Search Results for: finance

April 9, 2019

Personal financial worries are increasing workplace stress

Employers need to understand more about the impact of personal financial worries on workplace mental health, but are struggling to agree best practice standards to address the issue, new research from MetLife UK claims. More than six out of 10 (61 percent) senior HR executives have seen a rise in financial wellbeing issues affecting employee mental health and work performance, the nationwide study from MetLife UK suggests. (more…)

April 5, 2019

The ladder of life, the death of work, the cane toad of property and some other stuff

by Mark Eltringham • Features

We start with a question. Why hasn’t the gig economy killed traditional work?, asks Greg Rosalsky and goes on to explain what many people have now realised. The answer, as Greg points out, is that the gig economy doesn’t replace traditional work, never has, and the rise of casual work of this kind has primarily been a way for people to deal with a volatile labour market and shrinking real incomes. Offer them the choice of a decent monthly income, benefits and a contract and most of them will take you up on it.

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March 27, 2019

The pursuit of happiness, lumpy tech, space science and some other stuff

by Mark Eltringham • Features, Technology, Wellbeing, Workplace design

Underlying most of the stuff you read about the workplace is the quest for happiness. Indeed happiness has become something of a preoccupation for those pondering the issue at the apex of social and economic thinking, as epitomised by Gallup with its latest World Happiness report. As always, the Gallup report stumbles over definitions of happiness, often using the word interchangeably with wellbeing and stuffs it with other ideas without explaining how or even whether they contribute to happiness.

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March 21, 2019

Interiors are not enough to win the war for talent

by Ben Capper • Comment, Workplace design

I often refer to Google and Facebook in my blog, due to their influence on workplace design. Many consider them to be workplace interior’s holy grail. But today’s big employers are competing with one another on a much broader set of principles. Cool interiors alone just won’t cut it. Zürich, like many European cities is home to a large number of global brands, with bustling financial services and tech sectors. I regularly hear of people with multiple job offers taking a job with a lower salary, rather than accepting a role in a company that doesn’t reflect their ideals. This decision can be influenced by office design and facilities, career development options, corporate culture and much more. (more…)

March 20, 2019

Feeling appreciated and the quality of workplace both key to employee happiness

by Sara Bean • Facilities management, News, Wellbeing, Workplace, Workplace design

The quality of the workplace has a powerful effect on the levels of happiness of staff, with nearly half of respondents (49 percent) to a recent survey stating that having a great office environment is important to their happiness at work, but according to the figures, only a quarter (25 percent) say a good workplace environment is a current positive about their work. The survey from Peldon Rose also found that less than half (45 percent) of employees actually feel appreciated at work and only two-thirds (67 percent) report feeling happy. Yet the majority of workers (80 percent) who took part, believe that feeling appreciated is most important to their happiness at work – ahead of salary (58 percent) and feeling trusted (55 percent).

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March 19, 2019

Demotivated workers would be driven by higher pay and more flexibility

by Sara Bean • Flexible working, News, Workplace

Almost a third (31 percent) of UK professionals state that their expectations are ‘not being met at all’ by their current employer, whilst a further 24 percent state that their needs are only just ‘moderately’ being met. The findings, which come from research undertaken by recruiter Robert Walters and job board CV-Library – also suggest that while the amount they were paid was most important to staff, other benefits are increasingly playing a more prominent role in keeping staff motivated. Well over half (61 percent) claimed that work-life balance, flexible working hours (39 percent), and cultural fit (25 percent) are crucial to keeping them happy at work. (more…)

February 28, 2019

Communication skills trump experience as quality employers look for in candidates

by Neil Franklin • News, Workplace

New research from The University of Law Business School has analysed over 700 keywords from the job specifications of 30 common business roles (across three popular job sites), to reveal what employers are looking for from candidates. The research highlights the crossover in skills and requirements across roles and industries, helping encourage those considering a career move, or just starting out in the world of business by showing how qualified they may already be for a new career. Its key finding is that employers are hugely more interested in people’s interpersonal skills than their work experience.

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February 22, 2019

The biggest problem for city centres is a lack of high skilled jobs

by Mark Eltringham • Cities, News

The Centre for Cities, in partnership with George Capital, has mapped the UK cities with the strongest city centre economies in the UK, and identified their common features. The report City Centres: Past, Present and Future found that focusing on the struggles of certain high streets ignores the success of well-performing city centres and misdiagnoses the core problem: insufficient footfall in city centres due to a lack of jobs.

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February 21, 2019

SMEs intend to increase their headcount by over a fifth this year

by Sara Bean • Legal news, News, Workplace

SMEs intend to grow their headcount by over a fifth this year

Although official figures from the ONS show a decline in consumer spending throughout much of 2018, optimism amongst small businesses remains high, with UK SMEs hoping to grow their headcount by an average of 21 percent over the next 12 months. The new research from Opus Energy claims that half (51 percent) intend to grow their business in terms of people, with some even predicting they’ll increase their workforce by 50 percent. IT (39 percent), health (33 percent) and financial services (28 percent) were the sectors expecting the most growth. Even in the worst affected sectors, growth was still predicted. Half (50 percent) of retailers still expected to grow in 2019, at an average of 19 percent. 65 percent of food and beverage producers predicted an average headcount increase of 18 percent and 69 percent of manufacturers expected to grow at an average of 14 percent; despite facing the uncertainty of Brexit and the “death of the high street”.

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February 20, 2019

Employers have a poor understanding of what actually motivates their employees

by Sara Bean • News, Workplace

Almost half of companies (45 percent) still believe that an attractive salary and package is what motivates their workforce, despite the fact that employees cite ‘soft benefits’ such a flexi-working, work-life balance, and ‘being valued’ as key to feeling fulfilled in their job role. The findings come from recent research ‘Meeting demands through the job offering’, by recruiter Robert Walters and job board CV-Library that highlight the disparity between what employees want and what companies are offering to staff. While 60 percent of professionals’ state career development as an important part of a job offering, less than 10 percent of companies believe that a lack of career progression and development would be a key reason for losing talent. The report also found that although companies claim that ‘staff being stuck in their ways’ is the main reason behind the lack of quality applicants, over 40 percent of professionals state that they would be willing to take up a role in another field where skills would be transferable, or work in a new sector to broaden their skills.

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February 15, 2019

Amazon drops plans for HQ, judging others in the open plan, why people would rather electrocute themselves than sit and think and some other stuff

by Mark Eltringham • Features

Why is it so hard to design a decent office space? demands this article in Quartz. It’s a fair enough question but probably the wrong one. It’s perfectly possible to design a decent (or adequate) office with a pen, paper and bag of presuppositions and many people have done exactly that. The real question is why it is so hard to design a good or excellent office.

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February 13, 2019

Stark levels of stress among small business owners as they struggle to stay solvent

by Sara Bean • News, Wellbeing

Chronic work-related stress has risen sharply among small business owners, with a fifth of small business owners look to taking a job elsewhere to stay afloat this year. This is according to new research from AXA, which reveals that many are adopting short-term planning and cutting reliance on external funding ahead of Brexit. Staying agile and light is a common strategy, but may not give businesses the best chance of survival if financial cushions are not in place too. The study finds a sharp increase in financial anxiety amongst business owners. Over the course of 2018, those reporting they felt chronically stressed about their businesses increased by almost 50 percent, reaching 29 percent by year end. (more…)