If you’re one of the many HR managers expecting to have a proportion of their employees working from home permanently for the foreseeable future, you need to take a fresh look at the benefits packages offered. No longer being part of an office-based team is a dramatic change in working circumstances and some of the benefits offered previously as standard may no longer be suitable. It’s time to think creatively about employee benefits for 2021 and beyond.
- Topic:
- Human Resources
Are your staff and leadership team on the same page when considering what next regarding home working? As an HR professional, the chances are you’ll be aware of a variety of differing viewpoints within your business. But that presents a dilemma when it comes to balancing business requirements with personal preferences.
- Topic:
- Human Resources
I don’t think anyone is in doubt that nearly every aspect of life today is dramatically different to how it was 12 months ago. A few of the impactful changes we have seen are:
- Face masks becoming the norm
- An increased focus on our health and wellbeing
- The exchange of handshakes for social distancing and elbow bumps
- An increase in online purchasing
- Computer screens fast became our window to the world
- Finding solidarity in social recognition
The disruption we have witnessed is leading to a new phase in our working lives. As a result, organisations will need to examine how they create value and start to develop a more human-centred future. The role HR plays in this will be pivotal going forward, ultimately shaping the future of Work, the Workforce and the Workplace.
- Topic:
- Human Resources
As COVID-19 restrictions are easing across the UK, businesses are looking ahead over the coming weeks and planning how their workforce can make a safe transition to new working conditions. In this article, we examine the health and safety issues which need to be considered from two perspectives.
So much has changed over the last year as the pandemic caused untold disruption to businesses and their staff. Large numbers of people have been forced to work from home and others have had to adjust to more restrictive conditions and protocols when still attending their usual place of work – or have been furloughed and unable to attend at all. Now we are heading towards another shift and HR teams across the UK are working out the details and practicalities of who should return, when, and what the working environment looks like.
- Topic:
- Human Resources
Many businesses are aware of the pent-up demand for holiday across their workforce. It’s been a challenging year and across the UK as we make good progress towards achieving more normality and freedom in our daily lives, it’s understandable that so many of us are now thinking about taking time off from work.
Various announcements about the prospect of travel both in the UK and abroad have prompted plenty of people to finally start making plans for holidays over the coming weeks and months. And all of this presents a potential issue for line managers and HR staff to deal with.
- Topic:
- Human Resources
A wider view of employee wellbeing
Let’s start with a few statistics. The charity Versus Arthritis recently conducted a survey of people working remotely and found that 81% of respondents were experiencing some back, neck or shoulder pain, while 48% were less physically active than they were before lockdown. Another study, by the Health Foundation, discovered that more than two-thirds of adults in the UK feel somewhat or very worried about the effects that Covid-19 is having on their lives. A further survey undertaken by the RSA reported that from over 1,100 workers’ responses, four in 10 had worked within 10 days of a positive Covid-19 test result, while over 10% said they’d been ordered on-site when they could have worked easily and safely from home.
I’ve brought these statistics together because they touch on the physical, mental, occupational and social pressures being exerted on people during this extraordinary chapter – and suggest the need to look at employee wellbeing holistically. The pandemic’s effects have reached into all areas of our lives, not least our work situations. There’s surely never been a period of such flux in modern times, featuring so many changes to the fabric of the work environment including the shift to remote working, the need for altered workplaces when that’s not possible, as well as the furlough scheme. So there are naturally many tests and tasks to overcome on the road ahead.
Travelling towards simplification
The prospect of changing your HR and payroll software could be intimidating. At this point, you can choose your metaphor. Perhaps it seems like you’re going to be turning a tanker around. Maybe it’s more akin to trading in a dated but familiar, family car. Or, the perceived complexities might make it feel like you need to get a space rocket off the ground – a moonshot project. Whatever your outlook in this respect, it’s crucial to ask yourself why you need certain software now, but also to identify both your current needs and where you need to be in a few years. In short, to know where you are and where you want to get to.
The average HR and payroll software is changed somewhere between every seven to nine years and with the right people and purpose steering the project, a simplified system can be truly liberating. So don’t let the fact that you’ve always done things a certain way constrain you and do ensure you have the right people involved. Let’s take a look at some of the factors to consider and the things that can help when you’re planning to change your system.
- Topic:
- Human Resources
Once more unto the avoidance of breaches…
As we all know, nothing is certain in life except for death, taxes and the pressures of compliance. With time moving us towards a new financial year then, let’s take a look at some key regulatory areas to be aware of in the weeks and months ahead.
- Topic:
- Human Resources
The question many HR leaders are currently asking is: How do you create a positive candidate experience in the new normal? So much has changed over the last year, yet the challenge of recruiting and onboarding the best candidates remains, even as most (if not all) of this process is now completed remotely in many cases. So what is the secret to success?
As businesses have made the shift from predominantly face-to-face recruitment processes to more virtual interactions, many have found the change to be extremely effective. The breadth of technology now available – for example, cloud platforms, AI-powered analytics and streamlined automation – makes it even more likely that online recruitment and digital onboarding will become the preferred approach, even after pandemic restrictions have been removed.
So what are the companies having the most success with remote recruitment doing differently? At Access, we work with HR leaders across multiple sectors and businesses, and we’ve discussed multiple approaches with them. Of course, each business has its own unique way of doing things, however, we also found the following 5 approaches usually prove advantageous.
- Topic:
- Human Resources
HR modernisation: will you throw your hat in the ring?
For today’s HR professionals, it can feel like work involves wearing a lot of hats. Need to navigate a route towards improved company performance? Pop on a pilot’s cap. Busy with health and safety concerns? Try this hard hat on. Involved in difficult staff situations, or legal disputes? Time for the police helmet. Got training and coaching programmes to set up? Look out your mortarboard. Mindful that a hundred more tasks are waiting in your in-tray? Maybe a magician’s hat is what you really need, so you can pull a few more rabbits from it.
Luckily, achieving greater efficiency with a HR or payroll solution is not just for larger organisations, as moving from manual processes to software simplicity works for SMEs too. Indeed, every opportunity to automate repetitive or time-consuming tasks will free up your team to focus on responsibilities that have a real impact on your business. So, let’s look at some of the ways you can leverage software to make your work life easier, using the key areas below.
Recruitment > Onboarding > Compliance > Self-service and Mobile > Reporting > Integrations
