June 16, 2020

Study suggests need for UK employers to offer employee mental wellbeing support

A survey of 2,000 UK consumers by digital health company BioBeats suggests that nearly a quarter (21 percent) of UK employees say that their mental health will be negatively impacted by extending remote working measures post-lockdown. Only 5 percent of respondents state that their mental health will improve as a result of extended remote working but alarmingly only 3 percent say they would ask for help in coping with this new way of working, which presents a striking gap between employees’ needs and their ability to seek support from their employer. More →

June 12, 2020

Building a culture of trust has never been more important

by Jonathan Richards • Comment, Workplace

Trust is a concept we often find hard to describe. It’s sticky, intangible and difficult to pinpoint but we know when trust is absent. When it’s missing from a workforce, a culture can unravel. According to the Culture Economy Report 2020, 43 percent of employees in UK SME’s don’t trust their employer to do the right thing – a 16 point decline since 2018. This is alarming. Working remotely over the last few months has highlighted just how important workplace trust is, between employees and management, and vice versa. More →

June 12, 2020

Half of HR managers say profession must change post-pandemic

by George Eltringham • News, Workplace

The role played by HR teams during the Coronavirus crisis has thrust the function into the spotlight and demonstrated the importance of an effective people strategy. That’s according to new research from Personio, which also finds that HR teams are eager to maintain a more influential and strategic role in the future. And with half (51 percent) of managers claiming that the function cannot continue as it did prior to the outbreak, it’s clear the pandemic has only accelerated the profession’s ongoing evolution. More →

June 11, 2020

The lessons learned under lockdown will help us grow and improve

by Alicia Michael • Features, Workplace design

As the global community navigates the Coronavirus crisis, the nature of the workplace will be more important than ever. We have been working remotely on an unprecedented scale, and the benefits are clear – flexibility, time with family, and reduced commuting as a start. In some form, working from home is here to stay, even as returning to the physical office becomes possible. However, we have also discovered the limitations to remote working. While teams have been able to stay connected virtually, this cannot substitute for face-to-face collaboration, which is essential to fostering innovation. More →

June 11, 2020

Mental health in UK tech deteriorates in lockdown

by George Eltringham • News, Wellbeing

The easing of lockdown restrictions and a return to offices is raising the stress levels of over a quarter of UK tech professionals (26 percent) at a time when over 1 in 3 (36 percent) report that their mental health has deteriorated during Covid-19, according to a new Harvey Nash Study. The relaxing of restrictions has left tech professionals worrying most about bringing Covid-19 back into the home, and the health risk of their daily commute. More →

June 9, 2020

A thank you for the bitter knowledge offered by the lockdown

by Adam Burtt-Jones • Comment, Flexible working, Workplace design

With all challenges come opportunities. Covid-19 will most likely be the single largest challenge and disrupter of a generation. It has the potential to create the greatest significant shift in working behaviours and standards of the past hundred years. Workspace consultants, enlightened clients, designers, researchers and commentators have been hammering the agile / home/ remote working drum for the past twenty years or more, waiting patiently for this kind of opportunity. More →

June 4, 2020

Right, said Fred. Here I am again

by Mark Eltringham • Comment, Technology, Wellbeing

If there has been an underlying driver of workplace thinking over the past several decades, it has been a rejection of the principles of scientific management. These begat the idea of the office as a factory, subject to the same rigid times and places of work and the same culture of process, efficiency and productivity. This made a pantomime villain of its key figure Frederick Taylor. The worst adjective you could use to describe a working culture was Taylorist. More →

May 20, 2020

People miss the office but most do not want to return full time

by Neil Franklin • Flexible working, News

The latest report on the attitudes of people towards their working lives after lockdown comes from Okta, Inc. in its report The New Workplace: Re-imagining Work After 2020, which claims to highlight the technological and cultural challenges office workers have faced as well as the lesson businesses can take to emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic. The research, which was conducted by YouGov, surveyed 2,000+ office workers across the UK, also found differences about the impact our new way of work has had on London based workers compared to workers in the rest of the country. More →

May 11, 2020

Employee productivity proves remarkably resilient during pandemic

by Neil Franklin • News, Wellbeing

The surge in remote working coupled with the rapid adoption of communications and collaborative technology means many companies have seen no significant change in employee productivity, according to a new report from Willis Towers Watson. Organisations have responded to the rapid disruption caused by the dramatic spread of COVID-19 by finding innovative ways to help their workers cope with the impact of the pandemic, while at the same time preparing for an eventual return to the workplace for many employees, according to the survey of employers’. More →

May 7, 2020

Coronavirus crisis drives freelancer confidence to unimagined lows

by Neil Franklin • News

Freelancers’ confidence in their businesses and the wider economy has been driven to record lows by the Coronavirus crisis, according to research by IPSE (the Association of Independent Professionals and the Self-Employed) and PeoplePerHour, Europe’s largest freelance marketplace. Freelancers’ three month confidence in their businesses had already fallen to a six-year low last quarter because of concerns about the changes to IR35 tax regulations. More →

May 1, 2020

Organisations should seize this opportunity to look at their values

by James Morley • Comment, Flexible working, Wellbeing

Not since 911 has one event triggered such global impact and uncertainty across all businesses and industries. The unprecedented speed and scale of organisational change has challenged even the prepared leadership team. More →

April 30, 2020

The lockdown gives us a chance to reconsider business ethics

by Mark Strassman • Comment

The past few weeks have been a time of extreme disruption and tension caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, but there has been a sliver of good news – people around the world have been quick to notice the environmental benefits of people remaining in their homes. More →