the organisation has changed radically in the last 50 years after remaining essentially static for the industrial age […]

Talent acquisition and HR should be at the heart of M&As

M&As are common – 111 M&As took place in the UK in the second quarter of 2013 alone[1] – yet there is no one-size fits all formula to ensure smooth transitions. M&A is time-consuming and stressful and it is only by placing Talent Acquisition at the heart of M&A that the maximum value can be […]

A guide to creating employment ads that stick to the rules

Recruitment can be a huge task, and when you’re looking for new candidates you want to be as pro-active as possible. Effective job ads are key to attracting the right candidates, and in a highly competitive market a good ad can make your job spec stand out from the crowd. It’s fine to use your […]

Interview: Alistair Rennie, Managing Director of Foosle.com

Is recruitment going through a crisis and if so, why? There is a crisis but it’s nothing new. For a long time, the recruitment industry has failed to evolve in line with the on-going challenges faced by employers and candidates.  The industry has been sluggish about dealing with the frustrations employers have had for years: […]

What is a ‘mentally healthy workplace’?

We have been working with mental health charity Mind on a series of articles exploring mental health in the workplace. Take a look at the full content series today to get insight and advice on how to improve mental wellbeing throughout your organisation. As part of Mind’s Taking Care of Business campaign, we often highlight the importance […]

Can your leaders achieve change? Here’s what the data says

Most companies are going through change of some type and some sectors are experiencing unprecedented transformational change; that is change that shifts the underlying assumptions and norms of the way the organisation and even the industrial sector operates. We wanted to understand how leaders were perceived to be doing in leading this change and their […]

Employee engagement is about more than just a survey

I work with many organisations that have made a significant investment in money and resources, over multiple years on large unwieldy surveys producing tons of data but making very little impact on increasing or sustaining engagement.    Engagement surveys are a useful and valuable diagnostic, they take a ‘temperature check’ of the organisation at point […]

Financial services & manufacturing leaders ‘worst in UK’

The Financial Services and Manufacturing industries have the weakest leaders in the UK, according to a detailed study released this morning by Head Heart + Brain, a leadership development consultancy. To gauge the standard of leadership in different industries, Head Heart + Brain commissioned a poll of more than 2,000 people which asked UK workers […]

What is workplace incivility, why should we care, and what should we do?

What is Incivility?     You find yourself walking into work with your supervisor, and you hold the door open for her. She breezes through without saying thank you. When you get to the break room to have your morning cup of coffee, you find that the pot is empty—the last person did not refill the coffeemaker. […]

Encouraging HR resource best practice – five tips to self-service success

We recently conducted research into the current state of employee service in the UK’s HR departments and discovered some worrying results when it came to the additional strain being put on an already stretched resource. According to our research, HR decision makers are spending more than a third of their day on average – that’s […]

The Art of Communication – supporting those nearing retirement age

If there is one thing in life we can all be sure of it is that we age – hopefully gracefully, but we cannot escape the inevitability of growing older. For one so widely recognised, this fact can often be surprisingly difficult to accept. Employees in particular can often struggle to come to terms with […]

Resilient employees likely to be physically healthier and more productive

Psychologically resilient employees are likely to be physically healthier and more productive in work, according to new research conducted by well-being experts Robertson Cooper. Between June and August 2013, over 500 people from the UK working population were surveyed to determine their current level of psychological resilience – in other words, their ability to perform […]

Managing health and safety: the right-people, right-place, right-time approach

According to a report issued by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), toward the end of October 2012 there were 17,495 reported non-fatal injuries in the UK; an estimated 27,000 self-reported injuries, and an estimated 33,000 new cases of work-related ill health. It also calculated an estimated 1.8 million working days were lost due to […]

Interview: Brian Bowden, Director of HR Operations at Aer Lingus

1. On your LinkedIn you mention part of your role has been ‘re-positioning the HR function.’ Can you elaborate on this? Where was it before and where do you want it to be? Our transformation has sought to reposition the HR function so as to focus on strategic HR activity and standardise and systemise our HR […]

Five reasons CEOs fail to engage

There is now a weight of evidence connecting employee engagement and business success, within which leadership plays a key role. Yet, much of the UK workforce remains dis-engaged. So, why aren’t our leaders engaging more? Engagement, that is to say, the sense of emotional connection and purpose that is created among employees so that they […]