September 24, 2020

Workers long for clarity in their relationship with employers

by Jayne Smith • News, Wellbeing, Working lives

Employees are longing for purposeful and visible changes to increase safety measures in the office, according to a new survey of 2,000 people from NELSON Worldwide. This is top of people’s minds in order to assure that re-entry in the workplace is safe, according to the firm. Whether this is carried out by means of wayfinding, increased sanitation protocols, or direct implementation of distancing in workstations, staff are eager to see the action carried out. The survey concludes that 83 percent of employees have rated physical safety measures to be extremely or very important. (more…)

September 24, 2020

Under-35s face a confidence crisis at work

by Jayne Smith • News, Wellbeing, Working lives

Under-35s are in the midst of a professional confidence crisis, with work seen as a place where they feel isolated and afraid to speak out, claims research carried out by culture change business Utopia. The study which interviewed over 2,000 respondents across the UK, claims that workers under the age of 35 feel immense pressure to hold a standard of professionalism that shuns emotion and favours traditionally masculine behaviour, all the while juggling responsibilities at home. (more…)

September 15, 2020

Parents dedicate two extra working days a month to new Covid school routine

by Jayne Smith • Flexible working, News, Working lives

New research by Vita Health Group claims British parents are set to spend the equivalent of more than two working days extra a month on the school routine due to the additional childcare management needed due to the pandemic and employers will have to consider this in their workplace policies to ensure working parents don’t burn out. (more…)

September 7, 2020

Ditching the 9 to 5 has enlightening implications for the design of offices

by David Clements • Comment, Workplace design

What can we learn from 2020? Maybe one of the most important lessons is that we had got to accustomed to functioning, working and thinking like machines rather than humans? The deadly Covid-19 virus reminded all of us that the mortal human can never relax and believe all is ‘’OK’’. (more…)

September 2, 2020

Stress and burnout threaten the benefits of working from home

by Jayne Smith • News, Wellbeing

A new study by Adaptavist, suggests the threats to long-term productivity and employee wellbeing posed by improvised solutions during the transition to remote work. Overall, 82 percent of people report they are equally (47 percent) if not more productive (35 percent) working from home, and company-wide communications have improved during the pandemic. However, the lack of a shared understanding of which tool to use and how to communicate with it, combined with the ‘always on’ nature of working from home, brings added stress and motivational challenges for remote workers. (more…)

September 2, 2020

Video call fatigue amounts to millions of unproductive businesses hours

by Jayne Smith • News, Technology, Wellbeing

A recent study, which was commissioned by Bayfields Opticians & Audiologists and questioned 2000 people, claims people spent an average of three hours and 12 minutes each week on video calls – an increase of 120 percent compared to before lockdown. Connected Brits admit to spending hours getting ready for work-related video calls during lockdown and struggling to get back into the zone once the call is over, leading to millions of hours of ‘wasted’ work time since lockdown.

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August 28, 2020

A new social contract can improve the everyday experience of work

by Mark Spratt • Comment, Workplace

It’s not happening quickly enough for some and too slowly for others, but most companies are in the midst of managing a return to work and grappling with a very different post COVID-19 world and what it means for employees. HR professionals are paying close attention to how well employees are faring and are looking to build new forms of employee care into company cultures and values. But maybe there is something more they can do to foster employee trust and safety? (more…)

August 27, 2020

Number of calls to mental health helpline jump as depression cases double

by Jayne Smith • News, Wellbeing

Data from the health and wellbeing provider, Health Assured has revealed the number of people calling for support for depression on their EAP (employee assistance programme) helpline increased by 31 percent in June compared to May this year. In June, the helpline received an additional 249 calls regarding the illness. (more…)

August 27, 2020

US workers under lockdown three times more likely to report mental health issues

by Neil Franklin • News, Wellbeing

According to a recent survey of more than 1,500 US based respondents, workers are now three times more likely to report poor mental health than they were before the pandemic. The study also claims that seventy-five percent of people have experienced burnout at work, with 40 percent saying they’ve experienced burnout during the pandemic specifically. The report suggests that this is not surprising, given that 37 percent of employed respondents are currently working longer hours than usual since the pandemic started. (more…)

August 20, 2020

Half of British workers associate new tech with business growth

by Neil Franklin • News, Technology

British workers are much more positive about the impact of new technologies on job creation and business growth compared to employees based in Belgium, Germany, France or the Netherlands. This is according to a large-scale survey conducted by payroll and HR services provider SD Worx in collaboration with the Antwerp Management School. 44.7 percent of Brits have seen the number of jobs rise thanks to tech innovation, compared to 44.4 percent of the French, 38.4 percent of the Dutch, 35.6 percent of the Belgian and 25.7 percent of the German workers. The data looks at organisations in the past three years. (more…)

August 18, 2020

The challenge for the office is to stay relevant

by Ben Capper • Comment, Workplace design

The world is going through some painful changes at breakneck speed. As a result, the word unprecedented has reached number one spot on our ‘words to avoid’ list. What’s the big deal with unprecedented anyway? Our obsession with all things unprecedented taps into our fear of the unknown. But life itself is an unknown: Life is beta. Nothing is permanent. Every single day things happen that are unprecedented. Damn, said it again. (more…)

August 17, 2020

Is it time to get rid of all workplace policies and procedures?

by Freddie Steele • Comment, Workplace

After twenty-five years of telling employers that their first response to any workplace problem should be ‘draw up a policy’, it pains me to even suggest this; but what if we abolished all workplace policies and procedures? Yes, you heard me correctly – no policies for discipline and grievances, for handling sickness absence, menopause, mental health, flexible working, redundancies, emails, dress codes, discrimination etcetera. (more…)