December 11, 2018
Debt, relationship breakup and bullying are the top employer concerns about employee mental health
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.
Almost half (49 percent) of UK employees admit they speak to colleagues about health concerns before sharing it with a partner or loved one, claims new research by Bupa Health Clinics. Stress, sleep, anxiety and weight problems are among the main concerns being discussed by employees at work, before confiding in those closest to home. The new report found that 46 percent of employees prefer to talk about health with a colleague over a loved one. Many do so with good intentions with more than a third finding it easier to talk to a colleague as they are less likely to worry.
One year on from #MeToo – just one in four workers agree that international media coverage has helped to improve their workplace culture, according to new research on sexual harassment from Acas. The workplace experts commissioned the study from YouGov to find out whether media reporting on #MeToo and high-profile celebrity cases have had any effect on British workplaces. Only a third (30 percent) of survey respondents believe that incidents of sexual harassment in workplaces have decreased in the last five years. 
Over a third of UK employees (37 percent) have felt discriminated against in the workplace, more than one in ten (12 percent) believe they have suffered age discrimination and 8 percent feel they’ve been discriminated against due to their gender. This rises to 11 percent amongst women, claims a new study of 1,300 working adults by ADP. The study also suggests that standards and perceptions of behaviour have shifted across the generations, with those in so-called ‘Generation Snowflake’ more sensitive to unfair treatment than their more mature colleagues. According to the findings, half (50 percent) of those under 35 say they have felt discriminated against, compared to just a quarter (26 percent) of those over the age of 45. The contrast is visible across both age (15 percent vs 14 percent), gender (11 percent vs 5 percent) and other types of discrimination.
January 8, 2019
From nudge tech to listening tools, Gartner makes some workplace predictions for 2019
by Brian Kropp • AI, Comment, Technology, Workplace
Last year we saw businesses reporting their gender pay gap, General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) taking effect, speculation on how Brexit will impact jobs and further impact on how technology is changing the way we work. Looking forward to the year ahead, Gartner has pulled together a fresh set of workplace predictions for the coming year. This includes the demise of employee surveys as the adoption of sophisticated listening tools accelerates; precious little progress in closing the gender pay gap, but the evolution of discrepancies in pay scales between new hires and existing employees; the rise and rise of the #MeToo movement, which could lead to more senior executives being ousted in 2019 than in 2018; and new technologies designed to nudge workers into action.
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