The Great Debate UK

Check your social networking assumptions at the door

–Brice Jewell is a Senior Manager responsible for uCern, Cerner’s social business initiative. The opinions expressed are his own.–

Older generations don’t use social networking sites. Generations X and Y demand social networking tools in the work place. Executives don’t get social networking beyond what their kids do on Facebook.

I heard statements like these when Cerner got started on our strategy for social business – using social networking and collaboration software as workplace tools – in 2008. Don’t let them affect your strategy.

So what should inform your decisions? The numbers. Recent market analysis shows social business usage is greater with executives than with millennials. This led me to investigate the statistics from Cerner’s uCern™ Connect community to know where our usage and adoption stood.

We were looking for three things: Is there a correlation with associate activity and level? Does tenure impact activity? Is there correlation between high-performing associates and their activity?

Not just another day in the office: how companies are changing the workplace

-Dave Coplin led Microsoft’s Hybrid Organisation programme. The opinions expressed are his own.-

Here’s a modest proposal for your business. Stop making staff commute to office blocks and instead create attractive new workplaces that encourage people to drop in, bump into each other and hold ad hoc meetings in comfortable and stress-free spaces. Make sure you have the best coffee and food of any of your competitors. Don’t give staff their own desks but offer the flexibility to work from wherever they like and to choose their own computers. Take an axe to hierarchical constraints that constrain progress and watch out for middle managers that are likely to be your biggest impediments to change. Make IT systems accessible from any device, anywhere in the world. Sounds outrageous? Perhaps, but these tactics and strategies are precisely those being adopted by many forward-looking organisations.

With the macro-economy playing the role of elephant on the table this is a difficult time to be running a business. The default position might be to cut headcount, or at least freeze hiring, and sit out the downturn until more propitious times arrive. However, it might also be that a radical change to the way in which business is run will help create some far-reaching effects in cost of operations and facilities, ability to serve customers, the chance to make the most of teams and the opportunity to hire and retain the best people.

In 2010, Microsoft gathered together a series of experts in business management, social change, workplace design, technology and economics to describe and discuss an emerging approach it called the hybrid organisation. This is not intended to be a prescriptive definition but in this model companies enable their staff to work most productively through smart design of buildings, adopt a flexible approach to where work gets done, seek long-term goals rather than fill in short-term scorecards, and reject (or at least question) outmoded practices such as rigorous groups and roles. In this way, the group suggested, organisations would be best positioned to take whatever the economy and other external stimuli had to throw at them.

A year on, we examined close-up what’s happening at companies that have stepped away from business as usual and have become hybrid organisations. The stories that came back through extensive interviews with executives were remarkable.

Dutch electronics giant Philips instituted a Workplace Innovation Programme. Originally intended primarily to save costs, the project evolved into a broader and strategic change management programme that would help staff collaborate on new ideas and provide the tools and environment to attract top new employees. To that end, the company promoted “activity-based working”; in other words, staff had no fixed desks or phone lines but instead worked where they would be most productive and used wireless communications for voice and data.

Programme director Peter de Winter concedes that not everybody is happy: some staff members don’t like the increased noise levels of the open office environment. Middle managers often “don’t like the idea of having their office taken away”. And, he adds, in any change programme many will not be happy and some will become actively disengaged. But the final outcome is most staff love the way they now work.

Shake up workplace gender roles to advance women

Caroline Gatrell is a Senior Lecturer at Lancaster University Management School. The opinions expressed are her own. Thomson Reuters will host a follow-the-sun live blog on March 8, 2011, the 100th anniversary of International Women’s Day.

It is around 35 years since equal opportunities legislation came into force in the UK. In theory, this should mean that employed women are treated fairly at work, and paid the same as men in equivalent jobs.

In particular, women should be protected from discrimination on grounds of their potential, or actual motherhood. This story has a ‘glass half full’ side. It is true there are now many more women in business, management, parliament and the professions than in the 1970s.

However, another side of this story shows a ‘glass half empty’. The number of women holding positions of power within UK society remains very limited. It is still, often, men who hold the senior and most highly paid posts.

Things are no better in well paid skills-based occupations such as plumbing and firefighting. In 2006 the Women’s Work Commission showed a high level of occupational segregation, with men in the best paid jobs and women clustered in lower paid roles such as care work.

This discrepancy in earnings seriously affects women’s lives in the long term. We already know that women are disadvantaged in terms of pensions. But there are other, hidden effects of this gender pay gap.

Mediation service for workplace disputes on the rise

Businesses and employees embroiled in conflict are tapping into a free conciliation service to avoid expensive employment tribunal claims at a rate that has doubled since September 2009, the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service reports.

Acas, governed by an independent council funded by the Department for Business Innovation & Skills, fields about 87,000 tribunal cases a year to sort out disputes between employers and employees.

Complainants can call a telephone helpline as the first step, either before or after dismissal, rather than embarking on a costly and time-consuming formal legal tribunal procedure.

“The idea is to try and take out the heat and complications you have in employment relations and to stop you spending an awful lot of money and time by going to a tribunal,” Acas Chair Ed Sweeney told Reuters.

Pre-claim conciliation resolutions may include awarding a sum of money, an apology and a work reference, while the tribunal process offers reinstatement in the workplace or financial compensation without a reference, regardless of the outcome of the ruling.

The tribunal, which considers the reason for dismissal and whether proper workplace procedures are followed, can also require one side to pay the costs of the other.

At the end of February 2010, 10 months after Acas first launched the process, more than 8,000 pre-claim conciliation referrals were made, and 5,000 tribunal cases avoided, according to Acas.  The helpline receives more than a million calls a year.

Innovation key to workplace progress for women

-Dimitra Manis is senior vice president of talent at Thomson Reuters. The opinions expressed are her own. Reuters is hosting a “follow-the-sun” live blog on Monday, March 8, 2010, International Women’s Day. Please tune in.-

As part of this International Women’s Day celebration, we have been asked to look back over the last ten years and identify what has really changed.

From a personal perspective, the last ten years have been both challenging but fulfilling, with a growing family (two gorgeous daughters), and then changes in my professional life involving moving from Australia to France and then moving to the United States.

I consider myself blessed to have been able to build a life that worked for me both professionally and personally, with real flexibility required both at home and at work.   It is clear that the dialogue over the last ten years has shifted from a notion of “work-life balance” which is fleeting, and always challenging to achieve, to one of ‘work-life integration’, meaning ways to blend your work and life and to create a meaningful experience with both.

It is no surprise that the statistics for women starting their own businesses have taken off in the last 10 years. I also considered starting a business myself with my pastry chef skills. According to Entrepreneur.com, women own 10.6 million businesses in the U.S. alone, and employ 19.1 million workers– that is one in every seven employees.

What I’ve noticed in the last decade is that women are looking for ways to be in control of their diaries and their lives, and progressive employers are those who support them doing so.   I feel fortunate that I have landed somewhere where I can achieve this.

If you look at the definition for “career” in the Oxford English Dictionary, the word is defined as:  the course or progress through life.  Fascinating then that the majority of professionals think about careers as work-related, and forget it is life-related as well.

Japan lags behind in gender equality

-Atsuko Kitayama is a a Reuters translator and correspondent based in Toronto.  Reuters is hosting a “follow-the-sun” live blog on Monday, March 8, 2010, International Women’s Day. Please tune in.-

Japan has quite a way to go to narrow its gender gap and come closer to matching the disparities found between the sexes in other G7 countries, statistics show.

According to the 2009 United Nations Development Programme’s Gender Empowerment Measure, the world’s second largest economy ranks 57th out of 109 countries in political and economic participation for women, with female legislators, senior officials, and managers totaling only nine percent of its workforce.

The same statistics rank Germany 9th, Canada 12th, United Kingdom 15th, France 17th, the U.S. 18th and Italy 21st, while the top four spots are taken by Nordic countries.

The World Economic Forum’s 2009 Global Gender Gap Index, which also tracks gender inequality, shows that Japan ranks 101st out of 134 countries, far behind all its peers.

The situation in private corporations is also lackluster. The latest study by Japan’s Gender Equality Bureau of the Cabinet Office found that women accounted for only 4.1 percent of department managers in 2008. The number increased from 2.1 percent in 1999, but it still remains low.

OECD Secretary General Angel Gurria, shared his assessment on gender inequality during his visit to Japan in November 2009, saying the country is not making the most of women’s talents when it comes to the workforce.

International Women’s Day in a post-gender world

-Dr Elisabeth Kelan is lecturer in the Department of Management at King’s College London. The opinions expressed are her own. Reuters will host a “follow-the-sun” live blog on Monday, March 8, 2010, International Women’s Day. Please tune in.–

To mark International Women’s Day, the Women’s Empowerment Principles: Equality Means Business will be launched in New York on March 9, 2010.

It springs from a collaboration between the United Nations Global Compact and the United Nations Development Fund for Women, and contains comprehensive recommendations on how women and gender have to be considered in modern organizations across the world.

While the launch of the Women’s Empowerment Principles points to the sustained inequality between men and women in the workplace, many young women in the global north see International Women’s Day and specialist events for women as outdated. They seem to believe that they live in a post-gender world where gender no longer matters.

For many young women in the global north, gender equality is not seen as a relevant issue for their careers. They have grown up in a world, which makes it appear as if gender inequality is a thing of the past. Women form the majority of university graduates and achieve excellent results.

They cannot see why this should change in the workplace. Gender inequality appears to them as an outdated concept that is no longer worthy of discussion.

In our recent study on gender and the MBA, which will be published this month in the Academy of Management Learning and Education, women had an ambivalent relationship to discussing gender issues. Most of them believed that gender equality in the workplace is a fact and no longer needs any work.

Leaders inspire, they never bully

- Jonathan Perks is managing director of board and executive coaching at Penna. The opinions expressed are his own.-

The issues which surround bullying in the workplace, linked to the allegations surrounding Prime Minister Gordon Brown, provide a timely reminder of what good leadership is really about. But firstly it’s important to remind ourselves as to what behaviours constitute bullying and this definition sums it up nicely: “persistent, offensive, abusive, intimidating, or insulting behaviour, abuse of power, or unfair penal sanctions which makes the recipient feel upset, threatened, humiliated, or vulnerable, which undermines their self-confidence and which may cause them to suffer stress.”

The psychology behind why people may bully in the workplace is complex and varies from person to person. In some cases the bully feels inadequate, or insecure, and therefore seeks to take out their aggression on others by ridiculing, belittling, ignoring and creating a sense of fear for their targeted victim. Sadly some workplace environments reward and encourage such behaviour, especially when it’s linked to financial targets and incentives.

The bully is often in utter denial that they are bullying (they may have convinced themselves that they are just being robust and a strong manager and this is normal way to treat underperformers or weaker people).

There are a number of ways to protect yourself from bullying and potentially turn the situation around into a positive. The first one is to have the courage to be assertive by naming and refusing to accept toxic, bullying behaviour. Another approach is to use the teaching of nonviolent communication (NVC) in a way that is assertive, without being antagonising, and gives an element of choice to you and the bully. Very simply, this would involve a conversation as follows: “when you say A, it makes me feel B, the consequences are C and my request of you in future is D.” Bullies often use positional power and so their victims feel inadequate and unable to respond for fear of losing their jobs. This is where confidential help lines (which must remain truly confidential) can help individuals and give them coping strategies. A further approach is to go to someone in authority or HR and make a formal request for support.

An organisation or culture which is well led by inspirational leaders has the lowest incidences of bullying. It’s not acceptable to collude with the recent political apologists for bullying, since it is a sign of psychological flaws and unhealthy, dysfunctional behaviour. The finest leaders remain calm in the storm, listen and understand the staff and yet are equally courageous and firm enough to have difficult conversations with people about poor performance. Inspirational leaders invoke a powerful sense of trust and those who work for them willingly contribute discretionary life energy to help the organisation succeed. These finest leaders also have the courage to challenge bullying behaviour in their peers and other leaders and act as role models.

In some of macho organisations a bully’s toxic behaviour is sometimes condoned, provided they bring in lots of revenue and profits. This is not sustainable and individuals must understand the consequences of their behaviour and learn healthy, alternative ways of motivating the staff which are highly effective – executive coaching can help with this. Firstly an executive coach can measure and understand what motivates the bully and their level of emotional intelligence (ability to cope effectively with life and others) and help and develop it so that they inspire others, rather than intimidate them in a culture of fear. Remember “those who can, do, those who can’t, bully”.

Strong-arm management tactics harm staff and productivity

- Gary Miles is Head of Open Programmes and Events at Roffey Park – a provider of Leadership and Management courses. The opinons expressed are his own.-

As the controversy around alleged bullying in Downing Street continues, we’re seeing a stream of features in the media looking at the issue of bullying in the workplace: what is or is not bullying behaviour, why it happens, where victimised employees can turn to for help. Indeed, perhaps the one positive outcome of all this has been to bring a serious issue of working life to the forefront of the collective consciousness.

For me, however, there is a fundamental question that should not be left out of the debate, and that is to ask not what constitutes bullying, but rather what constitutes good leadership – leadership that is strong and effective, constructive not destructive. In my view, managers – regardless of how high or low they are on the organisational ladder – have failed as leaders if they have to resort to throwing things around and exhibiting bad temper.

Yes, leaders need to be able to talk realistically (indeed, passionately) about the challenges facing individuals and the business; where performance needs to improve, they need to be straight and ‘tell it as it is.’ However, this can be done in a respectful way; shouting and physical displays of anger simply do not have a place in the modern working world and should go the way of other forms of offensive behaviour associated with days gone by.

In that sense, whether such behaviour is or is not bullying is academic; it simply should not happen in the first place. The basic point is no one in this day and age, particularly those in positions of authority, should continually engage in behaviour that is upsetting, much less bullying, to those around them.

Without doubt, the most effective leaders model positive behaviour and relations at work by being calm and level-headed, particularly in times of crisis. Those are the leaders who command the respect of their people. Managers in senior positions who abuse their power and whose behaviour upsets those around them send a bad message not just to their staff, but to their customers, too. Moreover their organisations will not be attractive to potential talented employees who might want to work for them, and there is also a major knock on effect on absence caused by stress and anxiety for those on the receiving end of bad behaviour. So rather than galvanising people into action, strong arm management tactics  are more likely to have the opposite effect on staff and actually harm productivity of the company or organisation.

For those adopting bullying behaviour the label ‘bully’ would likely come as a complete surprise.  They will instead regard their behaviour as clever, strong and dynamic. It is therefore important that all leaders aim to get regular feedback from a cross section of their organisation, but the crucial point, of course, is that they listen and take action, so that those who are brave enough to come forward see a change.

Workplace bullying: the dark side of organisational life

- Dr Linda Alker is a princpal lecturer at Manchester Metropolitan University Business School.  Her areas of expertise include organisational change, leadership and workplace stress. The opinions expressed are her own. -

Workplace bullying is identified as one of the greatest sources of stress that you can put upon your employees, although organisations and managers are often slow to react to cases of bullying because bullying is not always accepted as a credible label for the kind of abuse that employees face in the workplace.

For many the term ‘bullying’ carries with it too strong an association with childhood and the difficulties victims experience at school or on the way to school.  A denial that it exists then ensures that it remains a major stressor within the darker side the workplace.

The evidence speaks for itself and there is a suggestion that the increasing pressures of the recession are highlighting the problem of workplace bullying.

Research undertaken by the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service (ACAS) and public service trade union Unison,  in January this year identified that one in 10 employees is likely to experience workplace bullying and harassment.

In addition, Unison reports that more than one third of workers have said they were bullied in the past six months, which is double the number a decade ago.

We know that bullying is persistent unwelcome behaviour, mostly using unwarranted or invalid criticism, sometimes threats, exclusion, isolation, etc.