Search Results for: population

December 19, 2018

ONS says Ill health and caring duties biggest barriers to work for older people

by Sara Bean • Flexible working, News, Workplace

The two most important barriers to working for those in their 50s and early to mid-60s are health and caring; according to the latest analysis from the ONS. Living longer: Fitting it all in – working, caring and health in later life, advises that although people in their 50s and early 60s have a good level of general health the prevalence of health problems increases over this age range and impacts on the likelihood of being in paid work. Of those potential older workers who are out of work (but would like to work), 38 percent of men and 28 percent of women are unemployed. Women are more likely to be looking after home or family than men (19 percent and 6 percent). Over a third of people aged 50 to 64 years are out of work because they are sick or disabled – with ill health the main barrier to working for both men (37 percent) and women (35 percent).

December 18, 2018

Government’s new workplace reforms: the world responds

by Neil Franklin • Flexible working, News, Workplace

The UK government has introduced what it claims to be the most significant package of workplace reforms for 20 years in response to last year’s Taylor Report on working practices. The Good Work Plan has introduced a range of measures which the Government claims will improve the rights of agency and part time workers and discourage employers from indulging in unwelcome practices. The reforms are intended to stop businesses opting out of equal pay arrangements for agency employees and improve the conditions for gig economy workers generally, for example by giving workers details of their rights from the first day in a job, such as eligibility for sick leave, pay levels, maternity and paternity leave.

December 17, 2018

Don’t be a turkey, get on the commercial property gravy train

by Jo Sutherland • Comment, Property

Last week, the RICS Commercial Property conference tackled the biggest issues impacting the built environment sector, arming delegates with fragments of the formula for future success. The morning CEO Question Time panel put a trio of CEOs in the spotlight. In addition to airing concerns about the current political climate, rapidly shifting societal attitudes, diversity and inclusion, the ageing population coupled with the ongoing housing shortage, climate change and the complexities involved in exploring new business models to drive and diversify revenue, they all zoomed in on the accelerated pace of change we’re witnessing, crowning it the key challenge for today’s C-suite.

December 11, 2018

Debt, relationship breakup and bullying are the top employer concerns about employee mental health

by Neil Franklin • News, Wellbeing

Debt, separation and bullying are the personal issues of most concern to employers when it comes to employee mental health, according to a report from Aon. It polled employers online and during an Aon seminar called the Contemporary Drivers of Mental Health, in which Paul Farmer, CEO of Mind and co-author of a government report, ‘Thriving at Work, a review of mental health and employers’ presented his findings.

December 7, 2018

Seven reasons why this will not be the office of the future

by Mark Eltringham • Comment, Facilities management, Furniture, Workplace design

At this time of year, it seems like we don’t have to wait more than a few hours before some or other organisation is sharing its prognosis about how we will be working in the future. The thing these reports usually share in common, other than a standardised variant of a title and a common lexicon of agility, engagement and connectivity, is a narrow focus based on their key assumptions about what the office of the future will be like. While these are rarely false per se, and often offer valuable insights, they also frequently exhibit a desire to look at only one part of the great workplace elephant. While the more informed reports make excellent points and identify trends, across most there are routine flaws in thinking that can lead them to make narrow and sometimes incorrect assumptions and so draw similarly flawed conclusions. Talk of the office of the future tells us rather a lot about how we view offices right now.

December 6, 2018

Asia increasingly challenging economic hegemony of western cities

by Neil Franklin • Cities, News

Oxford Economics has published its annual Global Cities research report projecting the shifting landscape of the world’s leading cities from 2019 to 2035. It examine which major cities will be the urban superpowers of the future and which are poised for the most rapid expansions of their economies, populations and business heft. Its main finding is that Asia’s cities, especially those in India such as Surat (pictured) and Agra are making huge strides, although New York, Tokyo, Los Angeles and London stay as the metropolitan superpowers. New York maintains pole position while Tokyo falls below Los Angeles and London in the ranking. More →

November 19, 2018

A cheap day return to Farringdon, please

by Neil Usher • Comment, Facilities management

Timing is everything. Re-launching a professional body while the country’s politics unceremoniously implode could not have been foreseen, but the vacuous space was full of the registered and invited, many with a trail of string going back a few decades or more. What a lovely gathering of old friends it was. On Monday 12th The BIFM formally changed its name to the Institute of Workplace and Facilities Management. This event was to reveal the new creative collateral and celebrate the optimism/excitement/apprehension (delete as applicable).

November 8, 2018

Your relationship with your boss may be playing a role in your stress levels

by Martin Turner and Matthew Slater • Comment, Wellbeing

Everybody knows how horrible it is to be stressed out at work. Sadly, across the world, employees are being subjected to increasing work demands and, as a result, work stress is on the rise. As we try to understand the root of the problem, we often end up blaming our boss. But is that really fair? Our new study, published in The Leadership Quarterly, suggests that your relationship with your boss does influence how you respond to stress.

November 6, 2018

Employers struggle to understand what motivates people in new generation of megacities

by Neil Franklin • Cities, News, Workplace

Mercer has published the results of an extensive study that examines the needs of workers in the world’s fastest-growing cities across four key factors – human, health, money and work. The study provides insight into the motivations of workers against the backdrop of fierce competition for their talent. The study, People first: driving growth in emerging megacities (registration required), is based on a survey of 7,200 workers and 577 employers in 15 current and future megacities across seven countries, namely Brazil, China, India, Kenya, Mexico, Morocco and Nigeria. As defined by the United Nations, these 15 cities will have a combined population of 150 million people by 2030 and share strong, projected GDP.

November 2, 2018

Skills and new businesses drive decade of recovery for UK cities

by Neil Franklin • Cities, News

Improving skills levels and new business formation have been the key long-term drivers of growth for UK cities since the financial crisis, according to the latest Demos-PwC Good Growth for Cities 2018 index that ranks cities on a combination of economic performance and quality of life. The latest Index analyses a decade of economic and social data to determine what long-term factors drive Good Growth. PwC analysis shows that the average city in our index has improved its good growth score significantly over 10 years from 2005-7 to 2015-17, and has now more than recovered from the recession and downturn triggered by the global financial crisis.

October 31, 2018

What is in a name for the UK facilities management sector?

by Jo Sutherland • Comment, Facilities management

Westminster. Home to fiery debate, unwavering scrutiny, calls for change, and cries of “Order! Order!”. Once again, RICS’s HQ, on Parliament Square, was jam-packed with a passionate and feisty crowd, panellists and audience alike, all set on pushing the industry conversation forward. While some were keen to maintain order during FMJ’s most recent RICS-IFMA debate concerning facility management’s place in the 21st century, others were set on redefining FM in order to pinpoint what this yet unestablished definition means for the future of the profession.

October 15, 2018

Review of progress on diversity in boardrooms shows that there is much to do

by Neil Franklin • News

Business leaders have been urged by Sir John Parker to step up their work on ethnic and cultural diversity at the top of business. The call to action comes as the Parker Review Committee, led by Sir John Parker, publishes its first annual update to track the progress made against the recommendations in its Final Report, published in October 2017. The Final Report urged business leaders to improve the ethnic and cultural diversity of UK Boards to better reflect their employee base and the communities they serve. It set out achievable objectives and timescales to encourage greater diversity.