Search Results for: workplace

May 27, 2014

A third of UK workers would welcome a digital assistant to free up their time

by Mark Eltringham • Comment, News, Technology

A vision of the present. © Pixar Studios

In the 2008 Pixar film WALL-E, humans have fled the planet they have destroyed in an orgy of garbage-generating mass-consumerism and been reduced to morbidly obese, sedentary lumps living vicariously through screens and whose every need is catered for by the machines around them. Well, they say the best science fiction is really about the present day and sure enough, it appears that many of us are perfectly happy with the idea of suckling at the galvanised teat of a robot overlord. A new survey carried out by ClickSoftware claims that a third of UK employees would welcome the idea of having a personal digital assistant to help them carry out everyday tasks. Over half (58 percent) hope that intelligent apps will take on at least a tenth of their workload in the future, especially those tasks considered mundane and repetitive such as administration, work scheduling and planning journeys.

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May 22, 2014

Talent challenge ahead as UK employers struggle to fill skills gap

by Sara Bean • News, Workplace

With the economy picking up, nearly two thirds of UK employers are concerned that they won’t be able to find the people with the skills needed to fill their burgeoning job vacancies. A global PwC survey of over 1,300 CEOs in 68 countries reveals that a quarter of UK business leaders plan to increase their headcount by up to 5 per cent in the next 12 months, with a further 20 per cent planning increases of up to 8 per cent and a further one in five planning increases of over 8 per cent. But 64 per cent of UK business leaders are more concerned about the availability of key skills than any of their Western European counterparts, rating it as the biggest business threat to their growth plans. Technology and engineering firms report the most chronic shortage of skilled employees. (more…)

May 21, 2014

Homeworking has environmental benefits, says Carbon Trust

by Sara Bean • Environment, Facilities management, Flexible working, News

There have been some doubts cast recently on the environmental benefits of flexible working. At the recent ThinkFM conference, Lord Rupert Redesdale, the CEO Energy Managers Association said that keeping buildings open for longer to accommodate flexible workers could become unfeasible for many businesses. But what if you simply increase the numbers of home workers instead? Homeworking reduces employee commuting, resulting in carbon, money and time savings. If office space is properly rationalised to reflect this, homeworking can also significantly reduce office energy consumption and rental costs. This is according to new research from the Carbon Trust, which found that if adopted and encouraged by employers across the country, homeworking could result in annual savings of over 3 million tonnes of carbon and cut costs by £3 billion.

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May 21, 2014

Supply of new office space in London continues to fall short of demand

by Mark Eltringham • Architecture, News, Property

One of the downsides to London’s attractiveness as a business destination, as we reported yesterday, is its inability to provide enough office space to satisfy the rapacious demands of the companies who want to work there. Survey after survey reveals the same thing. Even though London has a healthy pipeline of new offices under construction, it cannot keep pace with demand. The latest survey to make the same point comes from Deloitte Real Estate whose London Crane Survey claims that the 9.2 million sq. ft. of office space currently being built will fall short of what is needed. The report claims that London office space is likely to remain in short supply for two years as the new occupancy levels of offices continues to outstrip supply. The report claims that 2014will see 7 million sq. ft. of Grade A office space delivered, the largest volume for over a decade but nearly half has already been let even before construction is complete.

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May 21, 2014

Information overload is a big problem for ‘infobese’ UK workers

by Mark Eltringham • Flexible working, Technology, Workplace

We all know –or should – that we have a real problem with information. We are not only deluged with the stuff, we appear increasingly willing to wallow in it voluntarily, even when we know it’s bad for us. The full extent of the challenge we face managing information is laid bare in a new report from Microsoft called ‘Defying Digital Distraction’. The study is based on a survey carried out by YouGov which found that 55 per cent of 2,000 British office staff experience some form of information overload at work. A similar proportion feel they are distracted by information, just under half (43 per cent) experience stress as a result, a third (34 per cent) feel overwhelmed by it and 28 per cent believe it affects their personal wellbeing. The report is fronted by Dave Coplin, the Chief Envisioning Officer of Microsoft UK who we interviewed last year and coincides with the publication of Dave’s new book called The Rise of the Humans: how to outsmart the digital deluge.

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May 20, 2014

Office design should meet the basic human needs of workers, claims report

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

Designers can install sleep pods, slides and play areas in an effort to create a cool office, but the problem is that for every renowned Google campus are countless stuffy offices with fluorescent lighting and cramped, crowded conditions. When you drill right down to it office workers want those responsible for office design to meet their basic human needs; with more natural light, effective heating and air conditioning and the better use of office space. This is according to the results of a survey by Steelcase of more than 800 office workers across the UK to mark the beginning of Clerkenwell Design Week. It found that despite British workers appreciating the latest technology and high-quality office design, better lighting and more control over temperature settings would be a big step forward towards their dream office.

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May 20, 2014

Impact of BYOD is increasingly blurring lines between work and leisure

by Sara Bean • Flexible working, News, Technology

The influence of BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) on working life grows, with the line between work and home life increasingly blurred. According to the annual Edenred-Ipsos Barometer of 8,800 workers across Europe two-thirds of employees report that work keeps them busy out of hours. Laptops, smartphones, tablets and other devices are making it easier for people to work from home, with around half (54 per cent) of UK organisations giving employees access to this technology. However, despite these new tools being perceived as having a positive impact on the quality of life at work, respondents were critical of the actions taken by companies: 39 per cent feel that the efforts made to introduce new ways of organising work are insufficient, 36 per cent feel the same about wellbeing at work and 28 per cent about the flexibility of the organisation of working hours.

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May 20, 2014

Design skills cited as one reason why London is the world’s best city

by Mark Eltringham • Environment, Events, News, Workplace design

For the first time, London is the world’s best city for business, culture and finance, according to the latest edition of PWC’s annual Cities of Opportunity report. And the city’s reputation as a global leader in design is cited as one of the main reasons. The index of thirty of the world’s most important cities claims that London’s sheer economic clout, technological infrastructure and its design and development skills are just a few of the factors that led to the city usurping New York for the first time. When the survey was last carried out, it was ranked third. London is ranked one of the top three best places for intellectual capital and innovation alongside Paris and San Francisco and has leapt from eighth place last year to joint first place (with Seoul) in terms of its technological readiness.

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May 20, 2014

Trust in ethical behaviour is linked to the size of the business, claims report

by Mark Eltringham • Architecture, News

The larger the firm the less likely it is to trust its employees to behave ethically according to a new report from the Association of Accounting Technicians. The research also found that UK’s most ethical businesses are small architectural practices. According to the research, conducted by Opinion Matters on behalf of AAT, only 37 per cent of SMEs trust their staff to do the right thing compared to 66 per cent of microbusinesses. The report also found that firms in the architectural sector have more faith in the ethical decision making of their employees and are more concerned about the ethical behaviour of suppliers than in any other industry. Interestingly, the report highlights the fact that, as the number of employees increases, businesses are more likely to dedicate a member of staff dedicated to fostering ethical behaviour and have a formal code of conduct.

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May 19, 2014

Loss making design and build service withdrawn by MITIE Group

by Mark Eltringham • Company news, Facilities management, News

Diversified facilities management services business Mitie has announced it is no longer to provide design and build services in the energy sector and will no longer provide mechanical and electrical (M&E) services. It has announced in its preliminary results for the year to March 2014 that the withdrawal of both operations will incur substantial losses – £25.4 million and £22.1 million respectively – so it will now concentrate more closely on its core and more lucrative facilities management markets instead where it sees the ‘potential for growth and [to] meet our margin targets’. While the firm reports that a number of design and build projects had experienced delays and cost overruns which led to substantial losses, results for the whole of MITIE group show pre-tax profit up 4.3 per cent to £113.3m with revenue up 8.2 per cent to £2.14 billion.

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May 19, 2014

Poor office design costing firms in Gulf States dear, claims report

by Mark Eltringham • News, Workplace design

Companies in the Gulf States with poor office design are losing a significant amount of money each year because of an associated loss of productivity and other factors including ergonomics and health and safety. That is according to a new survey carried out by YouGov on behalf of the Index exhibition organisers and office furniture manufacturer HNI. The survey puts the cost of poorly designed workplaces at as much as $70,000 (Dh257,000) per year for a large business and more than $35,000 (Dh128,500) a year for a medium-sized company in the region, according to a new study. A total of 867 senior managers across the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) nations including the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait were surveyed to establish the leading cause of employee accidents within the workspace, as well as the major causes of occupational health issues.

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May 19, 2014

Managers rate early starters more highly at work, claims new research

by Mark Eltringham • Flexible working, Workplace

Humans remain wedded to long-held ideas about the times and places in which we work best so if you want to get ahead in your career, you need to be in the office nice and early, regardless of any flexible working arrangements. That is the conclusion of new research from the University of Washington due to be published in full later this year in the Journal of Applied Psychology. The research is flagged up by its authors in the current issue of the Harvard Business Review. It shows that our attitudes to presence are so pervasive that workers who get an early start are rated as more effective by their line managers regardless of the number of hours they work and what they achieve in that time. Researchers conclude that managers have a profound morning bias that leads them to confuse conscientiousness with an early start.