National Trust staff go green with extra day off
The National Trust has awarded all staff an extra day off on 29 February as part of a campaign to encourage staff to go green.Staff are being given the opportunity of time to improve their environmental footprint – starting at home. The National Trust says that small steps by thousands of individuals are of infinitely […]
Alarms ring as gay Christian scoops £47k discrimination award
A gay man has been awarded £47,000 as the result of a successful discrimination claim on the grounds of sexual orientation.John Reaney, a 42-year-old from North Wales, was awarded the vast sum after an employment tribunal ruled his appointment to the role of youth worker was blocked by the Bishop of Hereford, the Rt Rev […]
Training scholarships up for grabs
Skillsmart Retail and Retail Trust are offering more training scholarships after gifted managers snapped up their previous awards.The two not-for-profit companies are calling for retail managers to apply for 10 bursaries, for a place at the Oxford Summer School in August.The summer school will take place at Keble College, Oxford from 16-22 August. It gives […]
Succession planning: 10 steps to success
Succession planning must be an ongoing and high business priority that requires significant planning and resourcing, advises Steve Passam. For many organisations succession planning is often an afterthought that is only ever considered when a key team member tenders their resignation or informally signals they are seeking a new role and challenge.Yet in today’s knowledge […]
Ask the expert: Rights of agency workers
Do temporary workers have the same employment rights as permanent employees, when it comes to disciplinary procedures? Esther Smith, partner at Thomas Eggar, and Martin Brewer, partner at Mills & Reeve, advise. The question:If someone is on a recruitment agency contract, do they have the same rights with regards to disciplinary and capability? My brother […]
Romance at work on the rise as Valentine’s Day looms
Half of workers have a secret crush on a colleague and a third admit they have exchanged flirtatious emails despite being in a relationship. These are the findings of recruitment outfit Reed, which quizzed 2,000 office workers. According to the research, 38 per cent have gone all the way and had an office romance with […]
Appraisal failure costs over £2 billion
Poorly planned and executed appraisals are costing the UK economy over £2 billion.This is according to Talent Q, a people assessment company that says just 58 per cent of the UK’s 29 million-strong workforce receive a formal appraisal.The research found that where good appraisals are conducted, followed by effective development planning, productivity rose by 2.7 […]
UK star of European coaching survey
A massive European-wide coaching survey has revealed that the UK and Germany are ahead of the coaching pack, with 70 per cent of all EU coaches working in these countries. The survey confirms what everyone is talking about – that coaching is in its ascendancy in this country.The European Coaching Survey 2007/2008, for the first […]
Monday blues cured
Dreading the end of the weekend and the start of the working week is overrated, with as many as 28 per cent of workers actually looking forward to Monday.This is according to a new survey of 5,000 jobseekers by recruitment website reed.co.uk. Only 13 per cent of respondents said they actively hate Monday, with 29 […]
Employees not engaged with HR
Half of UK office workers believe HR teams make no difference to their jobs, a survey has revealed.The employee engagement survey, by HR service provider Ceridian, also found that 22 per cent of workers feel the HR function actually makes them less satisfied at work, due to HR mistakes that are being made.Doug Sawers, managing […]
Is a McDegree next on the menu?
A new not-for-profit consultancy will be launched in March to help employers that want to develop their own higher-education qualifications.HE@Work will help organisations develop their in-house training programmes to meet the standards required by higher education institutions. Instead of being restricted to a company-specific qualification, employees will be awarded recognised and transferable higher education credit […]
Virtual meetings: A way of life?
The benefits of online meetings are clear: substantial time and cost savings for businesses, employees and clients. But, as Lucie Benson discovers, there are other reasons to consider web conferencing within your organisation. In today’s modern and global business environment, online meetings are fast becoming a popular and effective way of communicating with customers or […]
Illegal working and unfair dismissal
Employing people from overseas can create many issues for employers, especially if the employee’s work permit has expired. Mandy Higgins offers advice on how to deal with this and avoid a finding of unfair dismissal. According to the Home Office (October 2007), people born overseas account for one in eight of the UK’s working population. […]
Colborn’s Corner: Jobs for the boys?
Few reading the headlines recently can have failed to notice the furore about MP Derek Conway and his alleged misuse of House of Commons funds in employing his two sons to do Parliamentary work. But are all recruitment decisions free of bias? Quentin Colborn examines favouritism at work. You might think that the employment of […]
International executive coaching: Trends for 2008 and beyond
Dr Sabine Dembkowski, Fiona Eldridge, Prof David Lane, Wendy Johnson, and Stephan Oberli exchange views on the developing profession of executive coaching and share the conclusions of their discussions. It’s that time of year when we develop a Janus-like approach – reflecting back on the past year and looking forward to the new. We have […]
HR tip: Lawful discrimination
These questions are being answered by Learn HR, a market leader in the provision of HR and payroll training and nationally-recognised professional qualifications. Question:"We have a large number of Pakistanis in our workforce but no Pakistani supervisors, although we believe that some of them could perform well in that role if they were given training. Will […]
Acas receives extra funding to aid workplace disputes
Secretary of state for business and enterprise John Hutton has announced that the government will be awarding up to £37 million to employment relations specialist Acas, in an attempt to prevent workplace disputes going to employment tribunals unnecessarily.The extra funding, spread over three years, forms part of the process designed to simplify the dispute resolution […]
Hello, is it me you’re looking for?
The CV is the personal sales tool of modern times, but many are ill-prepared and littered with mistakes; should this mean they go straight in the bin? Matt Henkes looks at some of the ways recruiters can utilise these mysterious and sometimes downright misleading documents. A person’s CV is their sales tool to prospective employers. […]
Make ’em laugh: Using humour in training
Dawn Smith looks at the link between humour and learning, and how laughter can be used in the training room to help make the message stick. The use of laughter to aid learning is of course nothing new. The king of silly walks, John Cleese, helped to pioneer the use of humour in corporate training […]
Why your top HR executive should be on the board
Chris Seabourne states that one of the main reasons why there should be a dedicated HR professional on the board is to ensure that people are always at the top of the agenda. So much has been written and spoken about HR management in the last 30 years that it is easy to forget why […]
