Search Results for: benefits

Workplace Week focuses on the office and individual productivity in all its forms

by • Events, Facilities management, Flexible working, Workplace, Workplace design

1KP_4971The holy grail of improving people’s productivity was the focus of this year’s Workplace Week, which took place last week from 3-7th November and raised more than £12,500 for Children in Need. The annual event organised by AWA and designed as a celebration of workplace innovation, included visits to 11 workplaces showcasing the latest techniques to get people performing at their very best, a day-long convention and a series of Fringe events. Andrew Mawson, who heads up AWA, opened the convention by setting the discussion in context. “We have maximised asset productivity by getting more people into buildings, and therefore working a building harder. But we need to focus on human productivity. If each organisation could make each person just 5 per cent more productive, that would have a major impact both on that organisation and the wider economy. In the knowledge economy we need to get the very best performance out of each and every brain on the payroll and to create the conditions that consciously support that.

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Unethical behaviour at work may reflect a blame culture with little trust or integrity

by • Comment, Wellbeing, Workplace

Unethical behaviour at work can reflect a blame culture In the same week Mind revealed that many workers are reluctant to admit to feeling stressed, comes data which shows high levels of unethical behaviour in Britain’s workplaces. And the two pieces of research are not unrelated. In a survey of over 1,600 managers by the Institute of Leadership & Management (ILM), almost three quarters (72%) had witnessed employees lying to cover their mistakes, with the same number reporting their colleagues cut corners and delivered substandard work. A further 68% had seen people badmouthing team members behind their backs. The fault lies in workplaces that foster a blame culture, where staff are worried about owning up to mistakes. This causes undue stress and people taking a combative, rather than collaborative approach. The findings formed part of ILM’s ‘The truth about trust’ report into trust and integrity in the UK workplace, which highlights the business benefits of high-trust high-integrity working environments. (more…)

Two new reports claim firms and employees are out of step on flexible working

by • Flexible working, Legal news, News, Workplace

flexible workingThe two latest stones to be tossed into the flexible working maelstrom in the hope of creating a ripple both suggest that employers are out of step with the expectations of their staff when it comes to working hours and conditions. The CIPD launched a new report Getting Smart About Agile Working, at the start of its annual conference in Manchester on 5 November which claims that a third (35 percent) of employees would like to change their working arrangements with nearly half (43 percent) saying they would most like to change the start or finish time of their working day. Meanwhile a separate report from BUPA claims that half of employees of SMEs think their employees underestimate the part that benefits including flexible working have to play in the overall feel of the company, and a similar number (51 percent) believe that not offering such benefits damages an employer’s attractiveness to new recruits.

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Failure to adopt strategic facilities management costs UK £1bn annually

by • Facilities management, News, Public Sector

Strategic facilities managementA new report from the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) claims that over a quarter of UK organisations are failing to adopt a strategic approach to facilities management. For those firms without this approach, the annual average cost is calculated by the report’s authors as £120,000, suggesting a total cost to the economy of nearly £1 billion. The claim is based on a study of around 700 organisations in both the public and private sector and across a range of organisational types and sizes.  Around half of those with a ‘dedicated FM programme’ said that doing so had saved their organisation money, 59 per cent reported an increase in productivity, a fifth (21 percent)reported a drop in absenteeism and nearly half (49 percent) claimed it had made them more attractive to customers. The best results were recorded in the public sector with 70 per cent saying strategic facilities management had increased productivity and 71 percent claiming they had seen an increase in employee engagement.

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More London convention one of highlights of Workplace Week, which starts today

by • Facilities management, News, Workplace design

More London convention highlight of Workplace Week

PwC More London Offices

Tours of Google, Mintel and Lloyds of London are just some of the highlights of Workplace Week, the annual week-long celebration of workplace innovation which starts today. Organised by AWA to raise money for Children in Need, the inaugural Workplace Week in 2009 happened after Andrew Mawson, AWA’s managing director, had the idea for a workplace-related event raising money for the charity. This year’s week includes a programme of 90 minute ‘working workplace’ tours involving some of the UK’s most innovative workplaces; including Google, Mintel, Innocent Drinks, BDO, Edelman, Lloyds of London, Guardian Newspapers, CBI, Invesco, Prostate Cancer, and PWC Embankment Place. The week will also feature a one-day convention at PWC’s More London office near London Bridge on Thursday 6 November entitled, ‘the Work/place Revolution….taking human performance to new levels’. The focus here will be on taking human performance to new levels, with a range of speakers offering case studies, insights and new research. (more…)

Prejudice against those with mental ill health still prevails in the workplace

by • News, Workplace

Overwhelming lack of support for staff with mental ill healthThe overwhelming majority (94%) of business leaders admit there is a prejudice in their organisation towards people with mental health issues, and despite claims by 88 per cent of employers that they are trying to encourage an open culture of discussion around mental health – as many as seven in ten (70%) employees don’t feel they can speak candidly about such issues or concerns. These are the results of a new study, Breaking the Silence, from Bupa, which identifies a disconnect between what leaders think they are doing to support good mental health, and what employees say they are actually experiencing. While three quarters (76%) of business leaders know that creating a mentally healthy workforce makes good business sense, leaders are not as understanding as they believe. Employers admit to labelling employees with mental health conditions unpredictable (27%), erratic (22%) and weak (22%). Meanwhile, almost half (47%) report treading on eggshells around employees who have experienced a mental health condition and one in five leaders (22%) avoid talking to them altogether. (more…)

The business case for green building widens to cover wellness and productivity

by • Comment, Environment, Facilities management, Workplace design

office designThe debate about the economic, commercial and social benefits of green building design continues to evolve rapidly. Where once it was primarily focussed on environmental issues and related cost savings, the world’s major champions of eco-building are now making the case for sophisticated building design that has a broader range of benefits for organisations and individuals. The most significant report in this regard for some years has just been published by the World Green Building Council (WorldGBC). Its study Health, Wellbeing and Productivity in Offices: The Next Chapter for Green Building offers “overwhelming evidence” for the ways in which office design significantly impacts the health, happiness, wellbeing and productivity of people.The report covers a wide range of that influence the wellness, job satisfaction and performance of office workers. It identifies the ways in which these undoubted benefits add a new layer of sophistication to the case for organisations to invest in better, healthier and greener buildings.

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

by • Comment, Environment, Facilities management, Workplace design

office designOne 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.

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Google and Deloitte set out blueprint for collaborative work in Australia

by • Flexible working, News, Technology, Workplace design

collaborative workDeloitte Digital has launched the final version of its report into the collaborative economy carried out on behalf of Google Australia. An interim report, published in July, estimated that the benefits of collaboration to the Australian economy is already $46 billion and could rise to $56 billion. The report also claims that collaboration could help to address specific structural problems including falling productivity and a comparative lack of innovation. The study claims that the average Australian worker spends just under half of a typical working day interacting with other people but that there remains considerable room for improvement in the way those interactions take place. The final version of the report also includes a toolkit to help individuals and organisations to gauge their level and success of their collaborative work. Tellingly, the test is weighted one-third to workplace design, one-third to technology and one-third to culture and governance.

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Employers unready to meet demand for flexible working in UAE, claims report

by • Flexible working, News, Workplace

flexible workingAccording to a new survey from YouGov and Citrix, office workers in the United Arab Emirates are almost universally aware of the benefits of flexible working and increasingly demand it from their employers. Yet under a quarter of organisations ‘encourage and enable’ employees to work away from their main place of work routinely.  The report claims that 94 percent of the 800 UAE office workers who took part in the study say they would feel less stressed, be more productive and achieve better balance between work and family responsibilities if they were given the freedom to work flexibly outside of the office. As a result, demand for flexible working has increased by 20 per cent since an equivalent report in 2013, with many UAE workers also indicating that the ability to work from anywhere would significantly increase their job satisfaction. In contrast, only 23 percent of the businesses surveyed fully ‘encourage and enable’ employees to work from anywhere, using any device.  (more…)

Few employers offer digital tools or support for flexible working

by • Facilities management, Flexible working, News, Technology, Workplace

Majority of staff not been given digital tools to work remotelyAs we reported recently, flexible working has become a massive recruitment incentive, and this is reflected in yet another survey which found nearly three quarters of parents rate flexible working as very important when they are looking for a new job. Homeworking remains the most popular form of flexi-work, yet according to the survey from Workingmums.co.uk of over 2,000 parents, relatively few employers supply equipment or technical support to enable people to work outside the office. It seems the desire amongst employers to accommodate home workers is there, but not the will to furnish them with the tools they need to do the job properly. In fact, the majority of homeworkers use their own equipment and have to deal with any problems themselves. Though 36 per cent can call on technical support if they get into trouble, unsurprisingly, the survey of over 2,000 parents, sponsored by BBC Future Media, found that many still lack full confidence in remote communications tools despite their desire to work from home. (more…)

New innovatively designed West End office development nearly fully let

by • Company news, News, Property, Workplace design

New Portman Square office development nearly fully let10 Portman Square, an innovatively designed office building based in London’s West End, is nearly fully occupied, following an agreement by Ardagh Glass to lease 10,250 sq ft of office space from British Land. Award-winning architecture and interior design practice Jestico+Whiles led the design of 10 Portman Square, which offers column-free floorplates of 18,500 sq ft, and benefits from natural light on all four sides with views across Portman Square. Ardagh Glass will occupy part of the first floor, to join investment management company Independent Franchise Partners, who agreed terms on the other half of the first floor in July. The building, which provides 113,700 sq ft of Grade A office space over seven floors, is also home to Aspect Capital, Arrowgrass Capital Partners and Aramco Overseas Company. The latest deal brings occupancy across the 2.4 million sq ft West End office portfolio to 96 per cent. (more…)

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