Search Results for: productivity

August 19, 2013

CBI raises growth forecasts, but cautious on sustainable recovery

by Sara Bean • Knowledge, News, Property, Workplace

A pick-up in confidence across a broad range of sectors, including services and construction and a better than expected second quarter has led the CBI to raise its growth forecasts, with GDP growth of 1.2 per cent predicted in 2013, up from 1.0 per cent in the May forecast. In 2014, the business group expects the economy to gather pace, forecasting 2.3 per cent GDP growth, up from 2.0 per cent in May. However, unemployment rates look set to stick at around 7.8 per cent. John Cridland, CBI Director-General said: “The economy has started to gain momentum and confidence is picking up, but it’s still early days. We need to see a full-blown rebalancing of our economy, with stronger business investment and trade before we can call a sustainable recovery.” More →

August 19, 2013

New report urges UK’s large organisations to adopt more flexible working

by Mark Eltringham • Facilities management, Flexible working, Knowledge, Technology, Workplace, Workplace design

The UK’s large organisations are missing out on some of the opportunities presented to them by mobile working methodologies according to a new survey from Deloitte and (what else?) telecoms provider EE. The Upwardly Mobile report questioned more than 1,000 employees of firms with more than 1,000 staff including Kier, Royal Mail, Oxfam and BP and found that this situation would change as Generation Y employees assumed the power needed to introduce a more flexible working culture. The report goes on to predict that by 2016, at least one FTSE 350 company will have a Gen Y CEO at the helm.

August 16, 2013

Healthier people theme for this year’s World Green Building Week

by Sara Bean • Environment, Knowledge, News

The UK Green Building Council has published a calendar of events for this year’s World Green Building Week (WGBW) which takes place from 16-20 September 2013. The theme is ‘Greener Buildings, Better Places, Healthier People’, emphasising the value of green buildings to people – whether higher productivity for office workers, improved learning outcomes for students, healthier workplaces for nurses and teachers, or better homes for people. The key messages are that green buildings make better places to live, work and play; that improving indoor and outdoor environmental quality help us to create healthier places to live and work, and that green buildings can improve well-being and quality of life for everyone in the community. More →

August 13, 2013

Unilever extends BT partnership to further more sustainable ways of working

by Sara Bean • Company news, Environment, Flexible working, Technology

Unilever, one of the world’s largest consumer goods companies, which includes Wall’s Ice Cream, Dove beauty products, Lipton and Knorr brands has announced a three year extension to its IT outsourcing contract with BT. It’s part of the firm’s Sustainable Living Plan to grow its business, while reducing its environmental footprint and increasing its social impact. BT, which first won its first contract with the Anglo-Dutch company in November 2002, delivers a fully integrated network providing voice, data, video and mobility services to the company’s 173,000 employees across nearly 100 countries. This includes the delivery of collaborative services such as audio-conferencing and video-conferencing, which is helping Unilever introduce more sustainable ways of working. More →

July 19, 2013

FMs must overcome engagement barriers to sustainability implementation

by Sara Bean • Environment, Facilities management, News

There is overwhelming support for sustainability to be embedded into business operations, but still some challenges in its successful delivery, according to the 7th annual Sustainability in Facilities Management survey from the British Institute of Facilities Management (BIFM). Of the top five barriers to implementation success, three related to engagement; engagement overall, amongst senior management and middle management. The report also found that many FMs are not targeting the areas of highest priority relating to behaviours or processes which have the highest impact, but tend to focus on technologies. More →

July 19, 2013

Dual source lighting schemes illuminate the way ahead for office design

by Shane Cohen • Comment, Facilities management, Lighting, Workplace design

Too bright, too dull, too much glare – lighting (alongside air conditioning) is often one of the most contentious factors in a workplace. Office workers need illumination to read, write, type and interact. Yet many workplaces get it wrong and fail to consider the downsides of poor lighting, and as such staff will suffer from eye strain, headaches and postural problems, leading to sick days, not to mention lost productivity and mistakes. Eighty per cent of office workers experience at least one negative effect from poor quality lighting, according to researchers Bruskin Goldring, and 68 per cent of employees complain about the light in their offices, according to a study by the American Society of Interior Designers.

July 18, 2013

Cooling advice issued on managing soaring workplace temperatures

by Sara Bean • Facilities management, Legal news, News, Workplace

We’d managed to avoid the topic “isn’t it really hot” on Office Insight but as the UK heat-wave enters its third week it’s become impossible to ignore. Employers are being urged by unions to relax workplace dress codes, with the TUC calling for the introduction of a maximum workplace temperature of 30C – or 27C for those doing strenuous work. Under current health and safety law, workplaces can’t legally fall below 16C but there is no upper limit. The Chartered Institution of Building Services Engineers (CIBSE) meanwhile, has issued a new guide that provides greater understanding and improved prediction of overheating in commercial buildings.

July 16, 2013

Work pressures mean over half of managers plan to work on holiday

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

BYOD are either an aide to productivity or fuel unhealthy levels of presenteeism, depending on which piece of research you believe. In a survey (by mobile comms supplier) Citrix, 24 per cent of managers think that using BYOD while away from the office is the best way to avoid the average 25 per cent drop in productivity suffered by smaller businesses during the holiday period. This is borne out by data from the Institute of Leadership & Management (ILM) which found an overwhelming 80 per cent of managers check their Blackberries or smartphone on holiday, a third (33%) checking in every day, and 54 per cent feel compelled to work while on leave. More →

July 11, 2013

Personalised design and office plants proven to boost wellness and performance

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

Allowing staff to make design decisions in a workspace enhanced with office plants can increase wellbeing and wellness by as much as 47 per cent, increase creativity by 45 per cent and increase productivity by 38 per cent, new research has revealed. Visitors at this year’s Chelsea Flower Show were challenged to take part in the study which measured their creativity, happiness and productivity as they experienced a range of different workspace designs. The findings, which would be expected to translate to a significant increase in business profitability, confront the popular belief that plants and art are an unnecessary or even wasteful element of the business environment. Results from this and related scientific investigations indicate that across all measures of psychological comfort and business performance, the managerially popular flexible, controlled, lean office, is consistently inferior to a space enriched by the design decisions of people who work there.

July 8, 2013

Flexible working can come with a career catch for chances of future promotion

by Sara Bean • Flexible working, News, Workplace

Half of all people now work out of the office at least once a week, and more than one in four (27 per cent) every day according to data from software supplier Sage, but a new report by social business the Timewise Foundation warns that this flexibility might come at a price. It found part time and flexible workers face key barriers in terms of career agility, with nearly three in four part time workers saying they haven’t been promoted once since working part time (73 per cent), and over a fifth (22 per cent) saying they wouldn’t even expect to be. Nearly two thirds (63 per cent) believe that promotion with their current employer might be possible, but only by increasing their hours – something that’s not an option for more than a third of respondents (36 per cent) who rate part time hours as ‘crucial’ in their lives, nor a straightforward choice for the 52 per cent who state they are ‘important’ to them. More →

July 2, 2013

Younger workers’ CSR ethics don’t necessarily extend to older generation

by Sara Bean • Comment, Legal news, News, Workplace

Is ageism one of the last bastions of accepted prejudice in the UK? Take the Daily Mail’s “night of the living dead” coverage of the Stones’ Glastonbury performance – deemed acceptable where jokes regarding gender, race or disability are not. A new survey illustrates this attitude. Nearly half of younger workers in a recent poll think older colleagues are in danger of stifling their career prospects by retiring later, that their prolonged presence could damage productivity and that they have very little to teach the younger generation. Yet over half (55 per cent) of Generation Y workers questioned in the poll say the ethical credentials of a company would influence their choice of employer. Since the scrapping of the Default Retirement Age (DRA) the number of over-65s in the labour force has exceeded one million, and the survey, carried out for KPMG by OnePoll warns that tensions could rise as the need for employees to stay in the labour force for longer growing due to social and financial pressures. More →

June 27, 2013

Ergonomics of dishonesty. How desk size influences behaviour

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

The influence the design and layout of the workplace can have on productivity is widely acknowledged. Now, according to a new scientific study expansive physical settings like having a big desk to stretch out at work can cause individuals to feel more powerful, and in turn these feelings of power can elicit more dishonest behaviour such as stealing, cheating, and traffic violations. This might sound far-fetched but The Ergonomics of Dishonesty was written by a group of researchers at leading business schools, including Harvard, Columbia and Berkeley and is soon to be published in a forthcoming issue of the journal Psychological Science. Co-author Andy Yap, explained: “Our research shows that office managers should pay attention to the ergonomics of their workspaces. The results suggest that these physical spaces have tangible and real-world impact on our behaviours.” More →