Employee engagement: how HR leaders can restore employees’ faith in career opportunities
The key to retaining talent is to offer continued career progression, but how can HR do this in the face of increased economic pressure and a volatile trading environment? Nearly half (45.6%) of UK employees who departed their jobs at the end of 2018 reported they left due to a lack of future career opportunities […]
Modern leadership: is neuroscience the solution to toxic leadership?
A toxic work environment is detrimental to workers’ mental health and productivity, so how can you recognise the signs and reform your office culture into a healthy and happy one? It’s all too easy to ignore a toxic culture and dismiss low level grumbling as the unfounded complaints of an insignificant minority. It’s also common […]
Nudging: what HR professionals should understand about behavioural science
Getting people to change their behaviour or make certain choices requires a ‘nudge’ – but how can HR teams make sure that they are not only nudging effectively, but ethically too? You may have noticed that there is a buzz around ‘nudging’, or behavioural economics as it is more formally called. You will doubtless have […]
The death of hierarchy: why open source leadership is key to business success
A new era of open source leadership has arisen and businesses would be wise to take a leaf from the book of the Silicon Valley technology hub in its approach to humble, transparent leadership that nurtures creativity. The old-fashioned, ‘stick management’ style of management is dead. For decades, companies have been founded upon rigid, hierarchical […]
The problem with modern leadership: diversity, inclusion and the ‘hero’ complex
The world is facing a leadership crisis. We need to radically refocus the way we think about leadership to focus less on the individual and more on collective responsibility. Only a diverse and inclusive approach to leadership can solve the mess we’re in. How many times have you heard someone say, “diversity and inclusion are […]
Wellbeing at work: how self-care and success work hand-in-hand
It is undeniable that our outlook on life and our interaction with those around us has a direct effect on our experience at work. We so often hear of the importance of taking better care of ourselves, both physically and mentally, and yet putting this into practice at work might seem unfeasible. Faced with the […]
Soft skills: how to increase empathy in business
Greater empathy within organisations has been linked to improved business performance, so isn’t it time we all injected a bit more empathy into our day-to-day business practices? Digital transformation is a bandwagon many companies continue to try and jump on. Last year alone, a purported $1.3 trillion was spent globally on digital projects. Despite this, […]
The future of HR: from human resources to human revolutionaries
Artificial intelligence may be able to take on certain tasks in the workplace, but human soft skills will always be in demand – it’s up to HR to champion and support them. The tech revolution dominates most conversations about the changing face of our world and, inevitably, business. The consequence of digital transformation is that the […]
Disconnecting belonging from exclusion to create workplace harmony
Is there an untethered link between belonging and exclusion? And, if so, how can we break apart these polarities to create truly inclusive workplaces? I have a problem with the idea of belonging. Why? Because belonging is almost always defined by its polar opposite: excluding. Most of the time, our sense of belonging is defined […]
Disappointing gender pay gap results: it’s time for a fundamental cultural shift
With no significant improvement in the gender pay gap between 2017 and 2018, it’s time for employers to radically change their approach to building a diverse workplace in order to make progress in the coming year. “Imagine a workplace where women don’t have to spend extra, or any, energy fighting for fair pay or defending […]
Leadership: why HR has a responsibility to build a sense of belonging among employees
It’s been proven that individuals and teams perform best in environments where they feel a sense of belonging. Leadership teams should be doing everything they can to help encourage this. A mountain of research spanning almost 200 years and looking across multiple cultures and contexts demonstrates beyond doubt that the single biggest predictor of our […]
Three ways to develop a sense of belonging in the workplace
Within any organisation, the need to feel like part of a team and to develop a sense of belonging is a vital to ensuring a comfortable working environment, and to a certain extent, increasing productivity. Whether you’re a new starter though, or simply joining a new team within a company that you’ve worked in […]
Why companies need to open up the dialogue around diversity
Creating a workplace culture that is truly diverse is not about ticking the ‘right’ boxes, it requires a shift in the way organisations communicate with their staff, HR teams and new recruits. Workplace diversity isn’t about recruiting a bunch of people from different backgrounds. That’s just a diversity of faces, and only leads to employees having to […]
How to take care of people, the planet and profits
Twenty-first century businesses need to prioritise more than the traditional bottom line – the new world order is about the social, environmental and the financial. Traditional businesses are set up with one aim and one aim only: to make as much profit for the shareholders as possible. In fact, in many states it has been illegal to have […]
Management hierarchies: are they still necessary in the workplace?
Digital technology has transformed the workplace and companies at the cutting edge are embracing flatter hierarchical management structures. It’s time for businesses to unpick bureaucratic processes and focus on developing an innovative and agile workforce. Most employees value clear direction from leaders, but they also value autonomy. In our modern, fast-moving world, the most successful organisations are those who are […]
Connecting candidate, employee and customer experience through a strong culture
Ahead of the 5th Annual Spring UNLEASH Conference & Expo, we spoke to Danielle Harmer, Chief People Officer at Metro Bank, about joining up the experiences of candidates, employees and customers through company culture. Danielle will be leading a roundtable discussion on this topic on Day 2 of the conference (20th March) at 11:15am on […]
Rise to the top: how to nurture successful teams
Performance management strategies would benefit from embracing Carol Dweck’s theory: developing a growth mindset that actively encourages talent to learn and improve. Imagine a world in which ‘know-it-alls’ are replaced with ‘learn-it-alls’. Not a bad vision, is it? As a topic of conversation in the HR world, it’s encouraging to see that ongoing learning is increasingly being […]
What is workplace incivility, why should we care, and what should we do?
What is Incivility? You find yourself walking into work with your supervisor, and you hold the door open for her. She breezes through without saying thank you. When you get to the break room to have your morning cup of coffee, you find that the pot is empty—the last person did not refill the coffeemaker. […]
Taking a measured approach to Christmas spirit
With a potentially explosive mix of office politics and alcohol to contend with, holding the office Christmas party can seem like a risky business. Christiana Tollast examines how employers can ensure staff behaviour does not descend into something resembling closing time at the Queen Vic. So what is the biggest […]
Messy desk? Have £7 million. By Sarah Fletcher
Writing this article was a real challenge, mostly because it took me all morning to find my keyboard under the horrors littering my desk: piles of paper, mould-filled mugs and a random collection of objects with no apparent use in the workplace – a potato peeler, tapes for a dictaphone lost years before I was […]
