Six steps to better learning and development for small businesses

Are you an HR professional within a small business? Do you support small businesses with HR consultancy? If so, how often do you have conversations about learning and development? I know that you are busy. If you work in an organisation, I know that you are called upon to wear many hats: HR manager, health […]

Employee engagement: why small businesses need to do it too

Years ago, I did a talk on employee engagement for small businesses. At the end, one of the participants came to speak with me. He ran a small business, and he wanted to engage his staff, but it seemed like more work on top of running the business itself. How would he find the extra […]

Workforce analytics: data storytelling and why you should know your audience

I had a debate recently with someone who believed that, when working with complicated analytics, it was important to explain the process and statistical methodology to add credibility to the storyteller and the message. His view was that this was important to all audiences, since credibility was the most important facet to portray in storytelling. […]

Workforce analytics: demystifying HR analytics – it’s not what you think

Perhaps the biggest misdirection or mystery surrounding HR analytics is what it is, and what it is not. HR analytics is not a discipline that is only focused on the functions, challenges and required solutions for HR itself. Also, it is not just complicated statistics and mathematics that nobody understands unless they have a PhD. […]

Workforce analytics: how to be a successful people analytics leader

During the last four weeks I have met over 60 workforce analytics leaders in the US and Europe in my pursuit to learn more about and help advance the discipline of workforce analytics. The companies they represent are some of the world’s most well known brands – banks, tech firms and retail companies among many […]

Reimagine business value: the world’s changing expectations of companies

For decades, society was content for business to drive economic growth and wealth creation. People looked to governments to keep their worlds secure, while ‘doing good’ was the job of charities. Companies were free to operate in a bubble of employees, products, customers and profits, as long as they made money for shareholders. Trade brought […]

Ten reasons to love doing HR for a small business

Alright, alright. You don’t have access to a ‘Leadership University’ or state of the art breakout rooms. You don’t have an army of HRBPs, and if you want a promotion you’ll have to give it to yourself. That said, doing HR in a small or medium sized enterprise has its perks. Let’s examine them. 1. […]

The ethical employee: a look at moral behaviour

In parts 4.1 and 4.2 of this discussion we looked at how our actions cascade outward through the organisations we work in, and how even our smallest actions can generate dramatic effects. We saw the importance of ‘the whole of us’ to the workplace, and that each of us is far more than just a […]

The ethical employee: what we bring to our business

Let’s begin this part of our analysis with a brief thought experiment… Imagine, just for a moment, that there is a part of you that is nothing more than a ‘work delivery unit’ (WDU). This is the part of you that fulfils your contract of employment to the letter. It’s the part of you that […]

The ethical employee: we have the power

In previous articles in this series I’ve talked about the nature of ethics, outlining three basic moral aims that we can use in assessing the morality of our businesses and our own management practice. These are: To nurture others To nurture our species as a whole To nurture all life I’ve discussed at a high […]

Recruitment: how to hire HR professionals and why it’s not as simple as you think

Most people think HR recruitment is one of the easiest areas to recruit for. HR people are ‘lovely’, there are lots of candidates out there, and you can pretty much guarantee that every company has an HR team. All of the above is true, but when you start to dig a little deeper into the […]

Avoiding automation culture shock among your employees

To an outsider technology and HR may seem like odd bedfellows, but the truth is that there are few departments (with the exception of IT) where tech is more important. The reality is that for new technologies to succeed in business they need the support of HR. We are the gatekeepers. As such, we need […]

Bridging the gap: how internal communications and HR can work better together

I am on a mission to promote the value and impact good communication can have for organisations, especially when it is aligned to its vision, mission and strategy. HR leadership and teams play a big part to achieve this, however over the years I’ve noticed there is a gap between HR and internal communication (IC), […]

Employee rewards: why bonus culture can be corrosive

In almost all job roles, financial bonus schemes are used to incentivise and motivate employees. Whether it is the large bonus packages given to CEOs every year for strong company performances, bonuses given to sales people for obtaining new leads, or financial bonuses given to office workers who hit all their KPIs in a year […]

Man trouble: HR’s role in men’s mental health

We have a professional duty to put in place psychological safety mechanisms and measures to protect employees’ mental health based on analysis and evidence. While analysing workforce demographic comparisons – including comparing male and female* employees – are helpful to highlight key concerns for HR, e.g. performance and flexible working, it seems that mental health […]

Recruitment: why job brand is now more important than employer brand

Getting a job has become a bit of a race. Candidates are applying for more companies than ever before, and because of this the celebrated ‘purpose’ of employer value propositions are starting to have less impact than we might think. Nowadays jobseekers are applying for roles across a range of industries. Employers now need to […]

Boring to brilliant: empowering your employees to understand their pension

It goes without saying that a good company pension scheme is one of the best benefits a company can offer its employees. Despite this, many employees still aren’t aware of the value of their company’s pension benefits. In fact, pension schemes often trigger a range of emotions, with financial planning and retirement regarded as complicated, […]

HR job seeking: how to stand out in a crowded market

This year has been one of change on both a global and local level, and this evolving political and economic environment is drastically affecting how companies recruit. In an unstable market, candidates can be nervous about their job prospects and reluctant to consider a move. There are a number of reasons for this, the main […]

Brexit and the free movement of people: where are we now?

As we approach a possible exit from the EU on 31 October 2019, clarity on the rights of EU, EEA and Swiss nationals in the UK remains crucial for employers.   If the UK leaves with a deal   The EU Settlement Scheme has been open since March 2019, with over 1 million individuals already […]

Ethical business: attracting and retaining top talent needs actions, not just words

Right now companies face one of the biggest challenges ever faced in attracting and retaining new talent and every business, large or small, will be affected at some point in the future.   The corporate world may be changing, few can argue with that, but talent is changing too and with a multitude of layers, […]