Opinion – Page 2
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OpinionCharles Cotton: Flexible working should be a focus point in 2022
Reward professionals have been busy responding to an increasingly tight labour market in the latter half of 2021. While skill and labour shortages have been felt across the board, they have been most acute in hospitality, haulage, health and social care, with bonuses and pay increases being used to counter ...
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OpinionTim Tyndall: FCA employees facing pay and benefits changes
Following a flurry of interest in the proposed changes to pay and benefits at the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), most notably from unions keen to look after members and to attract new ones, the FCA chose to publish its consultation document aimed at its employees to a wider audience.In opening, ...
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OpinionKaren Plumbley-Jones: Guidance for employers on the furlough scheme end
How many jobs have been saved by the furlough scheme? We won't ever know the answer to that question, but 11.6 million jobs have been supported by the scheme at some point. That equates to roughly 40% of the total UK workforce and we have seen far fewer redundancies than ...
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OpinionStephen Perkins: Can an agile reward strategy deliver an employer’s philosophy?
My answer about whether an agile reward strategy can deliver an employer’s philosophy is yes, provided there is honesty and openness among all concerned about what holding fast to the corporate reward philosophy means. The offer may be to recognise predictably what workforce members contribute over the longer term.Alternatively, offer ...
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OpinionHelen Burgess: It's a good idea to plan festive reward strategies early
People are starting to talk about Christmas, so it’s a good idea to think about a festive strategy now.Requests for leaveIf an organisation’s holiday year runs to the end of the calendar year, it should remind employees to book and use their holiday entitlement to avoid a last-minute rush for ...
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OpinionKavitha’s keynote: Hybrid working models are the future
Every week it seems different organisations are revealing details of their new hybrid working models. This week in particular, we’ve reported on a number of UK employers that have introduced such initiatives, as staff return to workplaces.Zoom, for example, has decided to allow employees to have a mixture of remote ...
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OpinionCharles Cotton: Is money still the most popular form of employee motivation?
Employees are attracted, retained and engaged by a whole range of financial and non-financial rewards, which change with their personal circumstances. Depending on what life stage they’re at, the financial elements of a reward package may not be the only thing of importance. For instance, people at the beginning of ...
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OpinionCrystal Hoole: Motivating employees requires a holistic reward approach
Many organisations talk about total reward strategies, but in reality, they focus purely on extrinsic motivational factors such as financial rewards to motivate and compensate their staff. While this may be effective to attract talent initially, it may not be adequate to retain key talent or motivate employees in difficult ...
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OpinionAlison Pay: We are at a critical junction for workplace mental health
Over the course of the last year the signs are that we’ve become more comfortable to talk about our mental health at work. The pandemic has impacted most people and both the shock and discomfort of finding ourselves in lockdown, on furlough or working virtually prompted many employers to either ...
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OpinionRandall Peterson: Remote working has changed the rules of motivating employees
Think back to a time not so long ago when working from home felt like a real privilege. If an employee had the right type of job, and the trust of the boss, they were granted the opportunity. The great 2020 pandemic changed all of that and employers the world ...
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OpinionKate Cooper: Creative ways to recognise employees’ hard work
This year has been a difficult time for all and so will it continue to be, heading into 2021. Getting together in the same physical location is just not an option, but this should not mean that those other important messages cannot be sent. So how do we tell people ...
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OpinionCharles Cotton: Festive celebrations can recognise employees for their hard work and value
Among those employers that responded to the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD’s) 2018 Reward management survey, published in November 2018, 64% organised a Christmas office party or lunch for some or all staff, something that tends to be more widespread in the private sectors, and among small and ...
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OpinionAma Afrifa-Tchie: Recognition strategies for furloughed employees
All organisations affected by the Covid-19 (Coronavirus) pandemic have a responsibility to ensure a recognition strategy is in place to help furloughed employers with their mental health during this uncertain time.This is a new concept to many of us, and for those impacted, there is a risk it will have ...
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OpinionCharles Cotton: Well-communicated benefits lead to greater employee motivation
Working from home has many benefits but it can also increase feelings of isolation, which may be heightened further during lockdown. It is therefore important that employers consider how to bring out the social aspects of a total reward package.They may suggest that teams have a weekly social catch up ...
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OpinionKate Cooper: Recognition schemes must display a clear sense of fairness
The Institute of Leadership & Management undertook research last year into the values that are espoused by organisations and those that individuals hold, to discover whether there is alignment between the organisation and its employees, and who decides the organisational values that employees are expected to live.Although it did not ...
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OpinionJess Young: Is employee engagement missing the little things?
Several years ago, I was responsible for implementing a new benefits package at a large university. Take-up was on par with others in the sector, and the initial outlay was relatively small. Management were delighted, but I couldn’t help feeling I’d missed something.Despite sharing plenty of case studies in the ...
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OpinionCharles Cotton: Aligning employees takes careful planning and investment
There are a whole range of approaches employers can take to reward their staff, which can be both financial and non-financial: a bonus, pay rise, holiday and recognition of work are just a few examples.Such variety indicates that no one approach can suit every circumstance, and employers must tailor their ...
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OpinionEmma Mamo: Recognition must be one part of a comprehensive wellbeing approach
In 2018, Mind surveyed more than 44,000 employees across upwards of 100 employers for our annual Workplace wellbeing index. We found that the key drivers for mental health were not just things like pace of work, workload and the physical environment, but motivation and relationships with managers. Employees need to ...
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OpinionCharles Cotton: Christmas rewards can recognise the year's achievements
March 2015 research by the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD), Show me the money: The behavioural science of reward, found that money can help incentivise employee behaviour in a variety of ways. For example, when promised money for a later task, people start to perform intermediate tasks better, ...
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OpinionDr Amy Armstrong: Lies, damned lies and employee engagement statistics
Organisations often look to their engagement survey data as a way of understanding how to motivate and reward their staff; however, the Hult-Ashridge Executive Education research report, Shades of grey: An exploratory study of engagement in work teams, published in November 2018, found that engagement statistics may not present the ...