March 23, 2023

American employees spend 200 hours a year watching adult sites on their work computer

by Jayne Smith • Flexible working, News, Technology, Workplace

American employees are wasting hundreds of contracted work hours a year using their work equipment for personal tasks and activities, according to a new survey from ExpressVPN. The survey, conducted by the consumer privacy and security company, found that some people are spending only 33 percent of annual contracted hours on work tasks. With a steep rise in hybrid and home working in recent years, many companies have provided employees with work devices to use in the comfort of their own homes, including work laptops, desktops, phones, and microphones. More →

March 22, 2023

Workspace Design Show goes from strength to strength this year with visitor numbers up by 76 percent

by Freddie Steele • Company news

The Workspace Design Show returned to the Business Design Centre from 27- 28 February 2023, with exhibitors and visitors alike hailing it as a must-attend addition to the trade show calendar and a place where the workplace community can come together to be inspired and network. The overarching theme for this year’s show was Destination Workplace: Places Where People Want To Be, exploring how to create environments where employees have a desirable experience at their workplaces. More →

March 17, 2023

Most hybrid workers worldwide don’t think they’ll return to old ways of work

by Neil Franklin • Flexible working, News, Wellbeing

A poll of 3,000 office workers by Insights Learning & Development claims that 70 percent of hybrid workers in the UK want to maintain the arrangement permanently. According to the report, UK employees are generally happy with their hybrid working arrangements – more so than employees in the US, Canada and France. Overall workers in the Netherlands are most satisfied with their hybrid working arrangements. More →

March 15, 2023

The UK workplace sector reacts to the Spring Budget 2023

by Jayne Smith • Environment, News, Property, Workplace

Today the UK’s Chancellor of the Exchequer, Jeremy Hunt presented his Spring Budget to the House of Commons. In it he announced what her referred to as his ‘four pillars’ of industrial and productivity strategy, namely: ‘Enterprise’, ‘Employment’, ‘Education’, and ‘Everywhere’. Perhaps the headline element of this announcement was the creation of twelve new investment zones across the UK as well as incentives for older workers to return to the country’s patchy workforce. This includes£63m for programmes to encourage retirees over 50 back to work, “returnerships” and ‘skills boot camps’. Another headline for the workplace sector was the offer of improved childcare arrangements, especially for the parents of very young children, who will see 30 hours of free childcare expanded to include one and two-year-olds. More →

March 15, 2023

“Flexible working has been introduced very inflexibly”: IN conversation with Jeremy Myerson

by Mark Eltringham • Features, Flexible working, IN Magazine, Premium Content

One of the latest people to invent activity-based working is a sociologist, who combined it with the similarly familiar hub and spoke office model on her substack as a solution to the Great Office Problem and as a way of implementing flexible working. She’s not the first and is a less surprising pioneer of a decades old model than some other people who should really know better. That includes an architectural practice who came up with the idea earlier this year and whose name escapes me. More →

March 10, 2023

Hybrid workers exercise more, sleep longer and eat better

by Neil Franklin • Flexible working, News, Wellbeing

A new study claims that hybrid working is leading to a healthier workforce, with more time being dedicated to exercise, sleep and healthy eating. Research among more than 2,000 hybrid workers by IWG suggests that the time saved by reduced commuting has led to multiple health and wellbeing benefits including weight loss, better cooking habits, improved mental health and a longer night’s sleep. More →

March 10, 2023

Employers over-estimate the wellbeing benefits of hybrid working

by Neil Franklin • Flexible working, News, Wellbeing

Employers and employees have a differing opinion about the health and wellbeing impact of hybrid working, according to a new poll from GRiD. Two thirds of employers (64 percent) believe that hybrid working has had a positive impact on their employees’ health and wellbeing, but only 53 percent of employees agree. Where they do concur is on the number of people for whom hybrid working can have a negative impact, with 6 percent of employers, and 7 percent of employees, acknowledging that it is not a positive experience for everyone. More →

March 10, 2023

Online personal brands are the key to job success say ‘Gen Z’

by Neil Franklin • News, Workplace

New research claims to reveal how people who belong to ‘Generation Z’ perceive online ‘personal brands’ as a crucial tool to gain more advantage in job markets. The study, led by the University of East Anglia in collaboration with the University of Greenwich, claims to demonstrate the importance of authentically building online personal branding strategies and tactics to bridge the gap between Gen Z ‘s desired and perceived images on social media when job seeking. More →

March 9, 2023

Progress depends on heterodox thought and difficult questions

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

Between the 9th and 13th Centuries, the world’s intellectual centre and the source of much of its progress, discovery and achievement was Baghdad. This was the Muslim Golden Age and at its core was the House of Wisdom, established by the Caliph Harun al-Rashid. At one point, this library housed the largest collection of books on Earth and drew the greatest minds in the world to share ideas, innovate and explore ancient sources of science and wisdom from Greek and Persian texts. Muslim, Jewish, Christian and atheist scholars worked together to advance human understanding until a slow decline culminated with a later Caliph declaring that its diversity of thought should bow to a literal interpretation of the Quran and Hadith.

March 9, 2023

Connection launches Paulo range for new generation of workplace lounges

by Freddie Steele • Company news

British furniture maker Connection has launched its new Paulo range to meet the growing demand for striking, adaptable workplace lounges as part of the new ecosystem of work. Inspired by the classics of mid 20th Century design, the new range offers an unmistakeably timeless response to a very contemporary challenge; how to make the office the best choice for people who can now work anywhere. More →

March 8, 2023

Just call it ‘work’; Kate Lister in conversation with the Workplace Geeks

by Mark Eltringham • Flexible working, Podcasts, Premium Content

In the latest episode of the Workplace Geeks podcast, one of the world’s leading experts on work and workplace, Kate Lister, focuses on a recent study in collaboration with Owl Labs, ‘State of Remote Work 2022’. The report, in its 6th year, provides a platform for a much broader conversation about hybrid and remote working (spoiler alert: terms which Kate hates by the way), Kate’s invitation to speak during the pandemic to United States Congress about home-working, and GWA’s long standing and freely available ROI and savings calculators. James returns following his blacksmithing course in the Peak District to a new discussion format – no more Pinder Ponder, get ready for the reflection section.

March 6, 2023

The six skills managers will need for the future of work

by Lea Kimpele • Comment, Flexible working, Technology

Conversations around how work and leadership will change in the coming years have inevitably been accelerated by the pandemic. Companies all over the world have been urged to seek new digital tools, solutions and methods for communicating, making decisions, and activating projects remotely. The companies that emerged most successfully from the Covid era were those that, despite all the uncertainty at the time, decided to adapt and view the pandemic as an opportunity for change rather than an obstacle. When it comes to the future of work, we need new guidelines for building change-ready and vulnerable leadership. More →