Lawyer takes firm to tribunal after redundancy during sick leave
A former partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers has taken the firm to an employment tribunal over claims of disability discrimination after he was made redundant while on sick leave caused by workplace stress. Colin Tenner was a former equity partner, who specialised in public sector consultancy for the Belfast branch of the company. He attested to the […]
Ask the expert: Should redundancy payment include bonus?
Martin Brewer and Esther Smith advise on whether redundancy pay should include a ‘set bonus’ and ‘travel allowance’. The question: Should redundancy payment include bonus? My friend works for a building company and has just been made redundant. He has been offered redundancy pay based on his basic weekly wage. For the past three years […]
Employer branding and total reward
In a volatile business environment, it is important that firms are able to harness the value of a defined employer brand to remain competitive. An employer brand is how an organisation markets what it has to offer to existing and potential employees. An effective employer brand can help ensure that an employer’s workforce is not […]
Pregnant partner sacking ruled fair due to papertrail
A Liverpool-based law firm accused of sacking one of its partners because she was pregnant has been cleared of sexual discrimination. An employment tribunal dismissed all of the allegations against DLA Piper, even though it was described as an ‘old boy’s club’ by Sarah Sweeney. The 36 year-old former real estate partner at the company […]
Are your employees aware of your sickness policy?
A survey of 500 businesses has revealed up to 1/4 do not routinely tell employees about any benefits of the sickness policy, leaving many employees unaware of any benefits to them if they fall ill. When asked to elaborate, eight per cent of businesses questioned had a policy in place but preferred to maintain secrecy […]
CIPD warns UK must prepare for 10% public sector cut
The CIPD has estimated that the UK should be braced for a 10% cull in the public sector workforce in the lifetime of the next government – whoever wins the May 6 General Election. The cut would bring the current 5.8 million roster of such jobs down by at least 500,000, says the CIPD (Chartered […]
Opening up talent for business success
Diversity should be threaded through all talent management activities and strategies so organisations can reap the benefits of accessing and developing talent from the widest possible pool. This is the main finding from our new CIPD research report, Opening Up Talent for Business Success: Integrating Talent Management and Diversity. Our research draws upon focus groups […]
Graduates: Less is more
An HR body has called on the government to review its “over-promotion” of university education and to focus more on providing vocationally-based diplomas at a time when nearly six out of ten graduates are unable to find suitable employment. The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) has warned that government targets desiring 75% of […]
Recession continues to strain employee-employer relations
The number of monthly calls being made to the conciliation service Acas’ helpline has doubled since September last year as the impact of the recession continues to put increasing amounts of strain on employer-employee relations. By the end of February, Acas had referred 8,034 pre-claim conciliation cases to its early conciliation service since launching its […]
Gas workers may strike over bullying
British and Scottish Gas workers are being balloted for strike action over claims of macho management and bullying by their employer. The GMB union has sent the ballot papers out to 8,000 of its members employed mainly as gas service engineers, central heating boiler engineers and distribution depot workers. The process is due to close […]
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 […]
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 […]
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 […]
Workplace bullying – not only at Number 10
Recent headlines have hit the Labour party with a book claiming Gordon Brown is a bully – an allegation seemingly backed up by a national hotline claiming they have received calls from ‘several’ members of Number 10 staff. However, this has now been hit with a backlash of its own as this has been perceived […]
CIPD: We’re not out of the woods yet!
The UK labour market remains in an “extremely fragile state”, with the unemployment situation likely to get worse before it gets better, an expert has warned. Figures released by the Office of National Statistics showed that total unemployment fell for a second consecutive month, albeit by a meagre 3,000 people, for the three months to […]
HR professionals ‘risk being left behind’, says CIPD
HR professionals risk being left behind unless they find ways to help senior managers reach their goal of building a genuinely sustainable business model for the future. The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) in the first report from its Next Generation HR project said that the HR function needed to move from its […]
Redundancies are set to almost double in the first quarter
Redundancies are set to almost double in the first quarter with nearly a third of public sector employers planning to cut jobs and the private sector unable to make up the shortfall despite signs of renewed hiring activity. A survey undertaken among 700 organisations by market researchers IPSOS Mori indicated that the jobs market would […]
Snow days: how to cope as a business and deal with employees
Sue Evans, a partner at Lester Aldridge, offers her advice to employers about how to cope when severe weather leaves your employees snowbound or without childcare. Businesses have experienced considerable disruption so far this year as a result of the severe weather that the country has suffered, and it’s a situation likely to repeat. Many […]
Navigating the new learning map
The CIPD has changed its courses in order to better support modern HR. Trainer Derek Robertson explains what it means for HR. Over the past decade we’ve seen a huge amount of changes in the role HR has taken in the business, from an admin and payroll centre in many cases to a decision making, […]
270, 000 may strike after redundancy pay cut
The biggest civil service union intends to both ballot more than quarter of a million workers on strike action and seek a judicial review following government plans to slash redundancy pay-outs by up to a third. The Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union claimed that cuts to the civil service compensation scheme, which comes into […]