Search Results for: change

March 7, 2019

Firms must break bad habits if they want to improve relationship with employees

To select, engage and retain the best talent, companies are going to have to break their entrenched bad habits, according to a new report from The Myers-Briggs Company. It claims that its Global Trends Report (registration) sets out how businesses can select the best employees, provide effective leadership and help their people to work together efficiently and harmoniously, despite a rapidly changing and increasingly complex business landscape. (more…)

March 6, 2019

Beware the great apex fallacy of workplace design ⁰

by Mark Eltringham • Comment, Flexible working, Furniture, Technology, Workplace design

Of all the memes and narratives that corrupt public discourse about workplace design, the most pernicious is the one that suggests there is a linear evolution to some grand end point called the Office of the Future. There is a natural human inclination to buy this sort of idea, fed by an assumption that what we find most interesting, aspirational and hence what we read and talk about forms a goal. Read any style magazine and you’ll see the same process at work in every facet of our lives. This is why so many people are quick to consume and then regurgitate the idea that what we see happening in the world’s great tech palaces and creative offices represents the apogees of design to which the rest of us must one day succumb. (more…)

March 6, 2019

It’s not a skills gap, it’s a diversity gap

by Agata Nowakowska • Comment, Workplace

As digital transformation impacts organisations in every industry, the workplace as we know it is evolving fast. For IT leaders, the accelerated rate of technological change means the pressure is on to deliver, manage and secure new platforms. But the wider ramifications of digitalisation projects are proving profound, leaving business executives facing a dilemma. (more…)

March 6, 2019

Less time spent commuting is key to workplace wellbeing

by Neil Franklin • Flexible working, News

Lenovo has released a study on ‘Britain’s evolving workplace’ (registration). It claims that more than three quarters (76 per cent) of those that have no commute by working from home are overall satisfied with their job and a third (37 per cent) of those surveyed admit to choosing their current role based on its close proximity to their home. The report claims that the changing nature of the modern workplace benefits both workers and employers, with one in ten workers most productive outside of typical 7am to 6pm working hours and a quarter (26 per cent) wishing to work more flexible hours.

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March 5, 2019

Employees want good tech and flexibility but stick with their own fixed desk

by Sara Bean • AI, Facilities management, Flexible working, News, Technology, Workplace

Almost two-thirds of those staff (60 percent) say inadequate technology is the biggest productivity blocker at work and by failing to do its job properly it is making life difficult for employees. This frustration trumps unnecessary bureaucracy, inefficient processes and annoying colleagues – other factors that stop employees from being productive, claims research from Cloudbooking. The research suggests that the digital piece of the employee experience puzzle is more prominent and important than expected – it is in fact the single most important factor with 90 percent of UK office workers who said efficient technology is important to their overall experience. Currently fewer than one in ten UK employees are “extremely satisfied” with their workplace experience, indicating there is significant room for employers to improve it by delivering better technological resources. However, despite wanting to embrace more flexible working, staff still prefer their own fixed desk.

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March 5, 2019

Digital transformation offers great opportunities for firms, but at a risk

by Neil Franklin • News, Technology, Wellbeing

Digital technology can improve our lives but it also poses a major risk of widening social inequality and blocking opportunities for people without the skills to navigate the online world safely, according to a new OECD report. A mix of technical, emotional and social skills is a pre-condition for people to combine their digital and real lives in a balanced way, and to avoid the mental health problems and other risks linked to abuses of online technologies, the report says.

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March 4, 2019

London’s West End office market stays strong despite slow start to year

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

The volume of transactions in London’s West End was down 45 percent, the lowest for January in over 10 years. This is to be expected with the continued ongoing Brexit negotiations, according to Savill’s, who expect to see a lower volume of transactions complete over the first quarter of this year. Despite this, space under offer still remains well above the long-term average, with 237,000 sq ft going under offer during the month. This held the overall total at just over 1.2m sq ft, giving a strong indication that leasing activity over the course of 2019 will remain robust. Pre-lets accounted for 42 percent of the overall sq ft let in January and there were five transactions to the Insurance & Financial sector and four to the Tech & Media sector.

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March 1, 2019

National Employee Appreciation Day? What a joke!

by Helen Jamieson • Comment, Flexible working, Wellbeing

Today is (apparently) a hot new date for all employers’ calendars as we ‘celebrate’ National Employee Appreciation Day. This US import seems to be finding feet in UK workplaces as employers plan to hand out freebies, gifts and perks to their hard-working staff. We all like to receive a thank-you, and likely won’t turn down free cakes, boxes of chocolates, or an early-finish. However, ‘moments’ like these do nothing to improve employment conditions. They are often nothing more than hollow gestures, designed to show the outside world how great an employer is rather than demonstrate true appreciation.

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March 1, 2019

Radical new environmental approach is needed to fix the global system, claims report

by Mark Eltringham • Environment, News

Entire systems change and fewer ‘sticking-plaster’ solutions from world leaders are urgently needed to address global challenges, reveals a report from sustainability non-profit, Forum for the Future. The report calls for urgent collaboration between governments, businesses, NGOs and investors to avoid climate change disaster and secure the future of our society and economy. The Future of Sustainability 2019: Driving systems change in turbulent times reveals a ‘perfect storm’ of seven factors that are set to impact sustainability in the future – including climate migration, nationalism, plastics and biodiversity loss. (more…)

March 1, 2019

Businesses pledge to work towards mandatory ethnicity pay gap reporting

by Sara Bean • Legal news, News, Workplace

The government is being encouraged to implement mandatory ethnicity pay gap reporting when it announces the outcome of its ‘Ethnicity pay reporting’ consultation, which closed in January. Pre-empting that, fifteen companies have signed a commitment today to work towards mandatory ethnicity pay gap reporting. Signatories include the Bank of England, Deloitte, KPMG, WPP, Santander and EY. The commitment, driven by membership organisation INvolve, aims to get more businesses voluntarily reporting on their ethnicity pay gap. In 2018 The Resolution Foundation estimated the ethnicity pay gap at £3.2bn. A report from INvolve also showed that white people earn on average between £67 and £209 more per week compared to similarly qualified individuals of a different ethnic background, and that the most ethnically diverse workplaces are 35 percentage points more likely to financially outperform industry averages.

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February 28, 2019

UKGBC claims built environment members are leading the way in sustainability

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

Many built environment businesses are adopting increasingly ambitious sustainability commitments reports the UK Green Building Council in its third annual report ‘Leading the Way’. This presents trends and analysis from research conducted as part of UKGBC’s annual Sustainability 360 Reviews, which look at sustainability trends and insights amongst UKGBC’s 50 industry-leading Gold Leaf member businesses.

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February 27, 2019

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Workplace ⁰

by Mark Eltringham • Comment, Facilities management, Technology, Workplace, Workplace design

We know, and have for a long time, that the workplace is in a state of near constant flux and so we often fall into the trap of assuming that there is some sort of evolution towards an idealised version of it. That is why we see so many people routinely willing to suspend their critical facilities to make extravagant and even absurd predictions about the office of the future or even the death of the office. This is perniciously faulty thinking. However we can frame a number of workplace related ideas in terms of evolutionary theory, so long as we accept one of the central precepts about evolution. Namely that there is no end game, just types progressing and sometimes dying out along the distinct branches of a complex ecosystem. As a nerdy sort of guy of a certain age, I’ve tended to frame my thoughts on all of this with reference to an idea from The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by the great Douglas Adams.