July 4, 2015

Beyond agile working + Is the environment a non-issue? + Neocon review

by Sara Bean • Flexible working, Newsletter, Workplace, Workplace design

In this week’s issue; Paul Goodchild reviews Chicago-based office design event Neocon; Andrew Mawson describes a major new research project on knowledge workers and Dan Callegari argues the business case for green building design is changing. Mark Eltringham finds we are often best able to understand the way people function by using symbols of mechanisation; asks whether the environment could now be something of a non-issue for building managers and suggests employers like open plan offices because they allow them to keep an eye on what people are doing. We reveal that working while on holiday is fast becoming the norm for many workers and that new evidence is published on the positive influence of good ergonomics on performance. Subscribe for free quarterly issues of Work&Place and via the subscription form in the right hand sidebar for weekly news, follow us on Twitter and join our LinkedIn Group to discuss these and other stories.

July 3, 2015

One in five Americans would change jobs for better work-life balance

by Sara Bean • Flexible working, News, Wellbeing, Workplace

More than half of US and Canadian employees report feeling overworked and burnt out (53 percent), yet the overwhelming majority (86 percent) say they are still happy at work. According to the inaugural Staples Advantage Workplace Index employees are working longer days, with about a quarter of them regularly working after the standard workday is done. A key motivator is to advance in the organization, with nearly two-thirds of respondents seeing themselves as managers in the next five years. Though employees are largely conditioned to working longer hours, about one in five do expect to change jobs in the next twelve months. Steps employers can take to improve happiness levels include; adding more office perks, improving office technology and providing a better office design. Alongside this, with employees working longer days and on weekends, the biggest request is for employers to provide more flexibility. (more…)

July 2, 2015

Over half of workers feel required to work on holiday, and it’s becoming the norm

by Sara Bean • Flexible working, News, Technology, Wellbeing, Workplace

Mobile technology is acknowledged as a boon to flexible working, but can very easily spill into an unhealthy work/life balance. This is most in evidence around summer holiday time, as illustrated by the latest poll on the subject by the Institute of Leadership & Management (ILM). It surveyed more than 1,000 UK workers and managers to find that more than half of workers (61%) feel obligated to work while on leave. The ILM suggests this is the negative side effect of modern technology, as people are contactable anytime and anywhere. 64 percent read and send emails during their time off, 28 percent take business phone calls and 8 percent go into the office. Meanwhile, only 28 percent of those surveyed reported that they had had arguments with friends and family about their working on holiday, down from 37 percent two years ago, which seems to indicate that it is fast becoming the norm to be constantly switched on.

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July 2, 2015

Employees prefer diverse working experiences to traditional career ladder

by Sara Bean • Flexible working, News, Workplace

Employees value a varied working experience and flexibility over traditional, linear career progression, a global study published by the Top Employers Institute claims. The Career & Succession Management Report identifies the global developments forcing employers to rethink career and succession management strategies. These include skill shortages resulting in a global competition for best talent and an increased risk of losing business-critical knowledge due to the ageing of the workforce. There is also a new generation of workers seeking diverse work assignments and flexibility, who are taking greater responsibility for their own career management, resulting in less loyalty to employers and less interest in the traditional step-by-step climbing of career ladders. The findings suggest that HR needs to move from assuring the smooth succession of leadership to concentrate more on wider long-term staff engagement and retention.

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June 29, 2015

Beyond agile working: the six factors of knowledge worker productivity

by Andrew Mawson • Comment, Facilities management, Flexible working, Workplace, Workplace design

Whilst the world has focussed heavily on the asset productivity of offices over the last 30 years, reducing the cost of offices per head, often using agile working as a tool for achieving this, it’s becoming clear that the mobility afforded by the latest technology products can be used to aid Knowledge Worker productivity. Knowledge work plays an increasingly large part in the economic fortunes of developing countries. Indeed the vast majority of people working in AWA’s client organisations are Knowledge Workers. Over the last 30 years we’ve seen a gradual shift from manufacturing to service and now to knowledge based industries. Knowledge Workers are broadly speaking ‘people who think for a living’. Whilst the concept of ‘productivity’ in manufacturing and service industries is well understood it is barely understood at all for knowledge based sectors.

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June 26, 2015

Value older workers or sleep-walk towards a skills shortage, employers warned

by Sara Bean • Flexible working, News, Workplace

A demographic time bomb means employers must act to avoid a cliff-edge loss of skills and talents by 2035, a new study by the CIPD has revealed. There are currently 9.4 million workers in the UK today who are over the age of 50 and while the employment rate of older workers has increased significantly in recent years, there is still a 64 percent drop in the employment rate between the ages of 53 and 67. New research from the CIPD and the International Longevity Centre-UK (ILC-UK), the independent think tank on longevity, ageing, and population change, warns the UK could face serious skills shortages over the next 20 years. Unless organisations start improving how they recruit, develop and retain older workers it is estimated that the UK economy will struggle to fill one million jobs by 2035, even taking into account the mitigating effect of migrant workers.

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June 25, 2015

Employers lagging behind the workplace revolution say CIPD and BIFM

by Sara Bean • Facilities management, News, Workplace, Workplace design

There is strong and mounting evidence on how organisational culture and the workplace environment influence the quality of our work and working lives. This is according to a major new joint report by the CIPD and BIFM, In Search of Better Workplaces, which forms part of a wider initiative, The Workplace Conversation, an ongoing collaboration between the FM and HR bodies, which explores the evolution of the working environment and what the future of the workplace looks like. The report says that to make the purpose of workplaces clear a completely different approach is required, individual to an organisation, and which reflects what it is trying to achieve and how it wants to achieve it. It adds that good workplace design should be available for everyone and not the sole preserve of cash-rich private sector organisations. There is a range of starting points and organisations should take steps that are the right size for them.

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June 22, 2015

Too much sitting down at work (or worrying about it) can increase anxiety

by Sara Bean • Comment, Flexible working, News, Wellbeing, Workplace

More evidence in the case against sitting down at work has been published this week by researchers from Australia’s Deakin University which shows prolonged sitting is linked to an increase in anxiety. In the first systematic review to examine the relationship between sedentary behaviour and anxiety, published in the open access journal BMC Public Health, it was revealed that only nine studies have investigated the link between sitting time and anxiety risk, but that in five of the nine studies, an increase in sitting was found to be associated with an increased risk of anxiety. There appears however, to be no data available yet on a rise in anxiety amongst office workers who, in the last few months have been being bombarded with scare stories about how “sitting is the new smoking” and how they’re putting themselves in mortal danger if they don’t try and stand for several hours a day.

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June 19, 2015

RICS case studies focus on business impact of strategic facilities management

by Sara Bean • Facilities management, News, Property, Workplace

Six case studies, which outline how businesses can make the most of strategic facilities management to enhance their performance are being launched today (19 June), at the NEC in Birmingham. Developed by International Workplace for the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors, the latest set of case studies in the series, provides examples of best practice as outlined in RICS’ Strategic Facilities Management (FM) Guidance Note. The case studies, which can be downloaded from RICS’ website, cover a range of strategic FM issues including procurement, innovation, technology, sustainability, talent management and health and safety. Key themes include a professional understanding of the impact of FM to a company’s reputation, brand and performance, engagement with staff and the supply chain, the importance of measuring impact and outcomes and communication.

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June 19, 2015

Well designed offices should create spaces suitable for everybody

by Dan Callegari • Comment, Flexible working, Workplace, Workplace design

The basis of the commonly held belief that offices are designed for extroverts seems to be that, because the primary goal of offices is to bring people together to work and because the de facto office design standard is open plan, then this makes them an ideal home for extroverts. They are parties to which everybody is invited, but at which the wallflowers are told to dance. There is something in this but it doesn’t tell the whole story. This is just as well because personalities are not so straightforwardly easy to categorise and the needs of everybody to collaborate or work alone – however extroverted they might be – vary throughout the day. The office remains endlessly complex and sophisticated and any simplistic notions about it and the things it does should be challenged with a cold, hard look at the facts and what is happening in the real world.

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June 18, 2015

Gen Z workers will be far more conventional than commonly assumed

by Sara Bean • News, Technology, Workplace, Workplace design

Despite being the first generation of workers to boast ‘native’ digital skills, so-called ‘Gen Z’ is far more conventional than previously assumed. The coming generation of 16-19 years-olds who are fast approaching the jobs market will care far more about their workplace and their employer’s ethics than Gen Y, new research from recruiter Adecco claims. The research shows that long-term security is more appealing to Gen Z than short term perks; with gym memberships (12%), free technology (16%) and time off to travel (26%) rejected in favour of qualifications and job security; at 43 percent and 41 percent, respectively. However, the research does show they have strong personal ambition and high expectations from employers, with half of those surveyed expecting a promotion within their first year of employment and the same number expecting to move on from an employer within two years.

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June 16, 2015

Back pain and mental ill health still the main reasons for workplace absence

by Sara Bean • Furniture, News, Wellbeing, Workplace

Back pain and musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs) remain the prime reason for long-term workplace absence (38%); with stress and mental-health disorders the main cause of absence for one in four companies. However, the results of the UK’s largest business survey on sickness absence published by EEF, the manufacturers’ organisation and Jelf Employee Benefits reveals that stress and mental illness is regarded as the most difficult form of absence to make workplace adjustments for, with almost a third of companies saying this is the case. Furthermore, a third of employers said that they do not have approaches for managing mental-health-related long-term absence. Just one in ten companies provides training for line managers in mental-health issues and only 2 percent of companies have an open mental-health disclosure policy, suggesting business matches society in finding it a difficult issue to address.