Posted By
Professor Cary L Cooper, Distinguished Professor of Organisational Psychology and Heal
05 October 2011
If we are to create a healthy workforce, we need to identify the structural issue in the organisation that may inhibit this, whether a long hours culture or glass ceiling for women or a bullying management style...
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Posted By
Andrew Sissons
03 October 2011
The financial crisis has left behind many lessons for developed economies. Among the most widely accepted is the need for advanced economies to re-balance towards manufacturing and other export-intensive activities, reversing decades of relative decline in manufacturing.
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Posted By
Andrew Sissons
03 October 2011
George Osborne’s speech to the Conservative conference was heavy on intellectual content, but light on detail. He set out a weighty defence of his tough fiscal strategy, and made much of his “monetary activism”, promising to keep the supply of credit flowing to businesses and households. But he made much less of another, equally important theme: how to help British businesses develop and make money out of new ideas.
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Posted By
Stephen Bevan
30 September 2011
Tomorrow sees the introduction of new Agency Worker regulations in the UK. Among other things, it means that people on temporary contracts or carrying out agency work will have the right from day one in an assignment to access end-users’ collective facilities such as canteens, childcare facilities, and so on and to be told about job vacancies. Perhaps most significantly, after 12 weeks, they have the right to the same basic pay and working conditions as permanent staff.
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Posted By
Neil Lee
26 September 2011
Brussels has given the Treasury the go-ahead to expand the Enterprise Investment Scheme (EIS). By reducing the tax investors pay when backing high-risk companies, it’s designed to increase investments in them. The government argues the scheme will create more high growth firms: the seven per cent of firms who create half of all new jobs. It’s a big win for NESTA (sponsors of our Big Innovation Centre) who have been highlighting the importance of these firms for some time.
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Posted By
Stephen Bevan
20 September 2011
It would be heartening to think that the gloomy news about the economy and the labour market would stimulate some novel thinking and even some constructive collaboration among politicians. Yet, as the political party season swings into action it is more likely there will be attempts to grab headlines with eye-catching but mostly inconsequential policy announcements and carefully positioned press releases, autobiographies and even personal sideswipes by former or current political allies. In addition, the coalition parties are sure to use parts of their conferences to emphasise how they are sticking to their own principles and are fighting their corner robustly in coalition debates.
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Posted By
Stephen Bevan
20 September 2011
How can we ensure that the NHS plays its part in helping people with long-term health conditions to stay in work? Are GPs – especially in their new commissioning role - properly equipped with the expertise they need to advise employers about workplace adjustments for employees with chronic illness? Is the government still thinking in ‘silos’ about workforce health as budgets tighten? Will the sickness absence review make decisive recommendations about keeping people in work rather than languishing on benefits?
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Posted By
Stephen Bevan
20 September 2011
In New York this week a very eminent group of clinicians, scientists, epidemiologists and politicians have been sitting down at a major UN conference on non-communicable diseases (NCDs). They are rightly concerned about the rapidly burden of cardiovascular disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder (COPD), cancer, obesity, diabetes etc which affect more of us each year. And although the main focus is on the wider public health priorities, with people having to work longer and the workforce around the world getting older it is no longer enough to think of these, and other, conditions being confined to those who have already retired.
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Posted By
Stephan Bevan
09 September 2011
The second half of 2011 sees Poland take on the Presidency of the EU and this week The Work Foundation launched a major report examining the economic, social and labour market consequences of musculoskeletal disorders in the Polish workforce...
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Posted By
Wilson Wong
18 August 2011
Last week after shops were looted and stores burnt, the media, politicians, and many in the chattering classes quickly labelled the perpetrators “thugs”, “criminals”, “looters”, “brazen”, “arsonists”, “scum”, “hooligans”, “vandals”, “black” etc.
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Posted By
Charles Levy
17 August 2011
A number of commentators have today flagged the jump in the number of people reporting that they have taken on part-time work only because they can’t find full time work. But as they say, a picture is worth a thousand words. The graph below shows quite how tough things have been in the labour market over the past three years. Since the very start of the credit crunch the number of people in this group has been climbing at an alarming rate.
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Posted By
Annie Peate
17 August 2011
Today, the Equality and Human Rights Commission published the findings of theirSex and Power 2011 report with overwhelmingly disappointing results for women whose aspirations extend beyond the ‘marzipan level’ of senior management. The report – which provides an index of women in positions of power and influence – found that more than 5,400 women are missing from the Britain’s 26,000 most powerful posts- a trend which currently shows no sign of subsiding.
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Posted By
Dr Paul Sissons
10 August 2011
The events of the past few days in London and other cities has brought (a small minority of) the nation’s young people into sharp focus. The reasons for the riots are multifaceted and complex and they are the subject of fervent debate among media commentators and academics. Two of the reasons offered relate to the labour market – increasing income inequality and rising youth unemployment. It is the second of these I want to comment briefly on.
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Posted By
Ian Brinkley
10 August 2011
The current focus on the financial crisis across the EU and the various austerity programmes has distracted from the equally important question – where is the growth and jobs to come from over the next decade? There is no long term solution to the private and public debt problems without a credible growth strategy.
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Posted By
Alexandra Albert
04 August 2011
We welcome the government’s response to Professor Hargreaves’ review of intellectual property as announced yesterday by Vince Cable.
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