Search Results for: business

November 28, 2013

RICS ‘Think Strategic’ campaign opens with advice to FMs on cutting costs

by Sara Bean • Facilities management, News, Property

The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) has published the first in a series of monthly articles offering practical advice from leading industry professionals for FM practitioners. It marks the beginning of RICS new ‘Think Strategic’ campaign designed to encourage FM professionals to think and act more strategically by providing the tools to develop an FM plan that will directly feed into their wider corporate objectives. The idea is to help FM leaders demonstrate the value of the profession to business and gain a competitive advantage. Click the link Why cutting FM costs can have a business-wide impact to access the first of the articles, which are all available to download for free from the RICS website. More →

November 28, 2013

The future belongs to those who leave themselves choices of how to deal with it

by Mark Eltringham • Comment, Facilities management, Flexible working, Technology, Workplace

Everybody likes to talk and read about the future. It’s one of the reasons we see so many reports about what the ‘office of the future’ will look like. Often these attempts at workplace prognosis are overwhelmingly rooted in the present which might betray either a degree of timidity or lack of awareness of just how far along their standard list of trends we really are. Even when such reports appear to be bang on the money, they tend to disregard one of the most important factors we need to consider when trying to get a handle on the future, which is the need to leave ourselves choices. This is important because not only will the future be stranger than we think, but stranger than we can imagine, to paraphrase J B S Haldane.

November 26, 2013

BYOD is not a temporary problem generated by a few errant staff

by Sara Bean • Flexible working, News, Technology

While most organisations are increasingly feeling the imperative to “do mobile,” many don’t know where to begin. Today’s employers have diverse workforces, made up of full-time staff, external contracting agencies, independent professionals, and part-time staff. In addition to the changes in the workforce, all enterprises (business, government and community) have been pushing their IT processes beyond their own organisational boundaries and it is increasingly clear they don’t have absolute control over the tools used to access their corporate systems and data. All this means, advises the experts at Gartner, bring your own device (BOYD) is not just a purchasing issue, but should be approached more broadly with the applications and strategies necessary for a changing world.

November 26, 2013

Meetings cost around £16,000 per employee each year, claims survey

by Mark Eltringham • News, Workplace

According to a new survey from conference call provider Powwownow, travel costs and time spent on the road and in meetings cost UK companies just under £16,000 per employee each year. And, because each businessperson attends an average of 207 meetings annually, taking up around 80 working days (plus the five days spent travelling between them) of their precious time, firms are missing out on the cost savings offered by alternative such as conference calls. While an average six person meeting costs around £395 in the physical world, a comparable conference call costs just £46. The survey also found that the top tenth of business people spend an average of £4,800 on travel each year.

November 25, 2013

How a 70 year old happiness model is still helping us to define wellness

by Mark Eltringham • Comment, Workplace

This year marks the seventieth anniversary of Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, the model that still introduces most of us to notions of what makes people happy and fulfilled. Maslow first proposed the model in his 1943 paper “A Theory of Human Motivation” in Psychological Review, developing his ideas throughout the rest of his life. His work has been parallelled and built upon by other researchers since, but few have had the influence and longevity. Maslow’s hierarchical characterisation of human needs by category is ingrained into the minds of students all over the world. In the first of two pieces to mark this anniversary, Cathie Sellars of Workspace argues that Maslow continues to offers us the ideal definition of wellness.

November 25, 2013

Over half of managers ‘constantly worried’, with real estate most stressed sector

by Sara Bean • News, Property, Workplace

Over half (51 percent) of managers say they feel ‘constantly worried’ and a disturbingly high number (40 percent) have experienced depression as a result of being stressed. The research, which was carried out by YouGov to support Bupa’s Healthy Minds programme polled the views of 6,000 employees across a range of industries, job levels and regions. It found that real estate is the UK’s most stressed sector, with more than half of workers (54 percent) feeling the pressure and a further one in five struggling to cope (20 percent) and worried about the effect of stress on their health (22 percent). With one in six adults experiencing a mental health problem at any given time, the impact on businesses is significant in terms of staff absence, productivity and performance.

November 22, 2013

Generation X leads the world in embracing social media recruitment

by Sara Bean • News, Technology, Workplace

Nearly half (44%) of respondents to a new global survey on social media and workforce have been contacted about a job via social media over the past year. All generations of workers are taking part in this trend, with surprisingly Generation X (47%) just slightly in front of Gen Y and Baby Boomers (42%) in receiving job information via social networks. However the latest Kelly Global Workforce Index finds the UK lags behind many other European Countries, with just 40 per cent of UK respondents contacted through social media about an employment opportunity in the prior year, compared with 55 per cent in Germany and Poland, and 52 per cent in Ireland. More →

November 20, 2013

Lawyers often view flexible working as ‘career suicide’, claims report

by Mark Eltringham • Flexible working, Legal news, Workplace

As we reported just a few weeks ago, when it comes to implementing flexible working practices, one of the UK’s most obdurate sectors is the legal profession. While an increasing number of law firms are implementing flexible working of one sort or another, progress remains slow compared to other types of organisation and is offered primarily to certain echelons of employees. Now a new survey from commercial solicitors Fletcher Day explores the reasons for this recalcitrance and suggests that many law firms are culturally reluctant to offer flexible working, may only agree to it as a short term measure and believe that flexible working is not compatible with a successful career. This view also appears to be held by over three-quarters of the lawyers surveyed, including those who may have requested flexible working arrangements recently.

November 18, 2013

Zero hours contracts: Are they really such bad news?

by Adam Hartley • Comment, Flexible working

Zero hours contracts have hardly been out of the news in recent weeks. The overwhelming majority of the media coverage has been negative, suggesting that zero hours contracts are exploitative of workers and should be outlawed. The pressure gauge has risen to such an extent that, in September, the Business Secretary, Vince Cable, announced that there would be a consultation process to tackle any abuse discovered. The Labour Party has also announced it will be conducting its own review. But why all this sudden interest? Zero hours contracts are not a new phenomenon… and, on the face of it, they provide employers with the type of flexibility which the Government has been so keen to introduce, allowing employers to maintain a flexible workforce capable of meeting short-term staffing needs. More →

November 18, 2013

Interview: Dave Coplin of Microsoft on Big Data, engagement and culture

by Mark Eltringham • Comment, Technology, Workplace, Workplace design

Dave Coplin joined Microsoft in 2005, and is now its Chief Envisioning Officer, helping to envision the full potential that technology offers a modern, digital society. He is a globally recognised expert on technological issues such Cloud computing, privacy, big data, social media, open government, advertising and the consumerisation of technology and is the author of a recent book called “Business Reimagined: Why work isn’t working and what you can do about it”. He is also one of the main speakers at this year’s Worktech conference in London on 19 and 20 November. In this exclusive interview with Insight he offers his thoughts on the lack of engagement between firms and employees, the most common misunderstandings about flexible working and the challenges facing managers in IT, FM and HR.

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November 15, 2013

Quarter of the UK workforce report they’re suffering long-term ill health

by Sara Bean • Facilities management, News, Workplace

Administrative and support activities, which includes facilities management, is one of five UK industries where employees have reported the highest levels of long-term ill health. However across all the sectors a staggering eight million people, or a quarter of the UK’s workforce (27%) say they suffer from a health problem that’s lasted more than a year. According to the new Health at Work Index from the British Heart Foundation (BHF) one in ten workers (12%) – approximately 3.5 million people – said their ability to do their job is limited by poor health. This includes over half of diabetes sufferers (58%) and the same proportion of people suffering from depression, mental illness or panic attacks (58%). More →

November 14, 2013

As economy picks up, change management is greatest employment challenge

by Sara Bean • News, Workplace

The latest figures from the Office of National Statistics show that the unemployment has fallen to 7.6 per cent, its lowest rate in more than three years, and the signs are that employers can plan for the future with renewed confidence. In a poll conducted at the recent Chartered Management Institute’s National Annual Conference, 74 per cent of managers said market conditions for their business are currently more conductive for growth than they were last year. Their biggest management challenge in the coming year will be implementing change initiatives, with other priorities being: coordinating business development activities; getting the best performance out of their team; achieving results with fewer resources; internally promoting their department as a value-adding business partner; and managing and bringing through star performers.