Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Wellbeing
    • Recruitment & retention
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • Brightmine
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Free trial
    • Request a quote
  • Webinars
  • Advertise
  • OHW+

Personnel Today

Register
Log in
Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Wellbeing
    • Recruitment & retention
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • Brightmine
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Free trial
    • Request a quote
  • Webinars
  • Advertise
  • OHW+

Early careersESGHR practiceHR strategyComputer misuse

Global HR round-up

by Personnel Today 9 Aug 2005
by Personnel Today 9 Aug 2005

Europe not doing enough to end to in-work poverty

Not enough is being done by EU institutions to raise people in work out of poverty, a European Commission report has warned. The report said that while “low pay is obviously an important risk factor… being low-skilled and remaining in unstable and often part-time employment, can also lead to poverty”. One-income households with one or more dependants are also at risk. The report said there were also concerns about self-employment, but that data was unreliable because of “under-reporting [of] income”. It wants further investigation into why workers’ earnings are “not sufficient to lift them and their households above the poverty threshold”, using new commonly agreed EU statistical indicators. Having a job helps people avoid poverty in the UK, Denmark, Belgium, Ireland and Germany, where it reduces the risk by two-thirds, while in The Netherlands and Luxembourg it improves things only “slightly”.
www.bookshop.eu.int

Swiss recruiter turns over old leaf to end brain drain

A recruitment firm in Switzerland has been set up with the objective of using older workers, not sidelining them. Sebastian Vallbracht, a German who studied at the University of London, said the idea for VMVO Senior Expert Consultancy emerged when he was a student and noticed that recruitment consultants trying to hire young talent were not much older than the candidates. “There was something wrong with that concept,” he said. “What struck me was that they had little experience themselves.” He discussed this with his professors and was encouraged to start a consulting business. “The current business trend of forcing highly qualified experts into early retirement as a cost-saving measure is worrying, and has proven to be a bad strategy in the long run,” he said. So far Vallbracht has signed up about 110 senior experts for specific projects.

Fourth time lucky for North American legal recruits

Sign up to our weekly round-up of HR news and guidance

Receive the Personnel Today Direct e-newsletter every Wednesday

OptOut
This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

North American law firms make job offers after the candidate’s fourth interview, according to a survey of lawyers among the 1,000 largest law firms and corporations in Canada and the US carried out by recruitment firm Robert Half Legal. Multiple interviews were reported to give more people a chance to be involved in the hiring process, look beyond a candidate’s skills and to get the right personality fit. IT recruiters and managers also average four interviews before hiring. These include a peer panel to examine how the candidate would fit in with the team, using hiring managers who look at the candidate’s skill set, and HR representatives to look at motivation and the ability to fit in with the corporate culture.

Hasty e-mail leads to maladministration charge

An investigation by the European Ombudsman has shown how a hastily composed e-mail can get an employer in trouble. The ombudsman has ruled that the European Investment Bank (EIB) was guilty of maladministration and breaking its code of good administrative behaviour. A job applicant had sent job enquiries to 18 EIB unit managers, which were forwarded to the bank’s head of HR, prompting him to reply (in French): “He has gone completely mad.” The comment was mistakenly forwarded to the applicant. The head of HR then wrote to the applicant, saying that he would “be grateful if you could refrain from [the ‘scatter gun’ approach] which is not bound to be in favour of your application”. The applicant was rejected and complained about his treatment. The ombudsman said: “This could be understood… as constituting a threat [and] frequent requests for information did not entitle the bank to threaten to reject this application.”

Personnel Today

Personnel Today articles are written by an expert team of award-winning journalists who have been covering HR and L&D for many years. Some of our content is attributed to "Personnel Today" for a number of reasons, including: when numerous authors are associated with writing or editing a piece; or when the author is unknown (particularly for older articles).

previous post
Top civil servant in Scotland invites critics to work on shopfloor
next post
Lost in translation: communicating pensions information to employees

You may also like

How neuroscience can unlock employee recognition

22 May 2025

UK and EU agree to collaborate on ‘youth...

19 May 2025

Workers ‘wait and see’ as companies struggle to...

16 May 2025

University of Salford launches Better Working Lives cluster

14 May 2025

Why HR burnout is a strategic issue

12 May 2025

So what does the election of a new...

9 May 2025

Rumours during recruitment: how should HR respond?

9 May 2025

Teacher apprenticeship route to be tied to school...

9 May 2025

British Steel to resume recruitment

8 May 2025

Young people are less work-ready, say employers

7 May 2025

  • 2025 Employee Communications Report PROMOTED | HR and leadership...Read more
  • The Majority of Employees Have Their Eyes on Their Next Move PROMOTED | A staggering 65%...Read more
  • Prioritising performance management: Strategies for success (webinar) WEBINAR | In today’s fast-paced...Read more
  • Self-Leadership: The Key to Successful Organisations PROMOTED | Eletive is helping businesses...Read more
  • Retaining Female Talent: Four Ways to Reduce Workplace Drop Out PROMOTED | International Women’s Day...Read more

Personnel Today Jobs
 

Search Jobs

PERSONNEL TODAY

About us
Contact us
Browse all HR topics
Email newsletters
Content feeds
Cookies policy
Privacy policy
Terms and conditions

JOBS

Personnel Today Jobs
Post a job
Why advertise with us?

EVENTS & PRODUCTS

The Personnel Today Awards
The RAD Awards
Employee Benefits
Forum for Expatriate Management
OHW+
Whatmedia

ADVERTISING & PR

Advertising opportunities
Features list 2025

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • Linkedin


© 2011 - 2025 DVV Media International Ltd

Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Wellbeing
    • Recruitment & retention
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • Brightmine
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Free trial
    • Request a quote
  • Webinars
  • Advertise
  • OHW+