Age Positive launch national awards to find Britain’s age crusaders
The search is on for employers and individuals who are challenging ageism in employment. Age Positive, the Department for Work and Pensions campaign aimed at stamping out age discrimination, is encouraging individuals and employers to enter the 2004 Age Positive Awards. The Awards, held across England, Scotland and Wales, will recognise and reward individuals and […]
Freedom of speech or harassment?
Debbie Taylor at Mercia Group Limited warns of the dangers of insensitive or unsolicited comments made in the workplace. A thought-provoking headline filled the newspapers recently about a well-known football commentator who resigned following a racist comment he made about a player when he thought he was off air. Certainly an end to his career […]
Enhancing employee productivity by improving your office
Improving your office environment can be a simple and cost-effective method of positively impacting staff performance. Justin Palmer, managing director at Principio, argues that HR managers may therefore benefit from a more direct role in workplace design and space management. Given that we invest huge amounts of time and money on our own home […]
CIPD pushes for extension of flexible working rights
In response to the announcement that the Government plans to extend flexible working rights to carers, the CIPD is urging the Government to consider extending the right to all workers when it reviews the legislation three years after its introduction.“This is further evidence that the Government is considering extending the right to request flexible working. […]
Carers to be given flexible working rights
Prime Minister Tony Blair has pledged to extend the right to request flexible working to carers of elderly and sick relatives. At a meeting in Downing Street to discuss work-life balance issues, the Prime Minister promised to extend to carers the same rights as those introduced for parents in the workplace. Currently carers can only […]
HR Tip – Transferred business
HRD & Payroll Solutions continues to bring HR Zone members a range of HR tips. This week’s tip looks at Transferred business. Q: The family firm I have worked for for ten years is being sold to a larger organisation. I don’t want to work for the new firm because I feel it will be […]
HR Managers Say Training Spend is Too Low
Eighty-five per cent of employers are not spending enough on training, according to a survey of HR managers.The poll, conducted by business information and support consultancy Croner, found that only 14% believed that businesses had got their training budgets “about right”, and just 1% said the amount spent was too high.According to the Croner research, […]
Negotiating the “negotiation differential”
The team at Credos share their views on why they believe women continue to be underpaid and offer some tips for HR on how to cater for the “negotiation differential” between the sexes. Fact: Women continue to be underpaid, undervalued and under represented in the upper echelons of companies. Linda Babcock and Sarah Laschever’s book […]
Review: The Employment Relationship – Key challenges for HR
Author: Paul R. Sparrow & Cary L. CooperPublisher: Butterworth-HeinemannISBN 0 7506 4941 0Price: Not StatedReview by:John Pope MBE TD MA FIMC CMC Management Consultant This is an important book on the changes which are taking place in the world of work. The authors have reflected on the many changes taking place in business and society. […]
How Did I Get Here? Fiona Knight, KPMG
Currently the Lead HR Manager at KPMG, Fiona Knight spills the beans on her career to date. All the previous career profiles can also be seen in the special How Did I Get Here? page. Current job titleLead HR ManagerDescribe your initial training within the professionIPD studies via Westminster University, followed later by repeating through […]
Training Spend Set to Rise
Training budgets are predicted to rise as skills shortages fuel recruitment difficulties, according to a survey by the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD).The CIPD’s Training and Development Survey 2004 found:* A third of private sector training managers expect their training budget increase this year.* 81% of organisations have a training budget – indicating […]
Developing staff through overseas assignments
“Locating employees overseas removes them from their ‘comfort zone’ and forces them to take a fresh look at how they do things and why,” says Eoghan Mackie of Challenges Worldwide. Here he looks at how you can get the most out of overseas assignments as a staff development tool. The central tenet of HRM, that […]
40% of workers willing to work overseas
Only 40% of UK workers would be willing to work overseas… but over three quarters of these want to get as far away as possible! Research undertaken by Black Mountain, international HR and employee benefits outsourcers, discovered that 40% of us would be willing to work overseas if asked by our current employers. Of those […]
The 10 key problems with competencies
Peter Goodge of the360.co.uk highlights some of the common problems with competencies and explains some the pitfalls. In principle, there is nothing wrong with competencies – clear, helpful competencies make a huge difference to HR’s business contribution. But, in practice there is sometimes a lot wrong with competencies! An organisation often discovers its competencies are […]
Flexing the benefits?
Amanda Stainton, a reward strategy specialist at cdatransform, has been involved in the design and implementation of UK-wide flexible benefits schemes. In this article, she reflects on that experience and considers some of the practical aspects of such an implementation. As organisations continue to strive to find their USPs in terms of the employment proposition […]
Recruitment is increasingly a shared responsibility
More than half of employers surveyed have made changes to the roles of key people within the recruitment process, according to new research.Line managers have experienced the biggest shift; more than four in five employers surveyed are now involving line managers to a greater degree when recruiting some or all vacancies. The IRS research, conducted […]
Failing to act on employee surveys destroys commitment
Companies that conduct employee surveys but fail to take action on the results could seriously damage employee commitment, according to research which questioned 3500 employees.In organisations where employee surveys are conducted regularly but no follow-up action is taken, only 4 in 10 employees report a high degree of commitment, according to the research by Mercer […]
HR Tip – Garden leave
HRD & Payroll Solutions continues to bring HR Zone members a range of HR tips. This week’s tip looks at garden leave. Q: What is “garden leave” and is it lawful?A: Ordinarily if you give notice to an employee, he or she continues to work throughout the notice period in the normal way and leaves […]
HR trends for Spring
Nearly two in five employers expect to be employing more staff this year yet few anticipate a significant rise in wage costs, according to a CIPD survey.The quarterly HR Trends and Indicators survey, involving almost 2000 employees, found that more than half of employers plan to recruit this Spring. Recruitment intentions are strongest in the […]
Review: HR Strategy: Business Focused, Individually Centred
Title: HR Strategy: Business Focused Individually CentredAuthor: Paul KearnsPublisher: Butterworth-HeinemannISBN: 0750657685 Price: £21.99Review by: Denis W BarnardFor some time now, Paul Kearns has contributed some very stimulating articles in various management and HR journals. In this book, he sets out to clarify the direct lines of sight needed to ensure that the HR and Business […]
