May 7, 2020
Many of us have had little choice but to resort to remote working in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic. It is just days since Google, Apple and Twitter were making headlines by ordering their employees to work from home, but you could now say the same about lots of companies. More →
May 7, 2020
Freelancers’ confidence in their businesses and the wider economy has been driven to record lows by the Coronavirus crisis, according to research by IPSE (the Association of Independent Professionals and the Self-Employed) and PeoplePerHour, Europe’s largest freelance marketplace. Freelancers’ three month confidence in their businesses had already fallen to a six-year low last quarter because of concerns about the changes to IR35 tax regulations. More →
May 6, 2020
Climate action is often about sacrifice: eat less meat, don’t fly, and buy less stuff. These things are essential. But climate action can also be about gain. Many causes of climate change make our lives worse. So transforming our societies to stop climate change offers us the chance to make our lives better. More →
May 6, 2020
New working patterns prompted by COVID-19 could cause employees to permanently reduce time spent in the office, as nearly half (45 percent) of Brits predict a permanent change to their employers’ approach to flexible working when lockdown lifts. O2 Business’ new report – entitled The Flexible Future of Work, conducted in partnership with ICM and YouGov – claims that employees will be reluctant to give up their new way of working after lockdown. Nearly half the workforce think flexible working will increase, with a third (33 percent) of this group expecting to increase the amount they work from home by at least three days a week after lockdown, and 81 percent expecting to work at least one day a week from home. More →
May 5, 2020
We exist in an era in which the ways in which we engage employees shift continuously in parallel with their working hours. Technology and innovative workforce policy allow businesses to include remote workers anywhere and at any time. While this opens up a number of opportunities for work-life integration, it may also pose a number of specific challenges. More →
May 5, 2020
This piece was originally published five years ago. While we now read it with different eyes, what is interesting is how the ideas have stood up. Some better than others perhaps but a welcome reminder that the conversations we are now having about life after lockdown began some time ago. One of the particular and often unspoken issues that shadows in any debate about flexible working is what we mean by the term. We’ve been talking about new ways of working for a good quarter of a century now and what is generally understood about the practice has evolved considerably. The very idea was conceived at the birth of the new online era so is inextricably tied up with the Internet and new technology. More →
May 5, 2020
Seventy-seven percent of the workforce say they want to continue to work from home, at least weekly, when the pandemic is over. That represents a 132 percent increase over those who did so before COVID-19. These and other findings from the Global Work-from-Home Experience Survey, which claims to be the largest post-COVID survey on the topic to date, will lead to profound changes in office space needs, workplace design, workforce policies and practices, and employer, employee, and environmental outcomes. More →
May 4, 2020
COVID-19 can be a catalyst for transforming how businesses and charities collaborate, with significant benefits for both. Companies and charities working together is nothing new. For many years Corporate Social Responsibility has had a place on the business agenda, as a means of doing some good while boosting companies’ reputations in the process. More →
April 30, 2020
More and more politicians and business leaders are keen to see the UK ease lockdown and begin a move towards returning to work. Is it’s too early to plan the exit from lockdown? Maybe. But either way, the general chatter about what a post COVID19 will look has predictably fanned the debate about how workplace will cope. It is a good debate, with valid ideas shared by the likes of Antony Slumbers, Neil Usher and others. More →
April 30, 2020
These days, almost every company implements team building exercises — and rightly so, as decades of research have shown how beneficial they can be. Indeed, in a Forbes article O2E Brands CEO Brian Scudamore argues that team building activities are the most significant investment companies can make. More →
April 30, 2020
Proposed “immunity certificates” allowing individuals to move freely in society could lead to discrimination, claims Edgar Whitley, Associate Professor from London School of Economics’ Department of Management, and other contributing experts in a new report. More →
May 9, 2020
The language barrier to wellbeing in the workplace
by James Geekie • Comment, Wellbeing, Workplace design
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