News: Northumbrian Water wins award for health and well-being initiative

Northumbrian Water has won a prestigious accolade after introducing an holistic wellbeing initiative that helped to cut its sickness absence rates by 3.1% between 2010 and 2011. The provider of water and sewage services to customers in the North East of England received charity Business in the Community’s Workwell Award last night after seeing absence […]

Are you being paid what you’re worth?

Most people have a reasonable feel for what they should be paid, though for some it’s not the most important thing keeping them in their role. For many others, however, falling disposable incomes make salary a question of increasing significance.   In most organisations, prospects for pay rises look bleak and even if you’re lucky […]

Equal pay tribunals could lead to near £20k of audit and legal costs

A review of all staff wages must be carried out by a company after it has lost an employment tribunal claim over equal pay, according to equalities minister Lynne Featherstone   If a tribunal rules that a worker has been discriminated against because of their gender, that firm would be compelled to examine employees’ salaries, an […]

Fancy a reward-ing career?

2011 was a difficult year for reward. Both permanent and interim reward recruitment began solidly.   Then the Eurozone crisis arrived – and with it an adverse impact on confidence in all recruitment markets, particularly in the financial services sector in the UK and across Europe.   Challenging times need to be put into context. […]

Blog: The employee impact of a recognition desert – survey

Recognise This! – The only qualifier for needing recognition in the workplace is being a member of the human race. Last week I had the pleasure of co-presenting with Thad Peterson the results of the Globoforce Spring 2012 Mood Tracker survey (which tracks the perceptions of full-time, currently employed U.S. workers).   Now available on […]

News: Hospital staff stick two fingers up to Kit Kat reward

Managers at Torbay Hospital have been accused of “insensitivity” after giving employees a Kit Kat each for winning a prestigious award. South Devon Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust, which runs the hospital, was recognised in the Health Service Journal awards for “best innovation, ideas and dedication”, while the hospital itself was named acute healthcare organisation of […]

A typical HRD: Part 3 – Small-to-medium enterprises

Is there such a thing as a typical career path for someone wanting to become an HR director in a small-to-medium enterprise – or even a typical HR director profile in this space? HR professionals generally seem to fall into three categories: those who spend their careers in corporate, blue chip environments; those who prefer […]

News: M&S staff up in arms as bonuses cut by two thirds

Workers at Marks & Spencer held angry meetings yesterday after being told that they could see their bonuses slashed by up to two thirds following a fall in profitability. The situation is unlikely to be helped by the fact that, despite the high street retailer’s reputation for fair pay and treatment, its Dutch chief executive, […]

News: Half of pubic sector workers got zilch in April pay settlement

As the April pay bargaining round in the public sector gets into full swing, it appears that just over half of all workers can expect to get nothing this year. The latest figures from online resource, XpertHR, based on 29 pay reviews that came into force last month, indicated that in 55.2% of cases, staff […]

News: Workplace disenchantment hits “crisis” levels

With disenchantment in the workplace hitting “crisis” levels, it is incumbent on HR professionals to find new ways to engage staff and compensate for below-inflation wage increases that are continuing to squeeze household incomes. According to the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development’s Labour Market Outlook survey of more than 1,000 employers, some 51% were […]

Living Leader Learnings: How can I make all of my team equally motivated?

The challenge: The manager of operations and logistics for a national vehicle leasing company asks:   “I have always believed that I am a pretty good motivator, but the performance levels across my team differ significantly. A number of people always exceed expectations, but the rest of the team are just not stepping up in […]

News: Unions ballot bus drivers for strike over Olympics bonus

Unions are balloting bus drivers on whether to take strike action over demands for a £500 bonus payment for working during the Olympics because of an expected hike in passenger numbers. Unite has sent out ballot papers to its 20,000 members, after off-duty drivers protested yesterday outside Transport for London’s head office.   The union […]

News: HRDs excluded from public company boardrooms due to “prejudice”

Prejudice against the HR function has led to HR directors being seriously under-represented on the boards of the UK’s largest public companies, with less than 1% boasting a top job. According to research undertaken by HR recruitment agency, Ortus, only five of the 595 board directors working at the country’s leading FTSE 50 firms have […]

Talent Spot: Kevin Fisher, HR director at Blemain Group

One of the six key tasks that Kevin Fisher was set when he joined specialist lender Blemain Group as an interim was to find a permanent HR director. And he found the perfect candidate: himself. From Blemain’s perspective, having Fisher on board as an interim HRD first of all enabled senior managers to ‘try before […]

How to beat a counter job offer

Against a backdrop of continued economic uncertainty, top talent at all levels is becoming increasingly hard to find and land. Competition for candidates is increasing as companies start to ramp up their hiring efforts after the downturn. This has given rise to more challenging candidate management and the infamous counter offer.   Recent research by […]

Blog: What HR can learn from alien abductions

As an Investors In People assessor, I frequently ask staff what would happen if they were abducted by aliens tomorrow. Not because I’m interested in probes and things (although I’m sure that would be quite fascinating.)   What I’m interested in is whether staff would be conspicuous by their absence. Would critical work not get […]

Blog: How to hold on to good employees – Part 3

You now know the reasons why employees leave your company, and last week I described two of the five top strategies that will help you keep them: creating and maintaining an attractive and nourishing working environment, and developing effective employee relationship strategies. To complete the picture, here are strategies 3, 4 and 5: 3. Employee […]

News: KPMG HR blunder #3: Failing to pay staff salaries

If HM Revenue & Customs didn’t have such a knack for mishaps, KPMG’s embarrassment might be more acute after it was revealed that the Big Four firm failed to pay its staff as expected on Friday 29 April. KPMG staffers are usually paid on the 29th of each month, and if that date falls on […]

Analysis: Oracle – Why we bought Taleo

The cloud human capital management application wars are set to be one of the prevailing technology topics of 2012 and beyond. SAP’s acquisition of SuccessFactors, Oracle’s purchase of talent management and recruitment firm Taleo, which completed last month, and Workday’s forthcoming stock market flotation all bear testimony to the importance of the HR marketplace to […]

CEO Insight: Sinead Hasson on Hasson Associates’ CSR programme

The arrival of 2012 brought with it the news that there are still 2.65 million people out of work in the UK.  Widespread redundancies, salary freezes or even cuts as well as the increasing loss of employee benefits are not only hitting employers hard, but also causing employees to question their job security.   And […]