News: Food employers join campaign to tackle youth unemployment
Tesco, Sainsbury’s and Marks & Spencer are among 23 organisations in the food and grocery industry to have signed up to a campaign intended to provide pre-employment skills training to unemployed young people. Thinktank IGD has launched a nationwide initiative entitled “Feeding Britain’s Future – Skills for Work Week” and is calling on other employers […]
Blog: How Malmaison’s employee incentive scheme ‘Wow’-ed customers
I’ve long been a fan of the Malmaison brand having had the pleasure of spending considerable time at a number of their facilities during my travels. I’ve always found the employees to be great brand ambassadors and that this positive and empowered behavioural culture worked well with the physical brand trappings. I featured Malmaison […]
Blog: Seven tips for navigating murky M&A waters
News last week that Mike Lynch is to leave Hewlett-Packard, just a year after the technology giant bought Autonomy, the data company that Lynch built from scratch, has sparked much speculation about a ‘clash of cultures’ between the two companies. This highlights the importance of a robust HR strategy to guide companies through the managerial […]
Legal Insight: Homeworking during the Olympics
So your company has decided that over the course of the Olympics period, it will allow staff to work from home. Great news – the business carries on as normal and employees don’t have to suffer the hassle of commuting. But it’s not just a simple case of plugging in a laptop. There are […]
Analysis: A Rypple effect – Spotify goes social
Music subscription service, Spotify, has gone social in a bid to ensure that its workforce around the world can collaborate more effectively. To this end, the firm has rolled out Rypple, Salesforce.com’s HR system, which it acquired late last year as a first step into the human capital management applications space. Johan Persson, Spotify’s […]
Ask the Expert: What is the holiday situation for sick workers going through redundancy?
The question An employee of ours has been on long-term sick leave since May 2011 until the current time. We have just confirmed her redundancy. But she has now asked a holiday-related question about which I would like clarification. She did not take any holidays last year (the holiday year is from January […]
News: Three police forces adopt shared HR services for first time
The three police forces of Leicestershire, Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire are set to become the first in the UK to share HR services under a collaborative agreement with outsourcing provider, Capita. The shared system called Origin will be provided by Capita’s secure resource solutions business under a contract worth £2.3 million over five years and, over […]
News: Unions call for urgent talks with HP to save UK jobs
Unions have called for urgent talks with high tech supplier HP in a bid to try and safeguard up to 1,600 jobs under threat at its UK operations. HP has confirmed plans to cut 8%, or the equivalent of 27,000 jobs, across the globe by the end of 2014. But Unite, which has about […]
Analysis: SAP outlines its cloud-based HCM apps strategy
HR has been a core component of SAP’s Business Suite for some time. But, while David Ludlow, its group vice president of HCM solutions, is the first to admit that the functionality has been under-marketed in the past, it seems that is all about to change. At an event held with the firm’s SuccessFactors’ […]
Blog: You may call yourself an HR business partner, but are you – really?
“So, what does the new title mean?” She had walked out on Friday as a generalist and returned on Monday with a new title of Business Partner. “It means I am now assigned to a business unit, I am their personal HR representative. “ And with that, a new title took hold, but within the […]
Blog: Would you win top prize at the Chelsea Flower Show?
For the 2nd year running Cleve West is celebrating winning best in show at the RHS Chelsea flower show for his garden celebrating the 250th anniversary of Brewin Dolphin. As I watched the video of his thank you speech I was brought to tears. I wondered why that might be and concluded it was a mixture of […]
Case Study: Managing seasonal workers
For many UK businesses, the school summer holidays provide a welcome peak in customer traffic and so, in order to cope, they increase the number of temporary staff that they take on, before shedding them again as winter approaches. One organisation that follows this model is responsible for managing some of the country’s most famous […]
TV Review: The Apprentice Week 10 – Explain the benefits
Another week goes by and another episode of the Apprentice slips away. Once again it was an episode full of incompetence, stupidity and Stephen’s ridiculous facial expressions, and another episode that had me shouting at the TV, the way I only normally do when the football is on. This week’s task was all about […]
Blog: Four managerial traits to ensure flexible working works
Earlier this year telecoms giant O2 announced that the vast majority of their employees (88%) were just as productive when working flexibly than when they are present in the workplace. Meanwhile a Stanford University study showed that one travel company noted a 12% rise in productivity when staff worked from home. The evidence would […]
Legal Insight: Pre-Olympic casual worker considerations
With the start of the Olympic Games coming ever closer, many businesses are looking to engage casual workers in order to meet the growing demands that they face as a result. It is routine for casual workers to be used in industries where the work is seasonal or varies from week-to-week and month-to-month. But as […]
In a Nutshell: Five suggestions to make your meetings more effective
We all spend a good deal of valuable time in meetings. But while there will always be a need to get together with others to discuss problems, share information, exchange ideas and come to decisions, for many people, the prospect of going to a meeting makes their hearts sink. Studies have shown that 49% of […]
Video Interview: Top tips for dealing with a stressful work environment
Steve Smith, Olympic high jump medallist and co-founder of workplace performance improvement consultancy, Raise the Bar, along with head of training and development, Gayle Robling, share their insights into how best to minimise workplace stress, boost mental resilience and give employees the competitive edge.
News: Youth locked out of jobs due to employers’ changing needs
The education system’s failure to adapt to employers’ requirements for soft skills rather than technical expertise among entry-level job candidates means that many young people are underequipped for today’s world of work. According to a report from the Work Foundation entitled ‘Lost in Transition’, more than 450,000 under-25 year olds have no experience of sustained […]
News: M&S staff up in arms as bonuses cut by two thirds
Workers at Marks & Spencer held angry meetings yesterday after being told that they could see their bonuses slashed by up to two thirds following a fall in profitability. The situation is unlikely to be helped by the fact that, despite the high street retailer’s reputation for fair pay and treatment, its Dutch chief executive, […]
News: Half of pubic sector workers got zilch in April pay settlement
As the April pay bargaining round in the public sector gets into full swing, it appears that just over half of all workers can expect to get nothing this year. The latest figures from online resource, XpertHR, based on 29 pay reviews that came into force last month, indicated that in 55.2% of cases, staff […]