One of the best things about running a business is being able to choose the companies and organisations you want to support.  We've been involved with New Ark Adventure Playground in Peterborough for some time now, we've done some work for them and we've even introduced our clients to them.  New Ark needed some painting and decorating as part of their maintenance and we happen to have Ben Fallows Painting and Decorating Ltd as one of our favourite clients.  They were introduced and the rest, as they say, is history.

This week we received a really lovely thank you letter from New Ark as we sponsored a race at their recent Race Night.  They raised enough money to pay for an intercom system on the front door so the children can be more secure while they're there.  

These days, we all lead busy lives with work, personal stuff, family, friends etc etc.  It's all too easy to forget to take time to say thank you but I think the power of a thank you cannot be underestimated.  It takes so little effort to say but has such a huge effect on the recipient. 

Confident and engaging.  Not what we were expecting when we were asked to do some mock interviews at a Sixth Form College in the Peterborough area this week.  However, the students were a pleasant surprise and they were indeed confident with engaging personalities.  I’m not sure that I would have been that confident aged 16/17 talking to a complete stranger about my skills and abilities! 

The mock interview day was one of a number of different events organised by Peterborough Skills Service, a pioneering new brokerage service working with employers and education centres.  The students were able to participate in an unfamiliar and sometimes nerve-wrecking activity such as having an interview but have it take place in the familiar environment of their usual place of learning. 

As HR Consultants with years of interviewing experience, we were able to give them a taster of the “real thing” – what it’s actually like sitting in front of someone and answering their questions, always with the aim of promoting yourself to the best of your abilities. 

This is a question that has a lot of businesses and organisations scratching their heads and it’s usually posed when a vacancy comes up and there’s someone earmarked to do it.  Hopefully it’s the right person with the right skillset and attitude for the role but leaving that aside for the moment, the business then has the dilemma of whether or not to advertise the position.

The short answer to this question is no.  There is no legal obligation to advertise any vacancy, neither internally nor externally.  However, unless you have an employee who is a perfect fit for the role, there are usually benefits to advertising.  Such benefits include:

did holding interviews in coffee shops/cafés/bars etc become a good thing?

This question has been bubbling around in my head for a little while but what prompted digits to keyboard was a comment from a Twitter connection (thanks Louicidal!) who observed that she’d overheard a number of different companies conducting interviews in the same coffee shop over a period of a few weeks.

Let me be clear.  I fully endorse different kinds of interviewing.  I don’t think that they should always be held in the dusty boardroom in front of a panel of even dustier interviewers.  I think there is a lot to be learned about a person’s attitudes and general cultural fit by the way they behave in different environments.

Mention Corporate Social Responsibility or worse, just the acronym CSR, to most business owners and you’ll be met with a blank look.

Interestingly, a recent report by Parliament Committees suggests that SMEs can play a fundamental role in promoting the uptake of CSR but that many are unfamiliar with the concept and tend to focus on the cost rather than the positive impact on their business and ultimately, on their bottom line. 

There’s just no hiding from HMRC when it comes to meeting your obligations as an employer and paying the right hourly rate.  An Employment Tribunal recently ruled that employees were entitled to a higher rate of National Minimum Wage after two telecommunication companies claimed that the workers were apprentices. 

Between them, the companies were ordered to pay wage arrears of almost £100,000 to 197 call centre workers and they received a penalty of £5,000 each to boot. 

The lesson here is that it really doesn’t matter what you call the working arrangement.  You can call your employees apprentices, get them to agree to it and pay them an apprenticeship rate but if you can’t prove that they really are apprentices, HMRC will not just take your word for it and you will be expected to pay up.

Research from Robert Half into employee wellbeing has concluded that employee burnout is common, affecting nearly a third of UK companies and the greatest effects are seen in London and the South East. 

The firm asked 200 HR Directors to cite the three factors they feel contribute most to employee burnout.  The top answer was workload, followed by overtime/long hours and then unachievable expectations. 

When asked if any initiatives had been implemented to prevent employee burnout, HR directors said they are promoting a teamwork-based environment (50%), reviewing/restructuring job functions and tasks (45%), encouraging team–building activities (34%), providing flexible working options (34%) and encouraging employees to take time off (31%).  One in five businesses (19%) plan to hire additional temporary / interim staff to help manage burnout.

Recent figures from the Office of National Statistics (ONS) indicate that the percentage of people working from home has gone from 9.2% in 2001 to 10.7% in 2012 which may not seem like a huge leap but it is indicative of a growing trend for people to be based from a home office. 

The benefits from such arrangements can be great for both employer and employee but as I mentioned in a previous article, an employer also needs to weigh up the potential costs, not to mention the risks.  

This trend looks set to continue and it’s apparent that many businesses can make it work successfully.  For those who have been able to work, there has been one key factor that has the power to guarantee success or failure.  That key factor is communication.

One of the most frequently asked questions recently is what is RTI and what does it mean to the average employer?  This guest post explains more.

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What is RTI?

With ever increasing overheads, it’s no wonder business owners are starting to see the obvious benefits of at least some of their employees working from home on a regular basis.  However, asking your staff to work from home could prove a costly exercise so it’s worth weighing up the pros and cons before you start celebrating the perceived savings. 

Management

You will need to give careful consideration to the potential difficulties of managing homeworkers and monitoring their performance.  Some people will enjoy working from home and will be all the more productive when they work uninterrupted.  Others will find the working from home discipline almost impossible to achieve.  You need to think about how you manage and monitor both types of employee because each will have their challenges.