September 1, 2021
Search Results for: mental health
August 17, 2021
Right to disconnect should be enshrined in law, says report
by Neil Franklin • Flexible working, News, Wellbeing
An overtime “epidemic” driven by the rise in home working during the pandemic must be curtailed with new right to disconnect laws, according to a report from think-tank Autonomy. The authors claim that unpaid labour is a growing problem in the UK, exacerbated by home working during the pandemic. They say employees are frequently contacted by their employers after the working day has finished officially to complete tasks, which impacts their mental health. The report proposes draft legislation to implement a ‘right to disconnect’ based on French law, which ensures respect for employee rest periods and allows them to ignore work calls and emails outside of working hours. (more…)
July 30, 2021
Employers believe the way we work has changed forever
by Jayne Smith • Flexible working, News, Wellbeing, Working lives
After more than a year of remote working, the majority of UK workers are well-versed in office-free employment. We’ve had plenty of time to think about how the experience has affected our working habits. Gazprom Marketing & Trading surveyed 1,000 employees across a range of sectors, asking participants about their working hours, mental health, and the challenges they’ve encountered along the way. (more…)
July 28, 2021
Firms continue to underestimate employee turnover threat, study claims
by Neil Franklin • Flexible working, News, Workplace
A new study from communications agency Zeno Group claims that businesses continue to underestimate the chances of an increase in employee turnover as a result of changing attitudes towards work. According to the survey, while companies often focus on addressing their disengaged or disgruntled groups, the study finds that 58 percent of satisfied employees in the UK now report being open to new opportunities, with many actively searching. In addition, those surveyed report their employers do not recognize this reality, with just 20 percent of respondents saying their employers think many workers are looking for new roles elsewhere. (more…)
July 21, 2021
UK workers hesitant to return to the office
by Jayne Smith • Flexible working, News, Wellbeing, Working lives
New research commissioned by Kadence claims that despite restrictions being lifted, office workers in the UK are resistant to a full-time office return. The survey of 1,500 UK and US office workers claims that over half of British workers (55 percent) still expect to spend fewer days in the office per week, with more than a third wanting to come and go as they please (35 percent). (more…)
July 21, 2021
British Safety Council launches updated Five Star Audit specifications for 2021
by Jayne Smith • News
The British Safety Council has revised and updated their Five Star Occupational Health and Safety Audit. It now places greater emphasis on assessing how effectively an organisation manages the combined risks to workers’ health and wellbeing, as well as business resilience and recovery. (more…)
July 9, 2021
Yoga is not a wellbeing strategy
by Stephanie Fitzgerald • Comment, Wellbeing
One of the problems facing businesses right now isn’t the so-called mental health pandemic, it’s that no one seems to know what to do about it. The increased focus on employee mental health and wellbeing has seen progressive leaps in the conversation that were unimaginable 10 years ago. Even the most cynical manager has had to concede that the circumstances of the pandemic have raised the profile and importance of taking care of your employees. The reaction is knee-jerk. Companies want to do something about their employees mental health and wellbeing and they want to do it now. Whatever ‘it’ is. The appetite is there, but they can’t find the menu. (more…)
July 8, 2021
Not waving, but drowning: why we need to take languishing more seriously
by Dr Melanie James • Comment, Wellbeing
The word ‘languishing’ is being bandied around in the media as the world tries to recover from the pandemic and is experiencing many struggles resuming a semblance of ‘normal life’. Recent articles in The New York Times and The Guardian have detailed languishing as an inability to focus, being off peak performance, feeling joyless and aimless and having a sense of stagnation and emptiness. (more…)
June 30, 2021
The rise of the loveable leader: pandemic inspires new generation of compassionate leadership
by Jayne Smith • News, Wellbeing, Workplace
Heralding the age of a more compassionate type of leader, almost eight in ten (76 percent) UK business leaders consider their employees to be friends, not just colleagues, with three quarters (74 percent) admitting they want their employees to like them, claims new research from Michael Page. (more…)
June 25, 2021





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Amid news that the UK government is mulling plans to grant Brits the right to work from home permanently, a new 

August 26, 2021
Working from home: how far we’ve come and where we might be headed
by Georgina Smith • Comment, Flexible working, Workplace design