November 1, 2018
Cultivating a culture of personal development can supercharge performance
We all want success. You started a business because you had a dream. Maybe you wanted to change the world. Maybe you wanted to fulfil a childhood ambition. Or maybe you just want to make parents proud. Whatever that reason may be, you started a venture that was, yes, risky and scary at times. But a safe journey wasn’t an option anyway, we know. To achieve the fulfilment of the dream though, you need a team with you. You need to surround yourself with the best people in the field. You need people who know more than you, are better than you. Because in today’s world, competition is fiercer. You are not anymore competing against locals. The game has become global. It has, therefore, become necessary to never stop innovating.
The rise of data and digitisation has led to the demise of the traditional working day for many CEOs, with a third now checking business analytics first thing in the morning and last thing before they go to bed. This peaks at 54 percent among 25-34 year olds but drops to just 5 percent for leaders over 45, who are much more fixed to their desk. According to the research by Domo (registration required), 80 percent of these leaders prefer to wait until they are in the office to check in. Three quarters (71 percent) of CEOs across the UK and Ireland believe their business could be at risk from current blind spots in data access and skills, however, there is another demographic split. 84 percent of CEOs age 25-34 said it could be a risk, compared to just half of over 55s.
Almost half of UK bosses admit they’ve felt forced to compromise their own health and wellbeing as a result of pressure at work, new research from Vistage has claimed. According to the study, 40 percent of business leaders say the demands of work have caused stress in their personal lives, while nearly a third say they frequently have to work through illness rather than taking the time they need to recover. While a quarter of business leaders say they’ve sought outside help to strike a better balance between their work and personal life, many more are choosing to suffer on in silence while their health and relationships suffer. 
Two-fifths of job-seekers are being hired into new roles only to discover they have the wrong soft skills for the job. This means over half are leaving companies because their personality or work style didn’t fit, claims news research published by HireVue. The 53 percent of those who had left for this reason saying the format of the hiring process had prevented them from discovering the mismatch earlier. While four-fifths (82 percent) of candidates are confident in their ability to articulate their soft skills and personality traits in an interview, many doubt that pre-hire assessments can showcase these important attributes. 
Over seven in ten UK employees want their employers to do more to motivate them claims a new study from Reward Gateway which suggests that some of the alarming effects that being unmotivated has on employees included a worsening in mood (60 percent); reduction in productivity levels (48 percent); declining mental health (46 percent) and a reduction in quality of work (40 percent). Over a quarter (26 percent) say their relationships with family and friends suffer and 2 in 10 admit to drinking more alcohol when lacking motivation.
Although the majority of business leaders rate their business as efficient, nearly a third of respondents to a recent survey waste up to 65 working days per year on administrative tasks, with over half wasting the equivalent of a working month. Priority Software’s Business Process Efficiency Index 2018 suggests business leaders are struggling to take charge of company productivity; and while senior decision-makers expressed the desire to spend more time planning for the future of their businesses, they said too much time is currently occupied by administrative tasks.
Under half (47 percent) of British managers ‘completely agree’ that they would recommend their workplace to others, lagging behind other countries, such as Austria (66 percent), Finland (53 percent), Switzerland (53 percent), and France (51 percent). This is according to a Cornerstone OnDemand and IDC survey of over 1,900 European HR, IT and line of business managers, 
November 2, 2018
Happiness at work: Lessons from home
by Dr Tracy Brower • Comment, Facilities management, Wellbeing, Workplace, Workplace design
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