Take five – communicate better
Encouraging efficient, effective and appropriate communication is one of HR’s greatest challenges. Jim Collins promotes having ‘to do’ and ‘stop doing’ lists to help efficency, and Michael Richards has put together these five tips, which are the first of a two part series to help you break the bad communication habits. So take five and […]
Train and gain or snooze and lose
Dwindling levels of investment in training must rise this year if UK employers are to remain competitive on a global basis as the economy starts to emerge from recession, an expert has warned. According to the National Employer Skills Survey (NESS) for England undertaken among 79,152 organisations and commissioned by the UK Commission for Employment […]
Rise in vacancies and recruitment activity point to recovery
The number of vacancies posted online in February was the highest since December 2008 when the recession really kicked in, but the jobs market is not out of the woods yet. These are the findings of the Employment Index compiled by online recruitment web site Monster UK. It noted that the amount of positions available […]
Government watchdog spends £170k on role play
Even though role-playing is an accepted and widely-used form of training these days, the Conservative Party has slammed the Audit Commission for spending £167,000 on the practice over the last three years. The Commission uses Roleplay UK, which employs professional actors, to help it out when hiring new staff or training personnel up for […]
Not safe for work – the prevalence of porn
With one in five men admitting to accessing porn at work, organisations know they are sitting on a potential time bomb. While accessing porn is not illegal – unless it is explicit – the risks associated with brand damage and employee harassment litigation are significant, says Andrew Millington. No organisation can impose an outright ban […]
Engaging your talent through embodied leadership
Which qualities does a leader require to inspire engagement of their key talent and harness discretionary effort? Make healthy high performance part of your organisation. In today’s fast-paced, impatient and often stressful world, leaders need to find a way of being and leading that liberates people to contribute their unique talents willingly – thereby giving […]
Drowning in a sea of applications
When you have so many applicants to sift through, recruiting can seem a huge ordeal. Dan Hughes offers a lifebuoy and explains how it has worked for Waitrose. Many employers experience the challenge of sorting through a sea of job applications to find the select few with the greatest potential for success in their organisation. […]
99th International Women’s Day reveals same glass ceiling
A study released to coincide with today’s International Women’s Day revealed that nearly half of all UK workers believe women are still subject to glass ceilings in the workplace and that men are favoured for promotion over their female counterparts. A survey undertaken among 1,741 UK workers by employment website Monster.co.uk indicated that, while a […]
Scotland lays down anti-violence guidelines
Scottish local authorities have issued what are believed to be the UK’s first guidelines to try and help protect staff from physical and emotional violence in the workplace. The guidelines called ‘Managing Occupational Violence and Aggression in the Workplace: Tools and Strategies’ were devised by NHS Scotland’s Scottish Centre for Healthy Working Lives, the […]
Ask the expert: Sleeping shift
Martin Brewer and Esther Smith advise on whether a sleeping shift requires national minimum wage. Sleeping shift – should we pay NMW? We are in the Care sector and have a shift called Late/Sleep/Early. A staff member would comes on shift, does a late shift then sleeps at the client premises then […]
Supertax could do more harm than good, says pension body
A pension scheme industry body has called on the government to rethink its taxation proposals for the top 1% of earners claiming that they will also hit lower paid workers and cost employers a fortune to implement. From April 2011, the government hopes to raise an extra £3.9 billion per year from around 300,000 people […]
Landmark agency and permanent staff wage equality
Asda’s landmark deal to ensure that agency workers in its meat and poultry supply chain are paid the same as permanent staff is likely to pile pressure on other supermarket chains to follow suit. The retailer’s move comes ahead of a report by the Equality and Human Rights Commission looking into working practices in the […]
Public sector people squeeze dents optimism
Although the UK jobs market appears to be on the road to recovery, more pain could be on the way as the impact of the forthcoming public sector squeeze makes itself felt over the next six to 12 months. These are the findings of the February’s ‘Report on Jobs’, which is produced by financial information […]
Public sector cuts are bad news for female workers
Female workers face the worst employment prospects for a generation as swingeing job cuts in the public sector, which employs twice as many women as the private, mean that they will be disproportionately hit. These are the findings of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development’s (CIPD) latest quarterly Labour Market Outlook (LMO) survey of […]
Engaging Employees – eight steps to become a people engager instead of a people manager
Engaging employees, rather than just managing them, is recognised by many business leaders as a crucial process to pull through the recession successfully. A UK Government report* also acknowledges the importance of employee engagement. So how do you get employee engagement right to help your organisation thrive in the upturn? Will Mitchell, Director of Consulting […]
M&S – HR business partners getting the balance right
Jan Hills tells how at Marks & Spencer the HR team is working hard to ensure the company maintains its employer of choice status as the UK comes out of the recession. Marks & Spencer has always been seen as the barometer for the UK economy and the retail sector. We talked to Joan Claridge, […]
Ask the expert: What are our responsibilities to employee with MS?
One of our employees suffers from multiple sclerosis. What are our responsibilities? Adam Partington and Esther Smith advise. The question: What are our responsibilities to employee with MS? I run a mortgage brokerage business that has a number of mortgage advisors who are self-employed. One of the advisors suffers from multiple sclerosis. […]
Flexible working for all – fantasy or reality?
A recent study by the Equity and Human Rights Commission has shown that some 20% of men in the UK were worried about asking their employer for flexible working because they felt it would harm their career. While many firms claim to be ‘flexible’, are the practices they introduce sufficient to enable a truly […]
Female workers should use their ‘negotiator potential’ to close the gender pay gap
Female workers will struggle to close the current gender pay gap of 20.2% unless they become more proactive in negotiating salary increases with their bosses, claims an expert. But the problem, according to Corinne Mills, managing director of consultancy Personal Career Management, is that too many women undervalue their contribution to the business and are […]
Staff distrustful of line managers’ instincts
Almost half of staff actively distrust their line managers' decision-making instincts in relation to both their own and colleagues’ futures, while three quarters of managers admit that they would change their verdicts if given their time again. These are the findings of a survey undertaken among 553 UK line managers and 1,002 workers by occupational […]
