News / Information

The war to keep top talent remains a priority for most organisations

We like this article we found in The Grapvine Magazine and thought you might too.

A new piece of research published by the Chartered Institute for Personnel and Development (CIPD) has discovered that despite the economic crisis 74% of employers have not changed their talent strategy.

705 employers were involved in the research, and only 26% have revisited and changed their talent strategy as a result of the current economic crisis. Nearly one in five (18%) are actually placing more emphasis on identifying, developing and retaining talent.

Continue reading Comments (0) 24 February 2009

Seven steps to riding out the downturn

We like this article we found on Management Issues, and thought you might too.

Worried about how you are going to manage your way through the downturn? You could do a lot worse than following a seven-step "resiliency strategy" drawn up by a U.S research firm.

The recommendations by Sirota Survey Intelligence are focused on effective people management at all levels, with the aim of ensuring that the business, and its people, are best placed to deal with whatever economic knocks may come their way.

The first of these seven steps is simply to develop and engender a "partnership culture" within your business.

Companies with this culture generally outperformed those with a more confrontational, command and control culture, during both boom-times and downturns, argued Sirota.

Continue reading Comments (0) 23 February 2009

Train and Upskill your staff

We like this article written by HRreview

Employers need to avoid a situation where they have made redundancies in a recession and are left with an untrained workforce once the economic situation improves.

That is the warning issued by Claire Steiner, chair of education and training at the Institute of Travel & Tourism. She said that companies would be wise to invest in their existing staff and up skill them so that they are able to work across more than one sector.

Continue reading Comments (0) 23 February 2009

Mentoring your way out of recession

26 Jan 09 / From The Talent Foundation

In the current climate it was almost bound to happen. Hard-pressed employers are taking an axe to their corporate training budgets, with spending declining at its fastest rate for a decade. But, while this means there will be less formal training and development of workers being carried out, it can also be seen as a valuable opportunity for managers to get more hands-on in the mentoring and coaching of their staff.

Research by California consultancy Bersin & Associates has found that over the past year U.S firms have been forced to cut back sharply on their spending on training spending. But this is not so say that training has disappeared completely. In its place there is now more coaching, informal and collaborative learning and increased reliance on using external trainers rather than maintaining expensive in-house training departments.

Continue reading 28 January 2009

Generation Y goes to work

Dec 30th 2008 | SAN FRANCISCO From The Economist print edition

Reality bites for young workers

JESSICA BUCHSBAUM first noticed that something had changed in May 2008. The head of recruitment for a law firm in Florida, Ms Buchsbaum was used to interviewing young candidates for summer internships who seemed to think that the world owed them a living. Many applicants expected the firm to promote itself to them rather than the other way around. However, last May’s crop were far more humble. “The tone had changed from ‘What can you do for me?’ to ‘Here’s what I can do for you’,” she says.

The global downturn has been a brutal awakening for the youngest members of the workforce—variously dubbed “the Millennials”, “Generation Y” or “the Net Generation” by social researchers. “Net Geners” are, roughly, people born in the 1980s and 1990s. Those old enough to have passed from school and university into work had got used to a world in which jobs were plentiful and firms fell over one another to recruit them. Now their prospects are grimmer. According to America’s Bureau of Labour Statistics, the unemployment rate among people in their 20s increased significantly in the two most recent recessions in the United States. It is likely to do so again as industries such as finance and technology, which employ lots of young people, axe thousands of jobs.

Continue reading 8 January 2009

Less than one in ten UK managers are rewarded for coaching their staff

The majority of managers in the UK who train their staff are not rewarded financially. That is according to new research conducted by the global consultation firm BlessingWhite, who surveyed over 2,000 employees and managers from 17 countries.

Continue reading 22 December 2008

Organisations in the UK facing a struggle to retain their top talent

According to new research conducted by professional recruitment consultancy Harvey Nash, organisations in the UK are struggling to hold onto talented employees as overseas job opportunities become very tempting. Official figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) are due out later this week, looking at the number of emigrants leaving the UK. These figures are expected to be considerably worse than the record 400,000 who left in 2006.

Continue reading 22 December 2008

Top 7 Techniques To Build Incredible Brand Loyalty/Brand Equity

We think these top tips on becoming a brand are really great. Many of which we do here within learnpurple - do you follow these techniques in your organisation?

1. Make sure your product or service ALWAYS GIVES more than the customer expected.

Continue reading 22 December 2008

What's important now - Leadership

We've all read about those leaders who, thrust into the harsh public spotlight, missed opportunities to shine. Your industry and behaviours may not be in the headlines — yet. But make no mistake: Your employees, investors, customers and community are already scrutinizing your actions. They will be inspired by what's authentic and more inclined than ever to reject disingenuous behavior. Will your leadership hold up?

Continue reading 22 December 2008

What's important now - Engagement

As you cut discretionary expenses, you need all employees to focus their discretionary effort on what matters most. That's where engagement plays a role. Engaged employees are not just committed, passionate or proud. They have a line-of-sight on their own future and on the organisation's mission and goals. They are enthused and in gear.

Continue reading 18 December 2008