Four years of redundancies cost UK employers £28.6bn
Nearly 2.7 million people, or one in 10 workers, have been made redundant in the last four years, costing UK employers a huge £28.6 billion. According to a report by the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, the manufacturing and construction sectors accounted for about a third of the job losses, while public administration, education […]
Case Study: Herts Council’s ‘Transformation’ programme slashes sickness absence
Hertfordshire County Council provides local services to more than a million people in the area and employs around 34,000 staff, of whom about 24,000 work in schools. Last year, it introduced a ‘Transformation’ programme – a new and radically different wellbeing strategy, aimed at reducing sickness absence and improving organisational performance. And, while it […]
National Science and Engineering Week: UK to be 2m engineers short by 2015
Guess how many engineers and scientists we’ll need to remain competitive in the next five years? Some 2.2 million. How many kids are going into engineering at the moment as a career? More like 125,000. That sobering statistic is one of the prompts behind ‘The Big Bang Fair,’ a jobs fair that hopes to […]
Blog: What makes you happy in your work?
We All Want Happiness! Today the sun is shining and the hope of a beautiful spring and lovely summer are in the air. Most of us know the feeling of happiness and wellbeing that comes with a lovely sunny day. The day made me think about happy days at work, and the happy […]
Talking Point: Will the Beecroft proposals really encourage employers to hire more staff?
It is clear that the government is trying to support employers and take steps to encourage them to take on more staff. What is a continuing mystery, however, is why ministers repeatedly ignore the areas of greatest concern to business. Such areas of concern range from the extremely high costs of employment and the […]
Talent Spot: Vikki Sly, global recruitment director at QlikTech
The old cliche that people decide whether or not to hire someone within the first few seconds of an interview horrifies Vikki Sly, global recruitment director at business intelligence software provider, QlikTech. “I don’t believe that, and if that’s the way you treat your recruitment, then you’re doing people a huge disservice,” she asserts. For […]
EU Parliament votes in favour of binding female boardroom quotas
The EU Parliament voted in favour of introducing binding quotas for women at the top table at the same time as a report revealed that UK progress on appointing females to executive board-level positions had been slow. The vote by the EU Parliament followed a consultation that was launched last week by EU Justice Commissioner, […]
‘Pop-Up Shop’ provides unemployed youth with retail work experience
A ‘Pop-Up Shop’ has opened in London in a bid to help prepare unemployed young people for a career in retail. The move came as work and pensions secretary, Iain Duncan Smith, wrote to Simon Cowell also asking him to offer work experience to out-of-work 16 to 24 year olds, following a war of words […]
Blog: Yes, you can really grow your brain!
“I’m just off to the gym to give my brain a workout”. That’s not something that you hear people say very often! No one would doubt the link between exercise and muscle development, it’s a well understood fact; if I want to grow my muscles I need to work them. Unsurprisingly the same fact is […]
Diplomat and influencer: The emerging ‘head of talent’ role
A perfect storm is brewing in the talent management arena due to the cumulative impact of demographics and global mobility challenges. The problem is that, despite record levels of unemployment and ongoing economic difficulties, there is still a shortage of leaders, and specifically, people with the skills required to help large companies meet the demands […]
Ministers in legal battle to stop Christians wearing crosses at work
Christians do not have the right to wear crosses openly at work, ministers are set to argue in a landmark case at the European Court of Human Rights. But the move will set the coalition government on a collision course with its own equality quango, The Equality and Human Rights Commission, which plans to put […]
‘Extreme interviewing’ migrates to UK from Silicon Valley
A technique known as ‘extreme interviewing’ is starting to migrate from Silicon Valley to the UK, with the aim of helping employers distinguish the exceptional candidates from the mundane. The idea behind the approach is to see how quickly job-seekers are able to think on their feet and, according to the Daily Mail, the late […]
Blog: Is ‘fire at will’ dismissal legislation a good idea?
Chancellor George Osborne has just proposed the introduction of “fire at will” dismissal law that will enable small employers to dismiss staff more easily. Under-secretary of state for employment relations, Norman Lamb, is unveiling plans during March which would remove restrictions on laying off staff at businesses with fewer than ten employees. It is […]
National Science and Engineering Week: Plugging the specialist skills gap
It is unsurprising that the ongoing spectre of a double-dip recession and sovereign debt crisis continue to spook world markets. As such, one could be forgiven for thinking that Europe is something of a black hole when it comes to employment opportunities these days. To make matters worse, the European Union’s controversial Agency Worker […]
Ask the Expert: How do we deal with an alleged accident victim who is now in Brazil?
The question We have an employee that slipped and fell at work about a year ago, but we are not sure if the accident was staged or genuine. He was taken to hospital and discharged the same day. The staff member had booked two weeks of holiday prior to the accident, which was due […]
Abercrombie & Fitch staff made to do punishment press-ups, claims leaked email
Employees at an Abercrombie & Fitch store were made to do press-ups if they failed to greet customers correctly, according to a leaked email. An internal message to staff from a manager at the US fashion chain’s flagship Milan store, which was leaked to the Italian Corriere della Sera newspaper, reportedly said: “From today, every […]
500 KPMG staff informed of redundancy risk – by voicemail
Hundreds of staff at the accountancy arm of management consultancy, KPMG, have been informed that they are at risk of redundancy – by voicemail. The company has, somewhat ironically, been voted ‘one of the best companies to work for’ by its staff over six consecutive years. But five hundred employees were reportedly sent a […]
Blog: Do we encourage a dependency culture at work?
At just aged six, my son is already learning to be independent. He washes and dresses himself he can run his own bath get his own drinks, breakfast and little things like that. At the weekend I took in him for his swimming lesson, and afterwards I told him to have a shower which […]
Nine out of 10 staff unaware of employer’s Olympics workforce policies
Although a huge four out of five employers claim to have devised workforce policies to help them cope with Olympics-related business disruption, almost nine out of ten employees have no idea what they are. To make matters worse, a worrying 55% of organisations attest that they have communicated their plans to staff, who should be […]
HR software deployments: ‘Big bang’ or phased roll-out?
There are two possible approaches to introducing a new HR system – one is to go for a big bang, ‘all-in-one-go’ implementation, while the second is to phase in the deployment over time. And both approaches have their merits as was highlighted at software supplier Unit4’s customer conference in Birmingham last month. Construction consultancy, Cyril […]
