How much of your people agenda can you really control?
The HR function is under greater scrutiny than ever. There is huge pressure for HR professionals to prove their value as strategic partners to business leaders. The biggest people transforming challenges – embedding leadership behaviours; attracting and strengthening the talent pipeline; fostering innovation; redesigning the structure; shifting the organisational culture –often sit on HR’s shoulders. […]
How to include every one – without involving them
Firstly, the challenge… You are director of a small, creative start-up. You have a last minute opportunity to pitch for a sizable piece of work and must pull together a group of people to write a winning proposal overnight. You need your best creative minds in the room as well as people who can work […]
Why positive organisations win out every time
Robert Quinn is professor at the Michigan Ross School of Business and a reseacher who has spent significant parts of his career analysing organisational change, leadership and performance. From his research he has become a believer in the power of ‘positive organizations’ due to the wide evidence base – essentially, when people are happy and thriving, […]
Nine qualities authentic leaders live by every day
There has been much discussion of the idea of authentic leadership, yet while I have read and heard much about its importance, less time and effort has been dedicated to understanding exactly what makes an authentic leader. The Oxford Dictionary definition of authentic is “of undisputed origin, genuine”. So what does this mean when we talk […]
Why aren’t we redefining the way we work?
There’s something fundamentally wrong with the way the world works. In a series of 5 articles over the next few weeks I’ll share with you why that’s the case, what we need to do about it and how you can begin to implement changes within your own organisation which will start your journey towards a […]
Leadership lessons from the Volkswagen scandal
Buried beneath the headlines about the recent revelations at Volkswagen are some worrying details, reminiscent of the banking crisis. At their heart are some stark lessons for leaders and organisations; lessons that firms have been slow to learn, but which will not go away and need to be addressed. The story behind how Volkswagen ended […]
What is the management culture like in the most engaging organisations?
Top performing organisations develop thriving cultures and winning people practices that propel them into the upper quartile of engaging organisations. People Insight, a consultancy supporting hundreds of organisations to measure and improve employee engagement, have created PIPER (People Insight Peak Engagement Research), a new study asking the most engaged employees in the most engaging organisations […]
Learnings from the HRZone Engagement Conference
Michael spoke at, and attended, the Employee Engagement Conference 2015, presented by HRZone. In this piece he outlines the main learnings from the day. The agenda for the conference was promising, with CEO and HRD panels, and talks from familiar faces such as Perry Timms, Jan Hills and HRZone editor Jamie Lawrence. There were sessions […]
What can Europe teach tomorrow’s business leaders?
There’s so much rich insight coming out of the academic sector that HR professionals need to know. At Academics’ Corner we feature the best HR researchers that tell you what they’ve found and what you need to do differently on the back of the research. Get connected to the academic sector through Academics’ Corner and […]
Are you able to find a leader in a haystack?
While the current labour market is highly competitive at all levels of experience, there is no more precious commodity than candidates for leadership roles. Despite effective leaders being widely recognised as the cornerstone of business success, our latest research shows that many organisations are quite simply failing at succession planning. The majority (63%) of the […]
From cleaner to COO: Karen Hester of Adnams
Karen Hester is Chief Operating Officer at the award-winning brewer and distiller, Adnams. In April this year she became the first female executive director to sit on Adnams’ board, since it was founded in 1872 – a remarkable achievement after joining the business as a cleaner in 1988. Here, she talks about her journey to […]
The world of work must change… but why?
There’s something fundamentally wrong with the way the world works. In a series of 5 articles over the next few weeks I’ll share with you why that’s the case, what we need to do about it and how you can begin to implement changes within your own organisation which will start your journey towards a […]
HR, is the search for relevance and meaning doomed?
There is nothing the HR profession loves more than ‘the next big thing.’ The initiative, activity or idea that will finally give the function its desired relevance and meaning to the organisations they work in. Moving on to the new ‘big thing’ is also helpful of course given the fact that very often the ‘last […]
Connecting transformational leadership, purpose and the triple bottom line
Of all the issues that executive teams and HR directors face, one of the most challenging is how to achieve a sense of purpose among employees. Initiatives in this area are just as likely to provoke employee resistance as they are to stimulate employee engagement. Too often, the process of instilling a powerful sense of […]
Your guide to ‘relationally-intelligent’ leadership
Effective leadership today is dependent upon a new covenant between leader and led which guarantees not only acceptable levels of security and prosperity for employees but also a sense of tangible contribution to decision making. In this article we justify the changed details of the covenant which optimises energy, engagement and active participation, utilising long […]
Get help by creating a personal following
Regardless of how prepared, knowledgeable, and organised you are, the ability to access the support, time, and guidance of those around you is a major advantage. Gaining the assistance of others or getting them on your team, however, is easier said than done. One of the best ways to earn the consistent support of a […]
Induction: a function of HR or masterclass of leadership?
Alison Lowe is our CEO keynote at The Employee Engagement Conference on September 10th in London. Grab your ticket today and join us! At Touchstone, a West Yorkshire mental health charity, staff numbers have steadily doubled over the last 11 years. As CEO, I was rarely involved in new staff inductions though, thinking this was […]
Exit the leadership vortex: to whom do operational leaders ultimately owe allegiance?
I was recently at a function at the House of Commons at which the seasoned CEO of a multinational financial services organisation aptly described the environment of business leadership much akin to operating in a vortex. In reality, amidst widespread confusion, if not chaos, leaders lack effective control of the speed, direction, indeed the ultimate […]
Let’s settle this. Is there an “I” in “team”?
There’s so much rich insight coming out of the academic sector that HR professionals need to know. At Academics’ Corner we feature the best HR researchers that tell you what they’ve found and what you need to do differently on the back of the research. Get connected to the academic sector through Academics’ Corner and […]
HR and the bottom line – where does the value lie?
The human resources department has not always been perceived as having a big impact on the profitability of a company, in the same way as, say, sales or finance. But this perception is perhaps a little unfair. After all, who is responsible for the talent that drives those departments? When you strip everything back, it […]