25th March 2011
All the latest stories from the world of work
The government has asked David MacLeod and Nita Clarke to build on the work of the MacLeod review of employee engagement by chairing a new taskforce on employee engagement. Launched by the prime minister on March 29th, the taskforce will focus on putting in place practical support for businesses to overcome the barriers to engagement.
IPA director, Nita Clarke, said: “Engaging for Success, the MacLeod Review report, really set out the case for taking employee engagement seriously. But even at the time we acknowledged that much more needed to be done to understand why organisations aren’t engaging their employees. As well as identifying the barriers, we want to put in place practical support for businesses large and small to give them the information and the tools to engage.”
The Employee Engagement Taskforce will also be made up of representatives from organisations across the public and private sectors including BAE Systems, BT, Serco, NHS Employers, John Lewis Partnership, Thomson Reuters, Sainsburys, CBI and TUC. The Taskforce is due to run for 18 months and over that time will be working with employers, employee representatives, academics and practitioners to help stimulate and support the spread of employee engagement across the economy.
More information about the launch and photographs click here.
Employee engagement has fallen across the NHS in the last 12 months according to the 8th annual NHS staff engagement survey. The survey reveals higher levels of work related stress, greater pressure to work when ill and fewer opportunities to develop.
The survey, carried out by the Care Quality Commissions gathered responses from 165,000 NHS employees in 388 trusts. The survey included a broad range of employee groups, from doctors and nurses to clerical staff and allied health professionals.
Despite the overall decline in engagement, the survey did reveal a more complex picture. For example, specialist and general acute trusts had higher engagement than PCTs and ambulance trusts. Although there are high levels of training in the NHS, only 35 per cent of respondents felt they had opportunities to progress at work.
The survey also showed some important barriers to engagement. Less than a third of employees felt that managers acted on feedback, and the number of employees reporting involvement in decision-making remained static.
For more information on the NHS staff survey, including results for each trust, visit the CQC website:
http://www.cqc.org.uk/newsandevents/newsstories.cfm?FaArea1=customwidgets.content_view_1&cit_id=37204
The government announced a three year freeze on regulation for businesses with less than 10 employees and new start-ups. The proposals have been heavily criticised by a number of trade unions, but received a more favourable response from the Federation of Small Businesses.
As well as a freeze on future regulation, the government is removing the right to request training for employees in workplaces with fewer than 250 employees, and abolishing the proposed extension of the right to request flexible working to parents with children up to the age of 17.
Ben Willmott, senior policy adviser at the CIPD, argued that the changes shouldn’t be taken as a sign that flexible working was a burden on business; “We understand the argument that multiple changes to flexible working regulations are not helpful. But this limited repeal mustn’t be seen as conceding the ill-conceived belief that flexible working can only ever be seen as a regulatory burden and a cost. Millions of workers already benefit from flexible working well beyond anything enshrined in legislation, because employers in firms large and small see the benefits they derive from a more flexible, more engaged, more diverse and more effective workforce as a result.”
