How to implement a volunteering strategy

When implemented effectively, an employee volunteering programme will enhance your brand reputation locally, allow your staff to build relationships both in and outside the workplace, develop the skills of your workforce and create a positive impact on the community.  Implemented badly, employee volunteering schemes lack engagement with staff, consume time better spent in the office […]

Interview: Jonathon Porritt, Founder, Forum for the Future

Who is Jonathon Porritt? Jonathon has been a campaigner on environmental issues for 40 years. He has campaigned extensively in support of the Green party in England and Wales. He is a co-founder of sustainability non-profit Forum for the Future and from 1993 to 1996 he was chairman of the Stakeholder Forum for a Sustainable […]

Employee development through CSR programmes

Employees are increasingly demanding that their workplaces not only provide opportunities for them to develop within the business, but outside of it too. With CSR remaining high on the agenda and workers craving the challenges and learning that come via volunteering and community-based initiatives, organisations must master the world of ‘intelligent volunteering’ that not only […]

Can businesses help solve the food waste crisis?

Here are some shocking stats. Just the bread and cereal products thrown away in UK households could lift 30 million of the world’s hungriest people out of malnourishment All the world's nearly one billion hungry people could be lifted out of malnourishment on less than a quarter of the food that is wasted in the […]

Five tips for effective fleet management

Fleet management is a growing business: Berg Insight suggest that the number of fleets deployed in Europe will grow from 1.5m units in 2009 to 4m in 2014. Due to the scale of fleets, marginal gains can often result in significant cost savings for businesses. And the latest developments in the industry, such as cloud-based […]

Museums ditching staff for volunteers – the result of financial woes?

Over a third of museums and galleries reduced numbers of paid staff last year, while a half increased the number of interns and volunteers. This is according to the Museums Association, a membership organisation, which added that staff cuts were due primarily to a reduction in public investment. “Interns and volunteers have plenty to offer […]

Interview: Patrick Quinlan, CEO of compliance and ethics firm Convercent

1. How is the role of compliance professionals shifting? For years, compliance has centered around addressing the bad in an organization, like fraud, bribery and general employee “rule-breaking,” and addressing it only after the matter. Inevitably, this turned compliance professionals into the “bad news guys” and tasked them with enforcing regulations that keep employees within their […]

Driving employee engagement through environmental sustainability

With today’s socially and environmentally aware workforce, and as Generation Y & Z begin to dominate the labour market, companies must work harder than ever to ensure that their CSR programmes support and drive employee and stakeholder engagement, as well as competitive advantage. CSR, and specifically a company’s sustainability profile, is an increasingly important catalyst […]

The role of CSR in driving business performance

Nicky is a CSR professional with 20 years’ experience in managing and directing corporate social responsibility in global companies. She runs her own CSR consultancy, Nicky Amos CSR Services Ltd. She spent ten years as Head of Corporate Responsibility for The Body Shop. Successful business leaders are unlikely to disagree with the proposition that corporate responsibility […]

Talent Spot: Tim Hadfield, co-founder of Inaccord Engagement Partnership and HRzone blogger

For Tim Hadfield, co-founder of engagement specialists Inaccord Engagement Partnership, there’s no mystery surrounding engagement, it’s simply common sense. But that doesn’t mean companies don’t need his help to get it right. “The big challenge is, managers know about engagement, but knowing it and doing it are two different things,” he observes.  And that’s where […]

In a nutshell: Lorraine Makepeace, Head of Amazing at The Chemistry Group

Lorraine Makepeace is Head of Amazing at Chemistry Group, which provides predictive assessment to solve complex people problems in large businesses. It’s a small company with 21 staff, but has put in a lot of effort getting the culture right and worked hard to describe its values and ensure that employees live by them every […]

In a nutshell: core values communication

Monica Walls is vice president of HR a Nexenta Systems, a Californian storage software firm with a worldwide presence.    Here she describes the steps she takes to ensure that the company’s core competencies are communicated worldwide using its performance management system.   1. Core values  It was essential to identify the core values and […]

News: Unilever volunteers staff for volunteering

Unilever is offering staff paid time off to volunteer as part of a scheme designed to build relations with local communities and increase staff engagement.   If staff decide to use their holiday entitlement to volunteer, Unilever will now match their time off with paid leave, as well as giving them an extra day’s pay […]

News: ‘Sign up to ethical code or quit,’ Barclays’ CEO warns staff

Barclays’ new chief executive issued employees with an ultimatum today to either sign up to an ethical code of conduct or quit, as part of the bank’s attempt to try and repair its battered reputation. In a memo sent to its 140,000 staff worldwide, Antony Jenkins warned that, in future, performance would be judged on […]

Legal Insight: The potential impact of employee shareholder schemes

At the Conservative Party conference last year, the Chancellor George Osborne unveiled plans to create a new employment status – the ‘employee-owner’.  The government promoted these proposals as part of its drive for growth and to give business more flexibility to hire and fire staff.    Some commentators were quick to dismiss them as political […]

Blog: New Year’s resolution #1: Become a charity trustee

In his Autumn Statement this week, Chancellor George Osborne announced that the UK economy is set to shrink by a worse than expected 0.1% this year. So with an uncertain business climate ahead, businesses will need to work more smartly than ever to ensure that their employees are productive and engaged during 2013.   One […]

Employee engagement continues to rise up the HR agenda

Given a perfect storm this year of low pay rises/freezes, increasing workloads in the wake of redundancies and falling levels of learning and development activity, the issue of employee engagement has been rising steadily up the HR agenda. And as the difficult economic climate appears set to continue into the year ahead, it doesn’t look […]

Blog: How to get employee recognition programmes right

Recognize This! – Culture management continues to rise in importance to HR leaders as the ability to measure and analyze culture also improves through strategic employee recognition. A couple of weeks ago, in a broader post on how to get more value out of your core values, I alluded to the SHRM/Globoforce Fall 2012 Report. […]

All you need to know about hiring a former drug or alcohol user

I’ve spent much of the last 17 years working with current and former drug users, homeless people and ex-offenders in London and Sheffield. Much of that time has been taken up helping them to access services, which include housing, treatment and mental health support, so that people have the necessary assistance to try and turn […]

News: CIPD 2012 – Engage for Success movement unveiled

On Monday 12 November, three years after the publication of the MacLeod Report on employee engagement, a series of events around the new ‘Engage for Success’ campaign will be launched in a bid to make the promise a reality. For example, about 30 chief executives have signed a letter that will be published in The […]