News

Mar 10th

Government Set to Overhaul Pensions System

Work and pensions secretary Iain Duncan Smith has pledged to press on with the Government's reform of the state pension, which would see an end to means testing and the imposition of a £140-per-week flat payment.

The changes will mean that mothers who want to stay at home to care for their children will no longer lose out for missing national insurance contributions when they collect their pension.

Duncan Smith outlined the plans in a speech to charity leaders today (8 March) and it is understood that full plans could be unveiled in this year's Budget.

Mar 10th

Recruitment Increased in February

Job growth accelerated sharply last month, but the UK is developing a “two-speed” labour market as vacancies in the public sector diminish, a monthly recruitment survey has revealed.

The number of permanent placements rose at the fastest rate in 10 months, while temporary staff placements saw the greatest rise since May 2007, according to February’s Report on Jobs from the Recruitment and Employment Confederation (REC) and KMPG.

Feb 21st

Singapore - The Finance Workers Preferred Destination

Singapore is the preferred destination of financial centres for banking and finance professionals, according to research from financial services recruiter Astbury Marsden.

The research shows 27% of respondents chose Singapore as their most favoured location, while 22% chose London, 20% Hong Kong, 19% New York and 13% Dubai.

Mark Cameron, chief operating officer at Astbury Marsden, says: “Results like this should be of real concern to more established banking centres such as London and New York.

Feb 21st

Lack of Confidence When Dealing With Underperformance

Six employers in 10 do not believe that their managers are confident and competent in managing underperforming staff.

This is according to the 2011 XpertHR managing underperformance survey, which also found that four-fifths of organisations think that underperformance is a problem in their workforce to some extent.

Feb 7th

National Sick Day!

The first Monday in February is National Sickie Day. In response to the ELAS data on sickness leave, Dave Fleming, Sales Director at Badenoch & Clark, comments on how employers should aim to engage their workforce.

“In order to alleviate the problem of employees ‘pulling sickies’, we would encourage employers to focus on motivating and engaging their workforce. Over the past two years, economic uncertainty has put enormous pressure on UK workers. Now it is up to employers to foster an environment in which their employees feel their contributions are valued.

Feb 7th

One-Fifth of Workers Believe They May Lose Jobs

One employee in five believes that they are likely to lose their job, according to research by the Chartered Institute of Personnel Development (CIPD).

The CIPD's Employee Outlook Survey found that public sector workers were the most concerned about their job security, with one-third fearing redundancy, compared with 17% in private companies and 22% in the third sector.

Feb 1st

Poor Work-Life Balance Hinders Women in Senior Roles

A poor work-life balance and family responsibilities are the biggest barrier to women securing top jobs, according to research from Opportunity Now, the gender campaign at Business in the Community.

The research reveals 82% of female managers and 54% of male managers see this as the main barrier for women, while 57% of women managers and 20% of male managers believe that women are considered less committed to work because they have family commitments.

Feb 1st

Rise in Private Sector Jobs

The private sector intends to ‘power on through’ 2011 with increased job creation.

This is the result of a survey from the commercial clients of SMRS, a recruitment advertising and HR communications agency based in London and Manchester.

Representing nearly a quarter of a million employees and with a turnover more than £25bn, nearly 50% of respondents said they definitely expected to grow in terms of recruitment in 2011, with just under 7% saying they expected their numbers to fall.

Jan 25th

Longer Work Experience to Help The Young And Jobless

The government has announced plans to extend the time young people under the age of 21 can do work experience without losing their benefits.

Currently, people hoping to bolster their CV with additional work experience are at risk of losing their benefits if they work for more than two weeks. However, the proposed change would extend this to eight weeks for those aged 18-21.

Moreover, under a new scheme to be run by the Jobcentre Plus, unemployed people aged between 18 and 21 will be matched with employers looking for people to do work experience.

Jan 25th

Graduate Vacancies on The Rise

The number of graduate vacancies on offer rose during the past year for the first time since the recession took hold, according to figures released today by the Association of Graduate Recruiters (AGR).

In the winter edition of its twice-yearly survey of graduate recruiters, the AGR found that while recruitment got off to a slow start in the early part of 2009/10, employers reported a surge in vacancies in the latter part of the year, resulting in an 8.9% rise in vacancies on the previous recruitment round.