The Work Clinic

So the smoking ban has nearly arrived, but what does this mean for the thousands of employees who smoke?

Some employers are putting in place smoking cessation clinics to help employees quit, even to the point of being given time off to overcome their habit. This is causing a divide in the office between the smokers and non-smokers, so where do you stand on the debate?

Read on for our expert Steve Miller's opinion...

Can fashion in the workplace have an impact on staff? It seems it can. One employee has written into me saying that they've been issued with a uniform sporting unattractive colours and this is deeply affecting morale. Should employees have the right to choose what they wear and how they wear it?

Dear Natalie,

I am an employee but we are around 150 very unhappy people and we need some help. We work in a clothes shop and they change the colour of our uniform every month or two. Recently they gave us a vote between two colours: pink and blue and blue won but now they are expecting us to wear yellow...

Do you sit next to the office clown, constantly cracking jokes that aren't funny? Or perhaps your colleague is prone to an all-year-round cold, incessantly sniffing their way through each day? Here are some of your office gripes about colleagues who exhibit anti-social behaviour at work, such as having loud mobile ring tones, bad body odour, or a voice like an amplified foghorn. Also, feel free to get your own office irritation off your chest.

It's that time of year again when pollen is starting to cause mayhem in the office. Are you being driven mad by those colleagues who are constantly sniffling, coughing and spluttering? I know I am.

Don't get me wrong, I'm all in sympathy of hayfever sufferers, but when someone refuses to blow their nose and sneezes saliva all over you because they're too lazy to cover their mouths, I feel myself bristling.

Is anyone else suffering in silence? If anyone knows of a good remedy I can pass on to my irritable hayfever sufferering colleagues and help them to stifle their daily blows, please, please, please, offer your top tips or point out any useful websites that can help below.

I've been inundated with responses from employees telling me that they feel left out of the team and this is having a detrimental effect on their morale in the office. If this is an issue you can relate to then you need to take immediate action before your stress levels explode.

Dear Natalie,

I work in an inexperienced team of seven. The majority of the team are good friends with the HR director outside work. When I come to work I get excluded and feel like I cannot relate to any them. There is a massive atmosphere in the office.

The HR director has been picking on little things that I do, which are not work related, and finds a way to make me feel like everything that goes wrong is my fault. I feel bullied and stressed out. I hate coming into work and finding another job is proving difficult as all this negativity is following me. I can't even put a grievance in as she is the highest rank. What can I do but leave?
Anon

What happens when someone on your team isn't performing well, but you're feeling the brunt of it as you or even other members in your team are picking up the slack?

Various employees I've spoken too recently have raised this issue where they think that colleagues are spending hours surfing the internet, making personal phone calls, leaving early or calling in sick and getting away with it because their manager is turning a blind eye.

The other dilemma of course is that some colleagues simply don't have the skill or technical competency to be able to manage their workload effectively and it's simply a case of a bad hire where a quick replacement was needed, they can't live up to expectations and the manager responsible for the hire fails to own up to their mistake.

Ros Taylor:
Why is it that managers are so bad at dealing with poor performers? They will shout the odds in the office but when it comes to a face to face discussion with someone who has not delivered, they avoid the issue. Other staff are left to fume as they are carrying the workload of all the non-deliverers. Perhaps it should be left to colleagues to deal with poor performers?

Should poor performers be sacked? This was an issue recently debated by Personnel Today...

Steve Miller:
I attended a business meeting with one of my new clients. As many of you are aware, I am often appalled at the competence of HR talent due to their lack of commercial acumen, and to be honest I wouldn't pay many of them in washers.

However, I am delighted to report that I recently met up with the most commercial HR head I have come across to date. The entire meeting was spent discussing the needs of the external customer and strategies to be employed that would ensure the business moved away from budget deficit and into surplus.

Don't get me wrong I don't mind the odd discussion on the latest piece of employment legislation (that in my opinion hinders business growth), but come on, can HR turn its focus more on how we can increase productivity, stimulate commercial growth and delight the customer?

If the answer is no then perhaps many chief executives have got it right when they refer to HR as a necessary evil.

Do you see yourself in future scheduling meetings via skype – either from home or the office, becoming a member of different communities in social networking sites where you brainstorm your work ideas in a virtual world and communicate with your colleagues through a variety of technology channels including instant messenger, mobile or blackberries?

Add to this a workforce becoming increasingly discerning about the environment, who are starting to demand that their company helps its employees cut down on their own individual carbon footprint on the planet, then how we conduct work and where we choose to work in a few years time could be a completely different reality to the one we know now.

HR is always saying that it whole heartedly supports personal career development, but too often does not back it up with requisite supporting action. For example, when professionals want to do courses to help their career but are blocked from doing them if they are not directly related to their job. John Hine, expert in the field of human development, says that this is a real gripe for many professionals who are determined to forge ahead with their careers.

I've just come across a site called The Work Nickname Generator, where you type in your first and last name and it supposedly tells you what your co-workers call you behind your back. If this is the case then apparently my colleagues refer to me as 'The Fist'?!

Gimmicks aside, it got me thinking about nickname etiquette in the office. Is it acceptable to shorten people's names, or make up nicknames for your colleagues? How does this affect office morale and do nicknames have a place in business culture?

How many of you are now staying in the same job for more than two or three years? The 'job for life' is fast disappearing. The 'itchy feet' syndrome kicks in far earlier than it ever has before, and people are becoming quicker to assume that the grass really is greener on the other side.

One company, however is making it easy for employees to return back to the fold by keeping in touch with its leavers. Donna Miller, European HR director for Enterprise Rent-A-Car, explains the 'boomerang hire' theory...

Following on from a previous posting, Working practices | How will the future of work look?, I was conducting research for upcoming blogging features, including a guide to blogging and a focus on social networking, when I came across the virtual world website Second Life, which describes itself as:

"A 3D online digital world imagined, created & owned by its residents."

On further investigation, I then came across an article in the Wall Street Journal titled: A Job Interview You Don't Have to Show Up For . The Wall Street journalist writes:

"It's now possible to meet with recruiters without actually showing up for a job interview.

Some employers are experimenting with Second Life, the online virtual community owned by San Francisco-based Linden Lab, to screen prospective hires. The program allows job seekers to create a computer-generated image to represent themselves – known as an 'avatar' – and communicate with executives of prospective employers as though they were instant-messaging."

Are businesses succeeding in making the most of their female talent? Sandra Buckley, principal consultant at Berkshire Consultancy, says:

"I think not. I would even go further and suggest that the glass ceiling in terms of progression is still very much in existence. This is despite evidence that women may be naturally more suited to leadership as traditionally feminine traits can better meet the requirements of a modern business leader."

Dear Natalie,

I work for a company that has a 'dress-down' day each Friday. One Friday a month they have decided to ask for a £1 donation to go into the firm's social fund. Money from the fund is used to subsidise a few events during the year.

The dilemma is this - are they allowed to ask for a donation as it is the company policy anyway, and if it goes to the social fund are they allowed to 'name and shame' the people who don't pay up?

It is a firm of about 100 people, and on days when they do a donation for charity they struggle to raise £30.

DK

Dear Natalie,

I would like to obtain information on the leadership background from a global perspective – ie why companies are adopting a leadership culture at all levels in organisations?

Where is the leadership concept emanating from? Why has it now become a need for all companies to drive a leadership agenda in their organisations? There are lots of theories around leadership and the question is which companies/leaders are successful and what are they doing to get the leadership culture right in a company?

Zennith

Preethi Nair, a successful author and owner of management consultancy, Kiss the Frog, believes that organisations need to tell more stories to instill creativity at work.

What is the value of storytelling in an organisation?

1. When you access the imagination, anything is possible
2. Good storytellers have the power to influence – people do not remember facts and figures, they remember a good story
3. Good storytelling builds teams – exchanging stories encourages a sense of belonging
4. Storytelling builds the knowledge base – people are more likely to retain information exchanged through coffee than pouring through a corporate handbook
5. Promotes innovation
6. Encourages fluid communication
7. Good storytellers are agents for change.

Here, Nair offers a story of her own and how her fairytale vision led to success...

We’ve all heard the phrase 'our people are our greatest asset', yet it seems to represent business about as well as an episode of The Apprentice. After all, where are all the front-facing staff when the City wrangles over a company’s performance? Why do all the financial deals we ever read about seem to revolve around headcount and cost savings? These are the questions Andrew Shapiro, executive consultant of The Forum Corporation addresses.

"Believe it or not, it really is the people that matter. Thus concludes some global research we recently carried out at The Forum Corporation, a global consulting leadership development firm, which looked at how companies grow – either organically, through alliances, or through the more juicy merger and acquisition (M&A) route...

Dear Natalie,

I am 29 and a candidate with seven years' media recruitment experience, and most recently was in a senior role in London. I have plenty of management experience and training yet I cannot break into HR.

I had a recent break from work to have a baby and during this time I decided HR is definitely a career I want to forge for the future. But it seems whichever direction I take I hit a dead end and I am just at a loss as to what else I can do.

So far I have tried the following...

Joe Calloway, author of Work Like You're Showing Off: The Joy, Jazz, and Kick of Being Better Tomorrow Than You Were Today gives advice about the rut; how you got in, and how to get out.

But before he does, I realised I'd been stuck in a rut before. Mostly when I've been unhappy in my workplace environment where I've had to work long hours for no reward or recognition, the boss is screaming, no one feels like they can talk out loud or be caught chatting so a 'whispering' culture' has developed for colleagues to let off steam before we all get to boiling point. This is definitely an unhealthy work culture. My way out was to decide to quit and find a new job. I figured the work culture wasn't going to change any time soon, my esteem became low, I felt demotivated and stressed as a result. I didn't recognise myself...

Dear Natalie,

I started a new job as a HR advisor three months ago, but I am finding the pace really slow. I have been thinking that I will stay here 12 months, mainly because I don't believe it looks good to job hop and also because from next April, we are to form a new private company which experience-wise may be challenging and something I can really get involved in. But I am wondering if I can last that long because I dislike coming into work.

The thing is I came from being an HR advisor with the NHS and the pace was really fast but it was underpaid. I only have two years' experience post MA and CIPD so I am thinking that on the one hand I should stay for longer as it will look better on my CV. The main question is - should I stay or should I go?

Kelly

Hi, my name is Dan... I'm on work experience and not a tea-run in sight. In fact, this is my first day of work experience at Personnel Today, and I'm the one being given the strong, black coffee... What strange business is this? I'm 18, wearing a t-shirt and trainers and yet not only feel valued and filled to the eyeballs with priceless journalistic titbits, but also exempt from the now notorious 'tea tally chart'? If that doesn't make any sense then check out the ongoing Personnel Today team office tea saga 'Office tea rounds | Nothing like a good brew to bring us together'.

At reception I was handed my very own 'special' staff pass and I've even been given my own desk - it's like a proper job. And here I sit, remembering the words of my old man and his tales of work experience which involved him standing next to a London butcher for eight hours, when he was a teenager: "That's how yer cut meat, boy!" If he were sitting next to me right now I might say: "Wow, how times have changed, father."

For my generation, it seems work experience is not only an essential weapon in the prospective employee's arsenal, but a damn sight easier on the legs, too...

Steve Miller:

Public sector HR professionals must learn from the private sector.I am aghast at the lack of practical and timely approaches when it comes to managing performance in the public sector. In fact, I find it laughable. Only recently I was in discussion with a public sector HR practitioner who discussed with me a number of performance issues he was managing, When I asked how long the employees had been performing so poorly, he went rather pink and said: "Around six months". I nearly choked on my Yorkshire pudding...

Customer experience expert Colin Shaw shares his views on why he believes that by keeping your customers happy, you will also keep your staff happy.

Colin Shaw, founder and chief executive of Beyond Philosophy, says:
"Running a customer experience (CE) consultancy, I see a variety of approaches to CE that range from the awesome – Mandarin Oriental Hotels springs to mind - to the abysmal. I won’t name names but the stereotype is the used car salesman - you drive away from the lot and the engine falls out but the dealer isn’t interested, the customer is merely the root of money. This is what we would describe as a ‘naïve’ organisation, while the Mandarin is moving towards the goal of becoming a ‘natural’ company, where they are truly customer centric without jumping through any hoops. So far, so good, you may be thinking, but how does this relate to HR?

Sourcing quality talent continues to gain importance, as a growing global economy with changing demographics puts greater pressure on locating and retaining the best talent. The candidate experience is also coming under the spotlight and, as a result, businesses are increasingly turning to Web 2.0-style tactics to gain competitive advantage in the war for talent.

Chris Philips, senior director of international marketing, Taleo, and Alice Snell, vice-president Taleo Research, said:
"The internet, and in particular the corporate career website, has emerged as a core channel for attracting and acquiring candidates, and is a prime source of new hires. At the same time, hype has been growing around social networking websites such as MySpace, Jobster, H3, Facebook and LinkedIn...

Yesterday evening I was called up and asked if I wanted to take part in a radio interview for Radio 5 Live about whether employers should ban Facebook. Before I knew it, the BBC had sent a car to collect me to take me to the studio...

Tom Hadley, director of external relations at the Recruitment and Employment Confederation (REC), offers advice to jobseekers about what to look for in a recruitment agent:

Let’s be honest, finding the perfect job can be really hard work and almost feel like a job in itself. It’s a process which involves, among other things, researching suitable employers, sending out targeted CVs and cover letters and rigorously preparing for interviews.

People are often selective when choosing which recruitment agency to work with, but are they as concerned about the individual recruitment agent they go through? The relationship between you and your agent could do more to bag you that dream job than you might at first think, so why not be picky?...

Few of us will fail to remember the terrible events of two years ago when Hurricane Katrina swept through the US city of New Orleans, destroying everything in its path.

At least 1,800 people lost their lives in the hurricane and in the subsequent floods.

The storm is estimated to have been responsible for $81.2bn (£40bn) in damage, making it the costliest natural disaster in US history.

I've just come back off a week's holiday in the depths of rural Wales, but not exactly the type of holiday where one lazes around soaking up the sun by the pool. Instead I was camping in a slopey field on a farm, so at night my body lay at 45 degrees dead up against the canvas. It was most uncomfortable. I was woken up at 5am by the pigs shuffling around in their pen just beyond the foot of the tent, there were torrential downpours and it was freezing cold at night.

I'm not complaining though. It was great to get some fresh air, mingle with all the farm animals, and I even joined in on a barn dance - the owners of the farm had organised a party for more than 180 people.

Everyone needs to get away from work once in a while though don't they? But what happens if you want more than that; where you want to travel the world, extend your horizons and do something different away from the corporate working environment?...

What is it about staplers? On my team we all have staplers on our desks. Today a colleague of mine used my stapler at least four times in the space of an hour - although I could be slightly exaggerating the space of time.

I stopped my colleague in their tracks and asked why they continue to borrow my stapler instead of walking a few steps away to the nearby stationary cupboard. The reply was that my stapler was within reaching distance and it was too much effort to walk the few paces to the cupboard.

Hang on a minute...

Paul Roberts, strategic director of employee wellbeing specialist IHC

"For goodness sake when will people stop printing this rubbish: 'Absenteeism is costing UK firms £20.9bn a year, equating to a total loss of 480 million days'.

I read it but have no idea what 480 million of anything looks like, feels like, let alone what am I meant to do with it!...

I must be just too simple. I know that I would like to win £20.9bn as I wouldn’t need to sit at a PC for hours a day. If the readers can’t grasp this stuff and if you can’t relate to it you can never make the first step to move from here to a new more interesting, more profitable place...

One dismayed employee raises a number of issues in her letter below and argues that a number of potential HR employers talk about how strategic their roles have become in the past 10 years but are seemingly unable to see beyond the length of their eyelashes when confronted with an individual with a commercial background. She asks why?

Dear Natalie

"There seems to be a tremendous amount of talk, research, and articles written on the UK skills shortage and the importance of HR as a profession to help generate and facilitate training, and change, but also gain credibility with business leaders, managers, etc. But if the current HR professionals can't even see beyond their noses, perhaps HR truly needs to re-think what is required in terms of skill development in its own world and realise it's a lot more than just changing their name from 'payroll' to 'personnel' or 'human resources' to 'human capital division'...

I was out for dinner recently with a group of girlfriends and, as you do, we ended up talking about work. The common prerequisite work questions quickly made the rounds at the table: "So, hows work then?", "What are you up to at the moment?", "Any work gossip?".

Let's be honest here, work conversation, especially in a group of four girls, will, from my experience, dominate the conversation for a good hour or so as we take it in turns to discuss in detail our day-to-day working experiences.

So here's the thing. How much fun should we be allowed to have at work? I believe I'm fortunate in my career, in that I chose to work in a creative environment, which attracts creative like-minded colleagues...

Wouldn't it be a breath of fresh air if all employers took responsibility to help cut down pollution and help promote a healthier climate like McDonald's has done.

Today, the Daily Mirror reports that:

"Fast-food giant McDonald's is recycling its rubbish to help heat 130 public buildings. In a pilot scheme, the burger chain will convert more than 1,000 tons of waste into electricity. Steve Easterbrook, CEO of McDonald's UK, said: This is an exciting opportunity to look at an alternative method of disposal with real benefits to the environment."

Imagine if employers instructed all staff that lived within a three mile radius of their place of work that they weren't allowed to travel to work by car, but instead offered all employees free bikes as part of an initiative to reduce traffic on the roads, cut down pollution and improve the fitness of employees. This may sound far-fetched to many of you, but in an article I wrote for Personnel Today – How can employers respond to the Eddington report and reduce the congested commuter network? – where furniture retailer Ikea gave each of its 9,000 employees a bicycle for Christmas, it's not that crazy after all...

I've just been blasted with a cool stream of air and stood up out of my chair to ask who the guilty party was. The declaration to my team went something like this: "I am absolutely freezing, has someone got the air conditioning on?" Everyone laughed when one of my colleagues, Mr A, turned to another, Mr B, and said, with a glint in his eye: "Isn't that you Mr B?"

This sparked a debate about the wars of air conditioning in the office. Mr A then stated he thought I was feeling the cold more because "all men are warm blooded creatures", and then it was suggested by a few of my colleagues I should post about air conditioning.

I would bet it's a common issue in almost every workplace with air conditioning units – it's either too cold or too hot. If someone could devise a system where everyone had control over their own desk space temperature, I'm sure they would be an instant millionaire...

Today, I’m competing against my fellow work colleague bloggers within Reed Business Information (RBI) - a large publisher in the UK - and it's all for a charitable cause.

THE BLOGATHON CHALLENGE:
RBI is donating £50 to charity for every blogger taking part and there will be additional donations to charity for the best performing bloggers on the day. So I need you to leave as many comments as possible and to link into your own websites and for bloggers; to link in over a three-day period starting from today. So please join in on, what will hopefully be, with your help, the biggest online global social experiment to get as many views on workplace culture as possible while at the same time carrying out your good deed for the day!

Pssssssst.... spread the word - here's how:

READY FOR YOUR CHALLENGE? - SPREAD THE WORD:

Bloggers: As well as leaving comments, please link in to this posting and encourage your own community to get involved.
Facebook members: Paste this text on your wall: "Hey everyone, paste this onto your own wall now: WALL TO WALL EXPERIMENT: then type this link into your browser now – www.personneltoday.com/wcblog – to take part in hopefully what will be the biggest online social experiment to debate workplace issues from around the globe - it's all for charity and you don't have to pay a penny."
LinkedIn, MySpace or forum members: Please paste this link www.personneltoday.com/wcblog to all your friends and ask them to join in.
Email: Send a message to all your friends and colleagues to join in!

Click on the continue reading link...

First of all, a big thanks to everyone that sponsored my charity blogathon. As a team of 21 bloggers within Reed Business Information (RBI), we managed to raise £2,000.

However, the charity blogathon posting is going to be monitored until end of play tomorrow, 26 September, so you still have time to participate and get involved...

Many thanks to those that have already linked in:

• Strategic HCM
• HR Wench
• The Wine Conversation
• Gullibility blogspot
• The Angry HR Exec
• McArthur's Rant
• One Man & His Blog
• Stephen Booth
• The Career Revolution
• City PA
• Apter International
• Lindsey Hawkerhunt
• Ban Bullying at Work
• Susan Russell of Charles Russell law
firm
• 8 hours and a lunch

If you link in today and tomorrow, there's still time to add you to this list. Let me know if I've missed you off.

‘Corporate hospitality’ – two words guaranteed to strike fear into any HR professional’s heart. Unfortunately, work jollies are a core part of many companies’ sales activity, and are here to stay says Helen McCormick, acting features editor of Personnel Today.

Helen is keen to receive and collate your stories of disastrous/humourous corporate days out, to serve as a warning to the rest of the HR community and to include as part of a feature to be published in a forthcoming issue of Personnel Today. If you wish to remain anonymous, you can send your stories to Helen at the Work Clinic in confidence (see details at the bottom of this posting).

Helen McCormick, acting features editor of Personnel Today:

Have your staff ever lost a hapless client in a foreign city? Has there ever been a case of ‘man overboard’ on your firm’s teambuilding boat trip? Has anyone ruined their favourite shirt through paintballing?...

So you're sitting at your desk, typing away when a colleague comes over, interrupts you, and talks to you; they could be passing on a phone message, briefing you on a task, rambling on about the weather in general, or just telling you about their plans for the weekend…at this point it could be about anything because you’re simply just not listening. You’ve definitely nodded appreciatively in the right places, mumbled “yeah” and “no” absent-mindedly. And, then, when they’ve walked away, you wonder what on earth they were going on about because you realise you don’t have a clue what they just said to you.

How many of you have found yourself doing this? I ask the point because after my blogathon, I received a comment which raised this very issue:

Dear Natalie

“Having read your blogathon meticulously, I note most people did not indeed answer the questions asked, only perhaps one of maybe three or five in a section...do you think this a reflection of the employee population ie their attention skills to details and instruction? I see our American friend in particular wrote detailed responses and shone out above the rest.”

I know I find myself switching off to others around me when I’m on deadline to finish off an article or trying to keep up with the flow of e-mails hitting my inbox - where I really just want to get on with the task in hand, without being disturbed....

While meetings are an inevitable part of office life, there are times when we have found ourselves sitting in a meeting, drumming our fingers and wondering why on earth we have been roped into it. Or on the other hand, are managers calling meetings galore as a way of coping with mounting workloads and use these as a tool to keep up with what's going on in the office?...

Steve Miller:

Who said that HR people can become type cast and fit for nothing else? I have always said that good HR people have a wide range of transferable skills and what happened to me recently reaffirms my belief.

I set up my training company four years ago. Taking forward my HR capabilities such as relationship builder, facilitation skills and passion for the human race, I have made the most of my abilities and achieved a double book deal with a top international publisher, appeared on GMTV, been featured in numerous magazines, appointed columnist to several publications, made a programme for the BBC and will soon be flying out for a few days to Los Angeles at the request of a television company in the U.S...

Dear Natalie,

“We want to make sure that staff across our organisation are clear and well-informed regarding internal HR policies and procedures. We are thinking of conducting an online survey to see if this is the case but would like some tips on how to make this activity a success.”

Jo Causon:

In today’s information-driven climate, individuals are bombarded with online polls and questionnaires, many of which are promptly deleted as spam or considered a waste of time.

With this in mind, it's important to understand how a survey would fit with other internal communications and requests for feedback. Is it necessary to do a separate survey, or could it be placed within an overall staff satisfaction survey requesting feedback about all departments?...

Do you have a fitness freak sitting next you at work? Are you that weekend marathon runner?
A recent survey by electronics manufacturer, Siemens, has found that half of the UK business population rarely takes part any physical exercise.

This lack of regular exercise may be contributing to increased levels of stress, ill health and impaired performance in the work place, it says...

Dear Natalie

“I have a first class degree in Economics, an MSc in the Psychology of Work and clocked up four years of recruitment experience before having my kids. Six years on I’m desperate to get back to work but on a part-time/job-share basis. I’m really struggling to get an HR admin job because I’m over-qualified and can’t find an in-house recruitment role that isn’t full-time. What can I do to improve my chances?”

Jo Causon:

There is no reason why someone with your qualifications and experience should not be able to gain a suitable position. In the current skills shortage, employers are crying out for candidates with high levels of expertise so, even though organisations are advertising full-time roles, they may consider allowing you to work part-time or job-share if you are the right person to fill the position.

Peter Cheese, global managing partner of Accenture:

With once-familiar talent pools drying up and new ones rapidly coming on stream, organisations have to move fast and act smart if they are to attract, motivate and keep the best people. Talent sourcing has become a particularly critical issue in many businesses as they grow and require new skills, and as they see their existing workforces ageing. Attracting and managing much more diverse talent – generational diversity, geographic diversity, virtual teams, and diversity of background and education - are becoming critical capabilities...

There’s a Chinese proverb that says: “When the winds of change blow, some people build walls and others build windmills”. It’s an apt maxim for today’s organisations, as they face up to a world that is changing at a bewildering pace. The currency of business is being transformed. Companies now work in a globalised, multi-polar world. They have to go where the talent is, where the resources are and where the markets are. To flourish, they have to connect up people and processes. And, crucially, they have to break down traditional barriers and challenge ingrained management mindsets where talent is concerned...

Do people really leave their manager or the organisation? Do more men or women leave because of bullying/harassment?

If you would like to answer these questions they form as part of a 10-question multiple choice section taken out of the second Employee Retention Survey conducted by people retention specialist, TalentDrain.

The research is due for publication in January 2008 and it aims to examine possible reasons why employees leave organisations, the impact of staff turnover on organisational performance, the interventions and approaches used to retain employees and the resources allocated to staff retention...

Facebook is still causing a furore in the media. Although Facebook has been hotly debated on whether employers should ban Facebook or not new research from Manpower now suggests that nearly half of Brits (43%) would feel outraged if an employer used a social networking site such as Facebook, Bebo and Friends Reunited to look for information about them and 56% consider such actions unethical.

Manpower surveyed 1000 UK adults and other results revealed included:

· 43% of employees would feel outraged if an employer used a social networking site to find out more about them
· 56% consider it unethical for employers to research about them using social networking sites
· 28% of social network users have limited their personal information available on the internet, with 78% expecting to do so in the future...

I shudder to think what would happen in a world with no e-mail access. I mean, I check my in-box at least a 100 times a day. Ok, slight exaggeration, but it begs the question, what did I do before e-mail came along? And more importantly, what did you do?

Some companies are resorting to 'no e-mail days' where employees are being asked to switch off their e-mail function because e-mail is found in some cases to be lowering productivity in the office.

After thinking about it, I realise I'm totally dependent on my e-mail function being switched on throughout the day with the e-mail notifications flashing up briefly on my screen to alert me that I've received an e-mail...

Dear Natalie,

“We are trying to make our office more environmentally-friendly and green. Having looked at a number of initiatives and the cost’s involved, we have now decided on what changes we are going to implement. What is the best way to put ‘green policies’ in place and manage them on an ongoing basis?”

Dear Natalie,

I am a young executive currently with a start-up company. I was recruited by them while in graduate school. My post is chief compliance officer, but there have been some things that have taken place in the office that I do not agree with. Nothing illegal though.

Also, the office is located in South Florida where I have no interest in living. I want to move on, but how can I find another company that will give a 24 year-old like myself a chance like the one I have? Is it possible to do so?

I would like to remain at the current level that I am at. I have been in my post for only two months, but I have provided vital infrastructure to the company and written most of the policies and procedures from scratch.

Dear Natalie,

“I am currently working as project administrator. I took over the role at the beginning of April this year. A 'development programme' has been devised within my department for those in the PA role, in which I do not wish to participate, and have subsequently been told that if I do not participate then I will no longer be able to occupy the position.

When I was first appointed there was no mention of an NVQ and, in addition, I am planning to restart my study in the new year, an Open University Degree. I do not believe that terms and conditions for a position can be changed after an employee has commenced his time in the post. Would you be able to give me your opinion on this matter?"

Are you sitting comfortably at your work desk? Or are you slouching about in the latest designer office chair with a twinge in your neck?

Apparently, each year, employers will splash out a fortune building and refurbishing their offices, yet the British Council for Offices (BCO) say that very few will ever bother to check if these changes result in a happier and more productive workforce. Which is why BCO has launched a new guide to Post Occupancy Evaluation (POE - an assessment of the performance of any new or refurbished building)...

Stefan Ciecierski, european managing director of Aquent

In a recent credit card TV advertisement, late and hassled parents are seen being ‘fired,’ ‘sacked’ and ‘let go’ by their sad and lonely children. The sub text is clear. These children have had enough of absent parents who spend all hours at the office only to slump into a chardonnay fuelled fog of guilt and exhaustion upon their return. But this isn’t how life is supposed to be, is it?

It’s no wonder that 1.2 million people are now employed in the UK through freelance, temporary or contract agreements. A temporary worker can enjoy higher rates of pay and the ability to develop and improve their own skill base through exposure to numerous employment situations.

This statistic should be a wake up call to all those employers out there who indulge in old fashioned thinking and are under the influence of archaic personnel thinking. These dinosaurs risk losing their brightest, most creative and talented individuals from permanent positions until they can show them the same respect, autonomy, empowerment and most importantly trust as the consultants, freelancers and temporary staff they employ...

I'd like to showcase a blog I've just been introduced to. Mr Moof happens to be a mobile working expert at Microsoft. His real name is James McCarthy and considers himself a "moofer". Yes, that's right, a moofer. What is a moofer I hear you asking? Well, like you, I just had to find out for myself. Don't be surprised if in future, the terms moof, moofer and moofing all become more familiar to you.

A "moofer" is apparently part of a new generation of flexible workers where staff have the power to choose where, when and how they want to work.

James McCarthy describes moofing as:

“The term ‘moofing’ is a loose acronym based on the term ‘Mobile Out of Office’ and describes someone who is working from a location best suited to the task in hand, whether that be in the office, at home or in another location. Technology has freed us from our desks and moofers are people who understand that work is something you do not somewhere you go. While UK workers clamour for a more flexible working lifestyle, many companies still cling to the outdated practice of presenteeism, where workers are measured on input, i.e. hours worked, rather than the output of their endeavours. Moofing is a response to this, and while it’s championed primarily by a new generation of workers who can see little logic in the 9-5 lifestyle, older generations are also beginning to question the practices that are currently in place while realising the benefits that mobile technologies can bring.”

Dear Natalie,

"I wonder if you can help me. I am part of an HR team who are beginning to go crazy about putting up so many Christmas decorations it looks like Santa’s grotto. My manager thinks it's great but I am concerned that other departments are beginning to see us as a laughing stock. We are an outgoing HR team and always very friendly with line managers and I worry if I suggest we are going a bit far I will become the outcast. Please can you advise?"

How many Christmas cards will you or your company be sending out to clients and work contacts? Depending on the size of your organisation, perhaps thousands? That’s a lot of card. Now consider the amount of trees that have been cut down and milled for the purpose of producing those Christmas cards and the impact this has on the environment. Well, one company that is trying to make a difference is Green Park Interim & Executive Resourcing.

Raj Tulsiani, Co-Founder & CEO, Green Park Interim & Executive Resourcing:

“This year, we’re not mailing out Christmas cards to our network – we’re sending an e-card to protect the environment. Old news? Not quite. This year, we’re using our Christmas e-card to launch our “Plant for Placement” scheme. We will plant a tree for every executive interim (or permanent) placement we make in 2008 – and beyond - through our agreement with the Woodland Trust...

Are you working late night after night because you're inundated with various management requests, finding it hard to juggle all your priorities because every task needed to be done 'yesterday' - yet the mounting paperwork on your desk keeps on mounting up? If you're finding it hard to juggle all the different tasks your role requires then you need to focus on your key priorities.

Jo Causon, director of marketing and corporate affairs of the Chartered Management Institute says that firstly, you should stop giving yourself such a hard time. In today’s busy environment, prioritising work is a major challenge for most individuals and that you are certainly not alone. Research by the Chartered Management Institute shows that 84% of managers find it difficult to juggle responsibilities and tasks...

Steve Miller:

I could not believe my eyes recently when I was called in to lift the impact of a sales team. Not only did they look drab, lack oomph and have little commitment to the products they were selling but there was also the most awful wreak of body odour.

Can you imagine the lack of inspiration these troops would bring to their customers? Luckily my own sniff detector managed to identify those carrying the not so ideal fragrance. As I carried forward my training session I made it quite clear (without pointing) that the appearence of the team needed to improve significantly if they were ever going to get close to hitting targets...

How do you uncover the truth when it comes to interviewing candidates to really find out whether they really are who they say they are? Over at Recent Trends in Human Management blogger Amit Bhagria says that:

"Behavioural based interviewing is the scientific way of interviewing that more and more companies and organisations are using in their hiring process. The basic premise behind behavioural interviewing is that the most accurate predictor of future performance is past performance in a similar situation. It provides a more objective set of facts to make employment decisions than other interviewing methods. Traditional interview questions ask you general questions such as 'Tell me about yourself'. The process of behavioural interviewing is much more probing, realistic, objective driven and works very differently with high efficiency."

These days, going for a job interview is as much about the candidate getting a feel for the company as the other way around. It’s a two-way process. While the butterflies will be fluttering mainly in the interviewee’s stomach, the interviewer will need to do just as much preparation. And the questions asked are just as important as the answers given...

Neville Bain, chairman of the Institute of Directors:
"People are our most important assets according to the mantra that we read in the annual reports of publicly listed companies. I believe this to be true, but see it practised less frequently than it is talked about.

If people really are the most important assets then why do we not see more attention paid to this in the company priorities? Part of the answer may well be that the role of HR director has not been elevated to high enough a level in the board room, and that directors do not give this sufficient airtime on their busy agendas. Indeed in a recent survey I found that boards spend more time on compliance than they do on caring for, and leveraging the talent in the organisation...

“Sit up straight!”, “Elbows off the table!”, “Stop slurping!” – there’s no forgetting the manners battered into us when we were kids. Or is there? As Brighton College announces plans to implement etiquette lessons for its senior students, we may need to look afresh at the importance of manners in the workplace …

After the near-hysteria that accompanied the thuds as people crashed to office floors left, right and centre, or spent whole working days in the loos, it's something of a relief to hear that the dreaded Novovirus doesn't after all signal the end of the world as we know it ....

According to psychologist Dr. Cliff Arnall, today is the unhappiest day of the year. Blue Monday, as it’s become known, marks the start of the last full week in January – when apparently we experience a series of ‘combined depressive effects’. Somewhat oddly, Arnall has developed a mathematical equation to explain the gloom ….

We’re often told that it’s worth investing in work clothes, but let’s face it, do we really want to ruin that £500 Dolce & Gabbana suit? Do we want it coated in all the horrible detritus of office life – tea, ink, crumbs and rusty paperclips? And how important is the ‘first impressions outfit’ when we’re meeting the same people day in, day out, and they wouldn’t notice if we turned up in a chain-festooned bin-liner? Deep down, wouldn’t we rather just wear jeans to work and put that hard-earned cash towards a decent holiday, far from the office?

In a recent survey of 1,000 women, George, supermarket Asda’s clothing label, found that 91% of respondents opt for the ‘no thought required’ or ‘on the top of the pile’ combination of white shirt and black trousers at least three times a week. So, following on from the hullabaloo caused by its £15 suit for men, Asda has launched a £5 white shirt and black trouser combo – you can just about get your lunchtime kebab and chips for that these days. That said, too many kebabs and you might be wanting a sturdier pair of trousers ….

Three out of four (77%*) employees working for the UK's 50 Best Workplaces want to work for their company for a long time, according to new research published by global research and management consultancy The Great Place to Work® Institute. This has increased from 44% just 12 months ago, reflecting an increased concern about job security and the risks associated with switching companies in an unstable economic climate. This research, the largest employee-centred survey of its kind, covers all aspects of employee trust in the workplace.

The research found that, within these organisations, 74% of employees surveyed believe that management consults them when making decisions that affect their jobs or environment. Three-quarters (76%) of these workers also believe that management shows sincere interest in them as a person, not just as an employee.

While bosses lose sleep – and hair – over the growing use of Facebook, My Space, Bebo and so on in working hours, a new survey revealed that half of office workers in the UK spend between 1 and 2 hours per day rummaging around for files and papers at work.

Britain was the fifth tidiest nation, after The Netherlands, Germany, France and Spain. Ironically, only the Italians, famed for their elegant and highly groomed style, admit to being messier at work …

Ali Gill, founder, Getfeedback:

What are the top ten challenges in talent management today? Personnel Today and talent management consultancy Getfeedback are looking for your views on the key issues in talent management today and tomorrow. You can download the full white paper from Personneltoday.com.

As a taster, we've included Getfeedback's top ten challenges for managing talent today, and how to overcome them...

Retaining the talent within organisations is the number one challenge for senior HR managers in 2008, according to a survey by talent management solutions provider Taleo. The findings echo the trends of a similar survey conducted in 2007.

The survey, ‘HR Challenges in 2008’, asked more than 200 senior HR managers in the UK about their biggest challenges in the coming 12 months, what tools they need to help optimise HR performance, and their HR budget expectations.

Survey findings indicate that recruiting and hiring are priorities for UK HR managers this year. When asked to select their top HR challenge going into 2008, the following trends emerged …

It’s Monday morning, February 4th. Take a look around the office. Who’s there, ploughing through their inbox? And who’s missing, the only clue to their whereabouts a croaky voicemail or misspelt text?

Yes, National Sickie Day is with us once more, the day when staff are most likely to ‘throw a sickie’ due to a combination of post-Christmas blues, poor weather and a long wait for the summer holiday season – not helped by incessant TV advertising of holidays, beaches, villas and even suntan lotion. All against a background of torrential rain, gale force winds and a risk of flooding.

Surveys have suggested around 310,000 workers will take a “sickie” today, at an estimated cost of £27million to British industry …

Peter Mooney, a spokesman for personnel software Employersafe, which monitors staff absenteeism, says:

“It is a well-known fact in the business world that the first Monday of February is deemed the worst in terms of absenteeism. We now advise our clients to keep a particularly close eye on staff taking this day off.

Although many people will be swinging the lead, employers must also acknowledge that many people are also off work with genuine ailments, such as colds and flu at the time of year.

That is why it is important to monitor staff absenteeism to work out who is genuine and who is faking it.”

Careers expert Judi James picks the top ten excuses for being off ‘sick’ ….

Oliver is one of our favourite films, and we’ve all laughed at the clever exploits of the Artful Dodger, but it’s a little more sobering to hear that we are a nation of thieves. A new survey commissioned by insurance Royal & Sun Alliance has found that British employers are large-scale victims of theft, with their own staff stealing so frequently that it has become ingrained.

The survey found that:

• Over 1 million employees in Britain steal stationery from work at least once a week
• Almost 1 in 7 employees have lied about overtime worked
• Over half a million workers a day exaggerate their expenses claims

Particularly alarmingly, given the recent spate of lost information, over a quarter of a million workers in Britain have taken a work laptop home for personal use and simply not returned it (which prompts a few questions about IT departments).

Read on to see why Britain’s workers are so light-fingered …

Given that we spend so much of our time in the office, it’s inevitable that we’ll have to squeeze a bit of personal ‘admin’ into our working day. Employees are divided between those happy to share private information with a whole floor full of people and those who prefer to communicate in cryptic half sentences or make calls in the stairwell.

But those days of ducking under your desk to call the dentist may be about to end ….

Did you make it home in time for David Attenborough’s latest, wonderful, offering last night or were you stuck at your desk, the joys of the pygmy blue-tongued skink to remain forever a mystery? If you’ve made it to the giddy heights of management, you well have been chained to your keyboard well after ‘going home’ time: a Chartered Management Institute survey of 1,500 managers has found that 89% regularly work more than their contracted hours.

Some food for thought:

• The average manager works an hour and 18 minutes over contract everyday
• That’s equivalent to an extra, unpaid, 40 days a year per manager
• Or 184m extra days, nationally

It’s Mother’s Day on Sunday, not that I need to tell you. Bombarded as we are by ads for flowers, pink things, fluffy things, bling things (all left unsold on Valentine’s Day, or am being cynical?), there’s no escaping the fact that working mothers still get a raw deal in this country.

According to Dr Gillian Paull, research associate of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, before the arrival of children, more than 85% of working women in Britain are in full-time employment – dropping to 34% after they become mothers.

Paull’s findings, published in The Economic Journal this month, show that despite policy innovations and large-scale cultural changes, working women in Britain are still far more likely than men to be working full-time.

Her findings may not come as a surprise, if you’re a working mother ….

We’re used to TV footage of binge-drinking women vomiting in gutters on what is fast becoming an average Saturday night for Britain’s cities. We’ve begun to expect our young women to live up to the stereotype, and there’s even a section of British society which takes pride in this ‘new tradition’ being taken overseas in the summer months. But what of that other, more enduring, stereotype – the nurse as ministering angel? All too sadly, this has just been shattered, perhaps once and for all.

Following a stay in Bath’s Royal United Hospital, Conservative peer Lord Mancroft has announced that the nurses who cared for him were “grubby, drunken and promiscuous” – harsh words, indeed. During a Lords debate on NHS patient care quality last night, Lord Mancroft reported that "The nurses that looked after me were mostly grubby. We're talking about dirty fingernails, slipshod, lazy. They were an accurate reflection of many young women in Britain today.”

In the last week we’ve heard that practice-owning GPs have awarded themselves a 58% pay-rise. Nurses have been accused of being dirty and drunk at work. And today we’re told that the easiest way to avoid all of the above when we feel a bit under the weather is to head to …. Sainsbury’s.

Once the domain of Jamie Oliver and his pukka recipes, there’s more to Sainsbury’s – or at least the branch in Blackley, Manchester – than meets the eye. Step forward Dr Mohammed Jiva, GP in residence …

It’s International Women’s Day on Saturday March 8th, and while the papers are full of heart-warming tales of high-fliers who have managed to have it all – career, marriage, children, ‘me time’ – the fact remains that, for most women, it hasn’t quite worked out that way.

And Opportunity Now, part of Business in the Community (BITC), has published the figures to prove it. Some food for thought:

International mergers and acquisitions are on the rise, with 172 cross border deals, worth $1bn, in 2006 alone. Yet it’s the international aspect of these mergers that is proving awkward.

Says Frances Wilson, the CIPD’s international manager,

“Mergers and acquisitions transcend national cultures, often making the integration process challenging and problematic”.

Wilson goes on to point out that

“HR can play a key role in making this integration a success for employees at all levels and can in particular lead the transfer of knowledge, so that HR teams learn from the operations they acquire.”

Next time you’re rummaging through the discount badminton racquets and tinned tomatoes at Lidl, spare a thought for the staff. Employees back in the store’s German homeland are being spied on ….

German news magazine Stern has discovered that the chain allegedly hired detectives to spy on its staff. Hundreds of pages of information have been collected, and the company now has details of which of its staff are ‘incapable’ or ‘introverted and naïve’. A quick read will even tell you where staff are tattooed, and what sort of people they mix with outside work.

Until recently, most Japanese people drove white cars, as they associate the colour with safety and good fortune. You’re probably sneering at what you might see as naïve superstition, but car insurers elephant.co,uk have discovered that we are every bit as bad. And worse still, we seem to choose our car colours according to our profession.

elephant.co.uk looked at data from over one million drivers, and here’s what they discovered …

A survey by budget hoteliers Travelodge has revealed that British workers, evidently more entrepreneurial than traditionally thought, are apparently swindling their bosses by more than £1bn a year, though making up false expense claims.

Travelodge discovered that the typical worker manages to claim an extra £17 per month – that’s £204 a year – through falsifying their expenses.

According to Guy Parsons, Travelodge chief operating officer,

“In today’s climate, companies cannot afford to splurge workers on ridiculous non work related expense claims which is costing bosses over £1 billion a year".

We spend so much time at work that we tend to regard it as a home from home. We personalise our work space – think photos, favourite mugs, even hideous fluffy toys – and we just assume that it is as safe as our own homes. We shouldn’t.

While we casually leave phones, jewellery, iPods and money lying on our desks, a survey from insurers Sheila’s Wheels has revealed that 15.3 million office workers in the UK may become victims of identity theft – by overtrusting their colleagues.

Those cunning foxes at Lambeth Council have joined the Department for Work and Pensions and professional services company Capita to catch out benefit cheats. In a recent pilot project, council staff phoned 2,000 borough residents and used Voice Risk Analysis to detect whether they were lying. Voice Risk Analysis picks up tiny changes in the voice, which indicate when someone is lying.

Next time you or a colleague are working late, think twice before relying on energy drinks to keep you going. A 40 year-old supermarket worker, Alfredo Duran, suffered a fatal heart attack, allegedly as a result of drinking four cans of energy drink Red Bull a night, every night, to get him through his night shifts.

Each 250ml can of Red Bull is said to contain 80mg of caffeine – the same amount as a cup of filter coffee – and some countries have already banned it.

A post-mortem showed that Duran had an enlarged heart, and according to pathologist Dr Ian Roberts “For an individual with this condition, the risk of problems with the heart is increased by stimulants such as caffeine and may be triggered by levels which would have no effect on people with a normal heart”.

According to the University of Birmingham, call centres are providing poor service to customers with strong accents. This won’t come as a surprise if you’ve tried to book a cinema ticket over the phone in anything other than the Queen’s English. A regional accent can mean the difference between seeing Ratatouille and La Dolce Vita – and the difference between a successful date and a failed one.

University researchers argue that the technology is at fault, programmed as it invariably is to recognise Americanised or Southern British accents. How would your accent fare?

Increasing numbers of UK workers are spending time working abroad, tempted by further career opportunities and potential higher earnings, according to a quality of life report published by NatWest International Personal Banking (NatWest IPB) and the Centre for Future Studies.

In 2006, over 200,000 British citizens left the UK to live abroad. Two thirds of them went to work abroad. Of those surveyed, four in ten (42%) were professionals or managers, and a further quarter (25%) were in other jobs. Results of the survey suggest that the typical expat abroad is no longer necessarily a retiree in the sun, but has a professional career, is aged 43 and earns an average salary of £67,000.

A newly published essay from The Work Foundation asks the nature of “meaningful work”, why more people seem to be seeking it, and what employers can do to make work more meaningful.

The paper argues that while thinkers and writers have long wondered at the value of work to human beings beyond providing a living, the notion of “meaningful work” is a relatively new phenomenon.

Employees who are technologically enabled by their bosses with WiFi, a BlackBerry and a mobile phone are working an extra 20 days a year – effectively giving their holiday back according to new research published by recruitment consultancy Office Angels. One in 10 of these ‘up-teched’ office workers admit to checking-in constantly outside working hours.
Despite this, 40% of those surveyed appreciate having the technology.
The benefits of being ‘up-teched’:

More efficient: 41% of UK office workers say remote technology makes them more efficient, and means more effective use of their time
Stress Buster: 15% say BlackBerries reduce their stress levels by preventing email build-up
Up-flexing the workforce: 39% say it allows for flexible working

According to research by employment law firm Peninsula, Tuesday is the most productive days of the week – and the weekend starts at 2pm on Friday, with seven out of 10 downing tools.
According to Deb Gibbons, head of employee relations at Peninsula,

"Monday seems to be occupied with meetings, conference calls and catching up with e-mail. It also sees greater sickness and absenteeism levels, so the real work gets started on a Tuesday."

Gibbons adds that:

"Employees and bosses also put the most hours in on a Tuesday, when more overtime is done than on any other day of the week. When it comes to a Wednesday, challenges seem less exciting and the work becomes more routine, it's the middle of the week, and the weekend still seems some distance away so momentum is slowing. Thursday is the start of the weekend wind-down and Friday tends to be the day when two-hour lunches and casual dress common, all having an impact on productivity."

Speaking to Personnel Today recently, underwear entrepreneur Michelle Mone said that we are at risk of becoming "lazy Britain" - and according to the latest CBI/ AXA absence survey, of the 127 million days lost to absence in 2007, more than one in 10 (12%) were thought to have been non-genuine.

Mone admits that in her parents' day it was "just work, work, work" but says that she wants her employees to want to go to work, and want to contribute to the company they work for.

The 21 million "sickies" covered in the report cost the economy £1.6bn last year, with 65% of employers assuming that staff are using them to extend weekends and 60% to extend holidays. Over a third suspected that sickies are used for special events like birthdays and major football games.

In an age where it is not unheard of for city-based office workers to turn up at the office in shorts, it seems that we may have finally tired of informality and inappropriate familiarity.
Research by Kristina Hultgren of Oxford University's Faculty of English has shown that the chatty language used by call-centre staff is beginning to grate. Customers are bridling, in particular, at the use by strangers of their first names. This odd familiarity is down to training. Call-centre staff, regardless of the markets in which they are dealing, are being asked to use that 'Have a nice day' American style of chat that doesn't go down particularly well with us more formal Europeans. While under pressure to deal with a certain number of calls per hour, staff are still expected to simulate a personal relationship with customers - addressing them by their first name seems to be the fastest way to achieve this.
And while call centres are not representative of society, the decline of formality is undeniable. Opinion is very much mixed as to whether or not this is a good thing. The relaxing of dress codes - certainly outside the City and more corporate environments - seems to be working well. Many people feel more comfortable, and more confident, in slightly more casual clothes, and are every bit as professional as when suited and booted.
It's informal behaviour, rather than dress, that could cause problems - particularly bearing in mind that the next generation of employees are much less formal outside work. Should we expect a generation brought up on FaceBook and texting to know how to address their workplace seniors? Should organisations have to take responsibility for teaching their staff how to behave in a business context? Or should we just accept that we will end up talking to the chief executive as if we met them in the pub?

In our weekly 'Top Job' column, we ask contributors what they consider the most overrated tool in HR. Nine times out of ten, they come back with 'e-mail'. Although we once considered it a panacea for our workplace communications ills, its shortcomings are becoming ever more evident.
Here's what Dr Cliff Sparrowhawk, a director at CQL Group, has to say:
"A project manager friend recently commented on her frustration that colleagues in adjacent seats e-mail each other to communicate information.  What do you expect from engineers, I responded jokingly.  It's ubiquitous and there is plenty of literature with compelling evidence about e-mail inefficiencies.  A common emotion expressed by the sender is relief at job done.  The 'phew in the sender' engenders somewhat more mixed feelings in those on the receiving end.  Some people keep assiduous bring-up systems for unanswered mail and constantly wing off reminders.  Of course e-mail has its place but instilling some disciplines carefully tuned to match your culture and operation requirements can help de-stress some of the workforce at least.  A recent article drawing on Maggie Jackson's book, 'Adapted from Distracted' raises a key concern with e-mails especially cited as being stifling to creative thought as the tendency to rapid response grows ever more intense ability to concentrate on other important tasks is dissipated".

Jackson's '10 ways to quell distraction in an attention-deficient age':
1. Speak a language of attention
2. Be wary of interruptions
3. Practice message restraint
4. Focus on one another
5. White space
6. Cut back on multitasking
7. Eat mindfully
8. Meditate
9. Hit the pause button
10. Be a role model for focus

In the good old days, our senior colleagues would happily use company time for lighter hearted pursuits such as language lessons, shopping or occasionally even golf. But the credit crunch has bitten even their well-upholstered backsides and it looks as if they are finally using their working hours more productively - to job hunt.

According to research released today by executive jobs website, Experteer.co.uk, the busiest hour for online job searches is 3pm on a Thursday. 

The study of job searching trends across Europe found that most job hunters are using their mid-afternoon coffee breaks to scour the internet for job opportunities, with 3pm being the most popular time of day almost universally in Europe. Germany is the only country where most searching is done only slightly earlier, immediately after lunchtime at 2pm. In the UK, almost a quarter (24%) of job hunters look for jobs online after their lunch break, between 2pm and 4pm GMT.  The morning is consistently a quieter period across Europe, with only 17% searching between 9am and 11am GMT in the UK.

Peak day and time for searching for jobs according to country:

The study found that even in the economic downturn, job seekers prefer to keep their weekends free for personal time, with Saturdays and Sundays remaining the least popular days for job hunting across Europe. Less than one in five searches is done at weekends in the UK (15%), Germany (15%), France (18%) and Switzerland (18%), and less than a quarter in Italy (23%). Considerably fewer searches are also done on Fridays in all of the countries, suggesting job hunters are busy planning their weekends or tying off the working week.

Experteer's study has also found that executives in different European countries spend varying amounts of time online in each job hunting session. Job hunters in the UK tend to spend an average of 4 minutes on each session while those in Italy spend just less than 5 minutes searching for jobs online in each session. This also varies according to the time of year, with job hunters spending considerably less time searching at the end of the year.  Longer search time was recorded across Europe in Jan, suggesting job searchers are more active in looking for a chance in the New Year.

While this kind of research is all well and good, it does make me wonder why organisations are paying so little attention to what their employees are doing? Senior or not, they are not paid to job hunt on company time, Allowing them to do so is nothing short of a slap in the face to people who are actually spending their working hours doing their job.

Cynical women - myself included - often refer to 'male pride', but it would appear that it is more than just a tired cliche. Academics in the University of Cambridge's sociology department have found that men who live in fear of redundancy are far more likely to succumb to depression than their female colleagues. And - oddly - both men and women are worse affected by the fear of losing their jobs than by actually being made redundant.

The study, which included case studies of companies which had been taken over by competitors, sparking concerns over potential job cuts, found that men recorded higher measures than women of depression and anxiety on the standard clinical measure. This measure records symptoms such as poor concentration, insomnia and unexplained sadness.

Senior lecturer Brendan Burchell says that "a macho issue about men being the breadwinner" has much to answer for, adding that "Men, unlike women, have few positive ways of defining themselves outside of the workplace between when they leave school and when they retire. Despite several decades of more equal employment opportunities for men and women, men retain traditional beliefs that their masculinity is threatened if their employment is threatened."

Ironically, although men may be feeling the strain, the number of women in full time work fell by 53,000 last quarter, whereas the number of men dropped by 36,000.

But is this news? We've known for years that men find it more difficult to deal with stress than women do. And we've all heard the saying "pride comes before a fall".  So rather than continuing to commission research that reaches the same conclusion each time, shouldn't the experts be doing something to combat this stress, or at least to understand and alleviate the symptoms before it's too late for the victims?

We've all seen the footage of drunk teenage and 20-something women staggering about the streets and invariably ending up in the gutter, if not their local police station. And new research has found that binge drinking among women has almost doubled in the past decade.
According to research by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, 15% of female drinkers over the age of 16 consumes more than double the recommended daily amount of alcohol (three units).

The report highlighted five main trends:

• An increase in drinking amongst women
• An increase in drinking among middle-age and older groups
• A recent decrease in drinking among 16-24 year-olds (both sexes but especially men)
• An increase in alcohol consumption amongst children
• An increase in drinking in Northern Ireland compared with the rest of the UK

While even a relatively unobservant line manager will hopefully recognise the symptoms of binge drinking, what of staff who have a less dramatic but potentially more serious problem? How can employers recognise alcohol problems among their employees? And what - if anything - should they do? Are employers morally obliged to help staff, or should they simply cast a blind eye as long as the job is getting done?

The news story of the month, all but knocking swine flu off the headlines, has been MPs' misuse of the expenses system. After the first couple of exposés, it quickly became tedious.

A couple of days later, avid TV viewers may have been a tad bemused to see an ad for Blackpool, sexing it up by dint of playing on its similarities to Paris (they both have wrought iron towers, and ...er, that's it) and having a pretty French girl tell us, in French, how much she loves living there.

 And

And last, but by no means least, well-known ex-soldier and fibber, Bear Grylls - he of the  wilderness luxury hotel stays - is elected Chief Scout. Oddly, of the three, this is the most galling, perhaps because we expect better of an organisation based on honour.
When did it become ok to lie? And under what circumstances, if any, is it excusable? We've all heard of the white lie, but cheating on your expenses is theft - whether or not you return the money. And misrepresenting something, somewhere or someone is every bit as dishonest.

 
With several generations now presumably convinced that lying is a sure-fire means of reaching the top, how are employers to ensure a culture of honesty and mutual trust?

According to Equality Works, the equality and diversity consultancy, workplace bullying is becoming more widespread as a direct result of the recession. Chief executive Jane Farrell says: "Many people think of bullying as simply meaning verbal or sometimes physical abuse," says Farrell. "However, in today's business climate of concern, informal comments or changes in attitude can lead to feelings of being under threat and victimisation."

Farrell also says that bosses need to be more vigilant to prevent serious problems in the future, adding that "Recession and redundancies are currently a hard fact of life but that is no excuse for not handling the situation with compassion and sensitivity."
Why is bullying so prevalent in UK workplaces? And surely now is the time to be supportive of one another.

One of the main problems is that bullies tend to see their behaviour as something else - maybe 'firm management' or their idea of 'encouraging' a team-mate. But at the end of the day, it's just bullying, plain and simple.

Some bullying behaviour to look out for:

Derogatory comments about someone's performance being made in an open-plan office

• So called 'jokes' being made that have the effect of undermining confidence
• People getting more competitive with each other and collaborating less and less
• Managers shouting at staff
• Continual drawing attention to 'difference' such as 'part timers not pulling their weight'.

According to North West law firm Mace & Jones, the recession is prompting an increase in senior level personality conflicts.

The root of the problem apparently lies in staff shortages. As more and more staff are laid off, managers are being forced to work more closely with their teams - managers more used to sitting in the corner office, avoiding unpleasantness.

Mace & Jones' head of employment law Martin Edwards says: "This is leading to personality conflicts as egos clash, insecurities are heightened and areas of responsibilities are redrawn."

He adds that "Personality conflicts are one of the most destructive employment issues in a workplace. Work is disrupted and teams are divided. This in turn leads to poor management, missed targets and bad working environments." All at a time when many companies are struggling to survive. 

Edwards recommends tackling the problem head-on, pointing out that "No business can tolerate staff who cannot put their differences aside for the good of the firm. If senior management, the leaders of the business, cannot work together, this is a very serious problem."

The danger here is that companies facing financial problems will not see this as a priority. They will assume, wrongly, that the situation will sort itself out. They may even think - again wrongly - that a bit of temper or inability to work in a team is not a bad thing in a senior manager. By the time they realise the error of their ways, they may well find themselves faced with a tribunal.

It used to be that any sign of emotion at work was a career-killer, particularly for women, who were expected to act like men if they wanted to climb the corporate ladder.

But these days, a decade after the death of Princess Diana and the ridiculous outpouring of grief it prompted, blubbing in the office is accepted, and even, in certain circumstances, de rigueur.

Experts say this is due to the proliferation of Generation Y employees. They've been brought up to show - and share - their emotions, regarding the traditional stiff upper lip as old-fashioned and unhealthily repressed.

So is it - or isn't it - ok to cry at work? I think it depends on the circumstances. If a colleague has been bereaved, immediate, public tears are both natural and acceptable. But if they're crying over something to do with work, or something colleagues would regard as relatively trivial, it would be best to find somewhere more private.

So take yourself off for a coffee or a quick burst of fresh air, and get it out of your system. Whatever Gen Y might think. sobbing over your keyboard (apart from the risk of electrocuting yourself) will mark you out as overly emotional and possibly less capable of doing your job.

Research conducted by free e-mail provider GMX has found that 1 in 3 Britons who use e-mail at work regularly become upset or offended due to misunderstanding what a colleague has written.

The survey of almost 2000 UK workers found that the most common cause for confusion is misinterpretation: in the past year alone, 41% of workers have received an e-mail from a colleague that has used an offensive tone, intentionally or otherwise.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, taking offence at misunderstood e-mails appears (along with so much else ,,,) to decline with age:

• 52% of workers aged 25-34 have taken offence at e-mails, compared to
• 39% between 45-54 years of age

I'm a bit sceptical about the validity of statistics like this. Do 45-year-olds even read their e-mails?! 

Best of all, and somewhat ridiculously, 71% of workers admitted to frequently becoming upset by having to wait for replies to their e-mails. Boo hoo!  

Shirt seller Charles Tyrwhitt says sales of its white shirts have increased by 50% in 2009 so far, from 220,000 to 330,000 year on year. 

I'm not sure what this means for the humble worker. But I just need to look around me to see that very few of my male colleagues are wearing white shirts. So who is ....?