Search Results for: economy

The state of the workplace right now? Everywhere and nowhere, baby

The state of the workplace right now? Everywhere and nowhere, baby 0

by • Comment, Facilities management, Features, Premium Content, Property, Workplace design

Work&PlaceMy trade is to ask questions about the workplace then make sense of the answers. That has been a particular challenge with the question, ‘what are offices today?’ What seems clear is that the various actors in the workplace ecosystem look at offices through very different eyes. Urban planning and development professionals still view offices as a distinct category of real estate and most real estate professionals view offices in terms of the delivery of floor space. Some things have changed,however. For some time, the hybrid economy of serviced offices has turned the product into a service. But, in many cases this has simply made the leasing of space simpler and more flexible.

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Government announces protections for pregnant mums and new parents returning to work

Government announces protections for pregnant mums and new parents returning to work

by • News, Wellbeing, Workplace

Pregnant women and new parents returning to work after having children are to be further protected from unfairly losing their jobs under new proposals set out by the UK government.  The consultation, launching today (25 January 2019) and running to 5 April, proposes that the legal protection against redundancy for pregnant women and new mothers on maternity leave is extended so that it continues for up to 6 months after they return to work. It will also seek views on affording the same protection to parents returning from adoption leave or shared parental leave.

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Work’s not working; to be productive we need to get creative

Work’s not working; to be productive we need to get creative

by • Comment, Workplace design

Productivity in the UK workforce is dropping; output per hour fell 0.4 per cent in the last quarter of 2018 compared with the previous and grew just 0.2 per cent on the third quarter of 2017, according to the Office for National Statistics. Yet the UK workforce log the longest hours in Europe, working 42.3 hours per week on average. Clearly something isn’t lining up. So we must surely ask the question, what is going wrong and what can we do to improve the situation?

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Robot delivery dogs, digital pollution, why tech firms like ping pong and some other stuff

Robot delivery dogs, digital pollution, why tech firms like ping pong and some other stuff

by • Features, Technology, Wellbeing

Today is officially* Blue Monday and instead of offering up an endless series of clickbait pieces telling you how to cope and make the day better for your colleagues, we’re turning our attention to more interesting things. Such as this recent piece arguing that our obsession with ‘millennials’ can cloud our perspective on more important issues about people, their characteristics, advantages and inequalities. It argues that birth dates are rather less important to people’s life chances than their background, individual abilities and structural issues in the economy and society. Who – as they say – knew?

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MPs back plan to increase gender diversity in business

MPs back plan to increase gender diversity in business

by • Legal news, News, Workplace

MPs back new measure to increase gender diversity in business

A majority of MPs have backed a recommendation to increase gender diversity in business by extending the “Women in Finance Charter” to cover all businesses in the UK. The recommendation comes from the professional accountancy body AAT (Association of Accounting Technicians). The Charter asks financial services firms to commit to implement four key industry actions; to have a named senior executive responsible and accountable for gender diversity and inclusion; set internal targets for gender diversity in senior management positions; publish progress annually and ensure the pay of the senior executive team is linked to delivery against these internal targets on gender diversity. More →

Shortlist for Business Book Awards features more on workplace and wellbeing than ever before

Shortlist for Business Book Awards features more on workplace and wellbeing than ever before

by • News, Wellbeing, Workplace

This year’s shortlist for the Business Booko Awards features more books than ever on wellbeing and happiness in the workplace as well as career self-development,  company culture and business ethics. A record number of women authors have also made the shortlist. More →

Mandatory reporting of ethnicity pay gap could be ‘counterproductive’ if not done right

Mandatory reporting of ethnicity pay gap could be ‘counterproductive’ if not done right

by • Legal news, News, Workplace

Reporting ethnicity pay levels could be ‘counterproductive’ if not done right

There is a ‘significant risk’ that the reporting ethnicity pay levels could be ‘counterproductive’ unless key differences between it and gender pay are recognised, said the Institute for Employment Studies (IES) in its response to the UK Government’s consultation on ethnicity pay reporting. Although the IES supports the government’s proposals to introduce mandatory reporting of ethnicity pay gap information, it suggests that cultural and practical barriers to collecting and reporting ethnicity data are greater than for gender pay. More time and greater government support are therefore needed to prepare for these changes. The consultation response voices specific concerns that measures to increase the recruitment of under-represented groups, for example through apprenticeships or paid internships, could serve to widen pay gaps initially. This could inadvertently discourage employers from taking positive action to improve their ethnic diversity. Reporting arrangements therefore need to also take account of changes in the levels of employment participation for different ethnic minority groups, as well as their pay.

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The problem with predictions, the cult of Facebook, WeWork woes and some other stuff

The problem with predictions, the cult of Facebook, WeWork woes and some other stuff

by • Features

If it makes you feel better about Blue Monday (today – ‘officially’ the year’s glummest day), it also marks the closure of the Predictions Window in my view. If somebody still has an unpublished list of forecasts for the coming year on their specialist topic, they’ve missed their chance. At least with us they have. But not to worry, there’s a good chance they can trot most of them all out again next year and they’ll be just as relevant. Anything else can be quietly dropped.

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Record take up in Northern Ireland office market amid concerns over future investment

Record take up in Northern Ireland office market amid concerns over future investment

by • Cities, Facilities management, News, Property

City Quays mixed-use regeneration projectThe Northern Ireland office market had a record year in 2018, with a 100 percent increase in take-up, according to the latest figures from CBRE. The Northern Ireland (NI) office sector enjoyed its most successful year on record with 885,023 sq ft of take-up reported across 84 transactions, more than double that achieved last year. Notable office deals completed in 2018 included the PwC move to Merchant Square, Northern Ireland Civil Service at 9 Lanyon Place, Allstate at Mays Meadow, TLT at River House and Baker McKenzie at City Quays 2, which is part of Belfast’s City Quays mixed-use regeneration project. However, according to CBRE’s Real Estate Outlook report, the office market in NI is hampered by a severe lack of investment deals in the face of ongoing local, national and international political uncertainty. This means that while the real estate market in Northern Ireland generally has performed well in 2018, the investment sector experienced a decrease in activity as a resulting knock-on effect of the current political situation locally at Stormont as well as ongoing Brexit negotiations.

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World Bank report calls for changing approach to working cultures

World Bank report calls for changing approach to working cultures

by • News, Workplace

A new report from the World Bank has call for more investment in people to prepare them for the economies of the future. The 2019 World Development report (WDR) “The Changing Nature of Work” claims that digital technologies are driving the demand for advanced cognitive skills, socio-behavioral skills, and adaptability in labour markets. The digital economy also presents an opportunity to create more jobs.

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How our body clocks affect our mental and physical performance

How our body clocks affect our mental and physical performance

by • Features, Wellbeing

Whether you’re a morning person or love burning the midnight oil, we’re all controlled by so-called body clocks. These body clocks (which regulate your circadian rhythms) are inside almost every cell in the body and control when we feel awake and tired during a 24-hour period. But as it turns out, our latest study found that our body clocks have a much bigger impact on us than we previously realised. In fact, our body clocks actually effect how well a person performs on both mental and physical tasks.

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Government’s new workplace reforms: the world responds

Government’s new workplace reforms: the world responds

by • Flexible working, News, Workplace

The UK government has introduced what it claims to be the most significant package of workplace reforms for 20 years in response to last year’s Taylor Report on working practices. The Good Work Plan has introduced a range of measures which the Government claims will improve the rights of agency and part time workers and discourage employers from indulging in unwelcome practices.  The reforms are intended to stop businesses opting out of equal pay arrangements for agency employees and improve the conditions for gig economy workers generally, for example by giving workers details of their rights from the first day in a job, such as eligibility for sick leave, pay levels, maternity and paternity leave.

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