Best Practice: Five pointers to ensure flexible working works
Wakefield Council’s flexible working programme has cut costs by £1.4m and boosted staff productivity while reducing commuter miles by 225,000 annually. Five key success factors include eliminating paper-based processes, taking a holistic corporate approach, securing management buy-in, engaging employees through training, and ensuring robust technology infrastructure.
Employee wellness programmes: Proving their worth and paying their way
Employee wellness programmes deliver measurable returns on investment, with research showing participants experienced significant improvements in self-esteem, job engagement, and productivity levels. A study of 752 employees found that low-impact exercise initiatives reduced depression symptoms by 28%, increased self-confidence by 35%, and boosted work productivity by up to 20%.
Blog: Five ways to get demotivated staff committed to their employer’s future
Help demotivated staff regain commitment by creating a compelling vision of the future. This guide explores five strategies including involving employees in planning, building on organizational strengths, and visualizing ideal outcomes to inspire engagement and drive positive behavior change.
How to build a positive corporate culture
Building a positive corporate culture requires moving beyond traditional hierarchical management to embrace trust, collaboration, and shared values. A strong culture engages employees, boosts performance, and helps organizations deliver on their brand promise by ensuring staff experience aligns with customer expectations.
Living Leader Learnings – How do I stop a valuable employee from dominating meetings?
A dominant high-performer can undermine team dynamics and create meeting challenges. Instead of managing behavior during meetings, invest in one-to-one conversations with quieter team members and reframe the top performer’s role as supporting colleagues’ success.
Best Practice: Four tips to help HR become more business savvy
HR professionals must evolve beyond subject matter experts to become business leaders with people specialization. The CIPD identifies four key behaviors for business-savvy HR: understanding the business model, using data for insights, networking with purpose, and taking a proactive approach to collaboration across the organization.
Blog: What makes you happy in your work?
Workplace happiness comes from meaningful work, team connection, and personal achievement rather than profit margins or management style. Creating a culture where employees feel proud of their contributions, laugh together, and see their impact can inspire and motivate entire teams, regardless of industry.
EU Parliament votes in favour of binding female boardroom quotas
The EU Parliament voted to establish binding quotas requiring 30% female board representation by 2015 and 40% by 2020 at publicly-listed companies. Meanwhile, a UK report showed slower progress, with female directorships rising to only 15.6%, prompting concerns that voluntary measures may prove insufficient without EU-wide legislation.
Diplomat and influencer: The emerging ‘head of talent’ role
Companies are appointing “heads of talent” to identify future leaders amid a global shortage of executives with emerging market skills. Research from FTSE 100 firms reveals the role requires diplomatic influence and CEO support to succeed, despite often lacking formal authority.
Blog: Do we encourage a dependency culture at work?
Many managers fall into the trap of doing their team’s work instead of delegating and developing them. This dependency culture undermines long-term growth, team independence, and the manager’s own career advancement opportunities.
Blog: Notes from the TLNT Transform conference – Welcome to the “new era of people”
The TLNT Transform conference in Austin revealed how HR is entering a new era where people strategy directly intersects with organizational success. As conference chair, the author observed that getting the “people thing right”—ensuring employees are motivated, skilled, informed, and engaged—is foundational to executing any business strategy and driving company goals.
HRD Insight: Leigh Lafever-Ayer on Enterprise Rent-A-Car’s women’s mentoring scheme
Enterprise Rent-A-Car has launched a women’s mentoring scheme to help female employees progress to senior roles, addressing a significant gap in boardroom representation. The company promotes exclusively from within and has achieved 40% female graduate hires, but faces retention challenges as women advance to middle management.
Video Interview: Sharron Davies on what it takes to be a winner
Olympic silver medalist Sharron Davies discusses the qualities required to be a winner, her path to sporting success, effective leadership, and the impact of the Olympics on London.
Blog: Does HR have the right skills to be in the boardroom?
A pan-European study reveals 70% of organizations are transforming their HR functions as the role becomes increasingly strategic. However, HR directors lack essential boardroom skills including business acumen, project management, and technology deployment, despite 62% now reporting directly to the CEO.
Addressing shared HR service challenges
Public sector organizations often overestimate the challenges of implementing shared HR services while underestimating the benefits. A recent survey found that while two-thirds feared negative job security impacts, over half of organizations already using shared services reported positive effects on employment and career development.
Unions reject MoD assurances about outsourced HR staff
UK unions reject Ministry of Defence assurances that outsourcing HR and shared services to Serco will protect employee terms and conditions, warning the private contractor’s cost-cutting model will lead to pay and job cuts despite ministerial promises.
Bridging the leadership communication gap
Senior leaders often fail to communicate transparently with employees, creating a trust gap between management and staff. HR must bridge this divide by focusing on organizational culture and helping leaders explain the reasoning behind their decisions.
Talent Spot: Nikki Hall, chief HR officer at SHL Group
Nikki Hall has served as chief HR officer at SHL Group for 12 years, overseeing the company through multiple mergers while maintaining a dual role that combines HR leadership with product management expertise in talent assessment software.
Nearly half of staff slam managers as “ineffective”
A survey of 4,500 managers reveals that 43% of employees consider their managers ineffective due to inadequate leadership training. Research shows that proper management development can boost organizational performance by 23%, yet many employers use ineffective training methods instead of proven approaches like professional qualifications.
Blog: Finding the right way to praise
Effective praise requires specificity and authenticity. Rather than generic recognition, leaders should identify exactly what employees did well to make a tangible impact. This small shift in how managers deliver feedback can drive significant improvements in employee performance and engagement.
