October 3, 2019
A new report is urging employers to promote their investment in automation and technology when recruiting to avoid missing out on top talent. The What Workers Want 2019 Report (registration), released by Hays, claims that although 70 percent of organisations are investing in automation, nearly a quarter (24 percent) of employers do not currently promote their investment when recruiting. (more…)
October 2, 2019
New research from travel app provider Seatfrog claims that workers are looking for more than just fun or unusual workplace perks to brag about to their friends when starting a job. While on-site table tennis, a free bar and unlimited snacks has become commonplace in the war to attract talent, especially in the technology sector, around three in five of the 2,000 people surveyed dismiss perks as nothing short of a gimmick. (more…)
October 1, 2019
More than two-thirds (68 percent) of British businesses think that acquiring tech skills such as coding trumps the importance of more classic subjects such as maths and science. The research, from tech job board CWJobs, also claims that 71 percent of businesses urge candidates to learn tech specialisms in order to futureproof their careers. Active jobseekers should take note of skills that can push them to the top of the hiring list, with eight out of 10 (80 percent) business leaders revealing candidates having a tech specialism is an important factor in their future hiring decisions across any job sector. (more…)
September 25, 2019
As well as using contingent staff to help them become more agile, research from recruitment consultancy Robert Half UK claims that over three quarters (76 percent) of employers are turning to the temporary market to aid their digital transformation efforts. (more…)
September 25, 2019
Around a quarter of firms worldwide and mid-sized companies are shifting permanent roles to contingent work positions this year to remain agile, according to a report from Randstad Sourceright. The quarterly Talent Trends study (registration), based on responses from executives, HR managers and other professionals across 17 markets worldwide, claims that businesses are using gig and freelance workers to fill formerly permanent positions. (more…)
September 24, 2019
Recent years have seen a widespread drop in global unemployment rates but what continues to puzzle economists has been the subsequent failure of wage inflation to follow suit. This has created an unusual phenomenon of wage stagnation across global markets, according to the eighth edition of the Hays Global Skills Index, a report into skills and the skills gap published by recruitment firm Hays in collaboration with Oxford Economics. (more…)
September 23, 2019
There’s a good reason why we find it hard to establish the causal links between our working lives, office design and our personal happiness. It’s because it’s all very complicated. So complicated in fact that you can sidetrack any discussion on the subject by asking elementary questions such as: ‘what do you mean by happy?’ or ‘should it be the role of work to make us happy?’ (more…)
September 20, 2019
Despite acknowledging the importance of new skills, 45 percent of managers don’t feel confident in their ability to develop the skills employees need today, according to a poll by Gartner. In addition to a lack of confidence, Gartner research also claims that managers lack time to coach their direct reports, with managers spending on average 9 percent of their time on developing their direct reports. (more…)
September 18, 2019
Unless the Government steps up efforts to manage the transition to automation, many people and entire regions of the UK face being left behind and British businesses could find themselves becoming less competitive, says the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) Committee in a report published today.
(more…)
September 17, 2019
Around one in twenty workers report not receiving any holiday entitlement, while around one in ten do not receive a payslip – highlighting the scale of labour market violations across the UK – according to new analysis published by the Resolution Foundation. (more…)
September 10, 2019
Managers should seriously consider giving their employees the reins for a day to test new research that indicates seven out of 10 employees worldwide (69 percent) say they can do their boss’s job better, despite nearly the same number of workers (71 percent) grading their boss’s competence a B or better.
The Global State of Managers research comes from The Workforce Institute at Kronos Incorporated and Future Workplace, which examined how nearly 3,000 employees in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, India, Mexico, the U.K., and the U.S. would grade their manager’s effectiveness across five factors: communication, competence, empowerment, professional development, and support.
According to the study, employees grade their managers high on competence but nearly fail them when it comes to work-life balance and job coaching. Overall, people feel managers are good at their jobs, with the majority of employees grading bosses an A or B for competence (71 percent) – the highest grade given – and work ethic (70 percent).
Bosses also received high marks (B or better) for their communication skills, people management skills, and ability to handle performance-related issues (all 67 percent). The older the employee, however, the more critical they are of their boss: Baby Boomers1 and Gen Xers grade managers more harshly with a C, D, or F for overall people management skills (37 percent and 38 percent, respectively). Worldwide, the employee-manager connection remains critically important: 70 percent of employees say their relationship with their manager is an extremely or very important factor when deciding to remain at their current job, with 22 percent agreeing it’s somewhat important. Millennial (79 percent) and Gen Z (73 percent) employees feel strongest about the importance of the manager relationship for retention compared with Gen X (66 percent) and Baby Boomer (62 percent) counterparts.
Other findings
Differences by sector and nationality
Despite rating their managers No. 1 in all categories, 95 percent of Indian employees still say they could do their boss’s job better all of the time (47 percent) or some of the time (48 percent). This sentiment is followed by 87 percent of Mexican workers and 71 percent of French workers. Canada (61 percent) and U.S. (59 percent) workers feel the least confident that they could do their boss’s job better – yet it’s still more than half of all employees.
Managers in the technology industry are on top overall, scoring highest marks (A or B) in people management (81 percent), communication (75 percent), and modeling work-life balance (70 percent). Professional services managers (e.g. accountants, engineers, lawyers) rank second-best, with 70 percent of employees grading them a B or better for people management and communication. Employees in the technology (77 percent) and finance (70 percent) sectors say they have a strong or very strong relationship with their boss, followed by manufacturing (62 percent); education (61 percent); retail (61 percent); and professional services (61 percent).
There is room for managers to model better work-life balance in frontline industries – i.e. those who must be present to do their jobs – with 53 percent of employees in federal government, 42 percent in healthcare, and 42 percent in retail giving their boss a C or worse.
Regarding pure competence, managers are graded worst – C or lower – by public safety (44 percent); federal government (39 percent); transportation/distribution/logistics (35 percent); and healthcare (34 percent) employees. More than one in three employees give poor marks of a C or worse for their manager’s work ethic in federal government (37 percent); healthcare (34 percent); transportation/distribution/logistics (34 percent); and manufacturing (33 percent).
Image by Pixabay
September 23, 2019
Having data about people and their behaviour does not create a science
by John Rapley • Comment, Technology, Workplace