Search Results for: pay ratio

October 17, 2014

The solution to complex issues like green building is to become more sophisticated

by Paul Goodchild • Comment, Environment, Facilities management, Workplace design

One of the current preoccupations of the World Green Building Council is to demonstrate how green business is good business. The way it is presenting this argument is intriguing because as well as extolling the most anticipated benefits of green building design, such as lower energy bills, it is linking green building design with human factors such as productivity, wellness and work-life balance. It has produced a number of reports on this subject, most recently in September with a publication titled Health, Wellbeing and Productivity in Offices which found ‘overwhelming evidence’ of the link between office design and productivity. What such compelling reports also highlight are the complex challenges we face and the sophisticated approach we must take to environmental issues and corporate social responsibility. Fortunately this is already exhibited by many organisations.

October 9, 2014

Winner and shortlist announced for UK Prime Minister’s Better Public Building Award

by Mark Eltringham • Environment, News, Property, Public Sector

Wiltshire County Council Offices

The (rather long) shortlist of nominees for the Prime Minister’s Better Public Building Award 2014 has been announced by the UK Cabinet Office. Hosted as part of The British Construction Industry Awards which aim to ‘recognise all-round excellence in construction, including the overall design, and delivery of buildings and civil engineering projects’ the award’s original nominees were assessed on a range of standards including economic and social value. As well as the rather impressive new headquarters for Wiltshire County Council (above), the Government claims the shortlist includes a college building that is engineered to be one of the quietest buildings in the country as well as a building that will almost entirely be powered by fish oil. Previous winners include Tate Modern and the Velodrome at the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park. The Government, ever keen to be down with the kids, has produced a Buzzfeed feature on the nominated projects.

September 2, 2014

Office planting improves workers’ quality of life and productivity finds study

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

Claims by office designers and suppliers that office planting has wider health benefits for occupiers than just making the place look more attractive have been given a boost in a new academic study which provides some empirical evidence. In the first field study of its kind, researchers found enriching a ‘lean’ office with plants could increase productivity by as much as 15 per cent. The study, which involved academics from the University of Exeter; the University of Groningen in The Netherlands, and the University of Queensland, Australia examined the impact of ‘lean’ and ‘green’ offices on staff’s perceptions of air quality, concentration, and workplace satisfaction, and monitored productivity levels over subsequent months in two large commercial offices in the UK and The Netherlands. It concludes that ‘green’ offices with plants make staff happier and more productive than ‘lean’ designs stripped of greenery. More →

August 20, 2014

Rise in staff social media profiling will transform the workplace

by Sara Bean • News, Technology, Workplace

Whether or not the younger generation are in fact more technically astute is still open to debate, but one thing is clear, they’re far less perturbed at the idea of being digitally monitored than the older generation. New research reveals that the younger generation are more open to sharing their personal data with their employees, with 36 per cent of Generation Y workers saying they would be happy to do so. Nearly a third of people would be happy for their employer to have access to their personal data, such as social media profiles and this kind of data monitoring of employees will rise over the next decade as Generation Y enters the workforce. Given the fact that by 2020 this generation will form half of the global workforce – they’re set to bring with them their different attitudes to technology and personal data. More →

August 14, 2014

Sustainable buildings are not more costly to construct, finds report

by Sara Bean • Environment, Facilities management, News, Property

The widely held belief that sustainable buildings are more costly to construct is dispelled in a new report which shows that achieving lower BREEAM ratings can in fact, incur little or no additional cost. Researchers from Sweett Group and BRE examined the actual costs and savings associated with a wide range of sustainable building strategies. The research team applied cost data from real construction projects to three case study buildings – an office, secondary school and community healthcare centre – to produce detailed capital and operational cost information. The report; Delivering sustainable buildings: Savings and payback also reveals the associated payback to be gained from reduced utility costs and finds that even where achieving higher BREEAM ratings incurs some additional costs, this can be paid back within two to five years through the reduced costs of operating a more sustainable building. More →

August 11, 2014

Government extends public estate scheme as DCLG moves in with Home Office

by Mark Eltringham • Facilities management, News, Property, Public Sector

The UK government has announced that it is to extend its groundbreaking One Public Estate scheme to a further twenty local authorities. The programme aims to divest and consolidate government-owned land and property to cut public sector spending and boost economic growth and regeneration. The government believes the initial phase will save £21m in running costs and £88m in capital receipts, generate around £40m for local economies and create an estimated 5,500 jobs and 7,500 homes over the next five years. The Cabinet Office is now looking to build on this with the extension of the schemes to councils including Liverpool and Birmingham city centres as well as six from Greater Manchester and Cornwall, Southampton and Plymouth. The Government Property Unit will provide funding and training to the participating authorities.

July 9, 2014

Sharp rise in demand for staff could spark a ‘vacancy vacuum’

by Sara Bean • News, Workplace

There was a record fall in permanent staff availability in June, according to the latest Recruitment and Employment Confederation (REC) and KPMG Report on Jobs which found the rate of contraction has accelerated to the sharpest seen in the survey’s history, which began back in October 1997. There was also a sharp deterioration in availability of temporary/contract staff, with June’s drop the greatest seen since March 1998. Amid reports of a shortage of suitable candidates, and with demand for staff increasing, permanent salaries rose during June at a survey record rate. However, as demand for staff has grown, this month saw the number of workers available to fill vacancies plummet to an all-time low, in particular across business development and sales. The latest report fuels concerns of a vacancy vacuum – and a reminder for employers that, for staff, remuneration is about much more than take home pay. More →

June 23, 2014

Breathing space? Why our office air could be harming us

by Richard Saint • Comment, Facilities management, Workplace design

As reported last week, the vast majority of office workers might prefer to work outdoors; but the office is where we spend most of our working lives. Indeed, for an average of eight hours a day, five days a week, office workers can reliably be found in the same surroundings – at a familiar desk, with familiar colleagues, within a familiar building. Perhaps as a result of this, too few of us stop to consider the risks of working indoors, assuming that the danger of serious harm is the sole preserve of outdoor working sites. Nonetheless, office work contains risks which are entirely its own. For example, while outdoor workers benefit from physical exercise, sunshine (occasionally), and fresh air, office workers perform their daily duties in a space where air is continuously recirculated, posing numerous dangers. Indeed, indoor air pollution is actually a major public health problem, posing a myriad of risks as dangerous particles accumulate in office air.

June 16, 2014

Demand for London commercial property pushing occupiers into earlier relocations

by Sara Bean • Facilities management, News, Property

The revival of London’s financial, professional and business sectors, along with sustained demand from the TMT (Technology, Media and Telecoms) market is resulting in increasing demand for commercial property across Central London. This along, with a restricted supply of existing stock, due to conversion of office to residential usage is prompting many occupiers into making relocation decisions well in advance of a lease break or expiry. Cluttons’ London Property outlook for the second quarter of this year shows that rental costs are increasing in response to sustained demand, with a west to east migration by occupiers in evidence. Many tenants are also relocating from London’s West End to the Southbank area; while further out, ‘fringe’ areas such as Stratford are drawing tenants. More →

June 11, 2014

Challenge for employers to find right talent as candidate availability falls

by Sara Bean • Flexible working, News, Workplace

There’s been a record employment rise over the last three months, with nearly 5,500 more people in work every working day and the number of private sector workers up by more than 2 million since 2010, according to official figures published today. The latest Labour Force Survey tallies with the recently published Recruitment and Employment Confederation (REC) and KPMG Report on Jobs, which revealed the steepest drop in permanent staff availability for 16½ years; fuelling concerns that employers are finding it increasingly difficult to find the talent and skills they need. The report on jobs also suggests that employees want more from their workplace than better pay and better benefits; as though starting salaries continue to rise, job seekers are sending out a very clear message that remuneration is not the only reward they are after. More →

June 4, 2014

Business leaders must do more to address gender inequality says Mitie CEO

by Sara Bean • Facilities management, News, Workplace

The Chair of the Women’s Business Council, (WBC) Mitie Chief Executive Ruby McGregor-Smith, is calling for a fundamental change in mind-set from business leaders, to help remove the final barriers to women’s equality. In the Council’s ‘One Year On’ report which included discussions with over 500 companies and individuals over the last year, as well as canvassing the views of male Chief Executives; the WBC concludes that male leaders are important, as visible agents of change, to ensure women are not held back in reaching their full potential in the workplace. Back in June 2013, the WBC published a number of recommendations for business and government to improve opportunities for women. Since then things have been moving in the right direction. But despite this progress, the organisation argues that male leaders could do more. More →

May 28, 2014

Money alone isn’t enough to attract and hold on to Gen Y employees

by Jessica Pryce-Jones • Comment, Flexible working, Workplace

The retention of Gen Y employees is key for all organisations. No organisation wants to invest in their next generation of management only to find that they leave, and someone new needs to be trained. But the 20-30 year old workers of Gen Y exhibit a new-found job mobility. Which makes for a ticking time-bomb of potential cost and disruption to their employers. The iOpener Institute has gathered and studied questionnaire responses from over 30,000 professionals across the world, gaining insights into how employers can retain their Gen Y talent. The research clearly shows that while pay and financial rewards are important to Gen Y (i.e. they are not prepared to be under-paid for their work), there is no significant correlation between increased levels of pay and greater talent retention.