Christmas reading: Why not try a business book? From Amazon’s 14 principles to TED Talk secrets December 1, 2014 Although you might feel mildly frustrated if you’ve missed out on the four day-long Black Friday to Cyber Monday discount shopping extravaganza, that shouldn’t stop you from getting a good Christmas read sorted in advance. There are plenty of guides to the best books of 2014 – from novels to economic tomes – [...]
Priory clinic opens in the Square Mile: How to tackle stress in the City November 30, 2014 The opening of a Priory clinic in the Square Mile should be a call to action for employers. The Priory Group’s move to open a new wellbeing clinic in the City is a strong indication of an increasing problem. Recent ONS statistics show that the number of working days lost to “serious mental health” [...]
Should culture trump strategy? It’s no contest November 27, 2014 Forget Alton Towers away days – values do not change overnight. The baseball team, the club, the academy and the fortress – four categories of corporate culture outlined by Yale’s Jeffrey Sonnenfeld in 1988. Is your firm a group of well-rewarded star players, prone to moving on to better opportunities (the baseball team)? Or [...]
As Harriet Green exits Thomas Cook, what’s the right amount of time to stay in a job? November 26, 2014 Quitting while ahead may help you to move on to bigger things. Whenever high-flying chief executives abruptly part company with their firm, the gossip antennae of City folk immediately start twitching – searching for signs of a scandal or cover-up. Not so with outgoing Thomas Cook chief executive Harriet Green, who yesterday resigned [...]
Get the most out of business travel: Avoid jet lag and embrace distraction-free flights November 25, 2014 Fasting to avoid jet lag and embracing life without internet can ensure you don’t waste time. Travelling abroad is part and parcel of business life, and flying is often essential. But these trips can often be very short and, while your schedule on the ground may be back-to-back, there is a risk that the [...]
Best business podcasts: From Harvard’s HBR IdeaCast to Marketing Smarts and The Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders November 24, 2014 Listen to anything from Stanford lectures to coffee shop discussions If you're not a podcast listener, the chances are that you know someone who is. In 2013, subscriptions to these downloadable audio files (featuring everything from comedy to political debate) hit 1bn through iTunes. And according to podcast hosting company RawVoice, the number of [...]
How social media can land you a job November 23, 2014 Recruiters may be reining in their sharpest practices, but there are tricks to getting noticed. When the internet was still in its infancy 20 years ago, finding applicants for a job was all about placing an ad and waiting for the responses to come in. As recruiters, we’d then have the pain of sifting [...]
Flexible working: How it can boost women in work November 20, 2014 Companies underestimate the productivity benefits of the practice. The latest figures show that women are still under-represented in senior leadership positions, with only one in five FTSE 100 directorships and 7 per cent of executive directorships occupied by women. So it’s not surprising that we’ve seen a rise in the number of campaigns looking [...]
UN Universal Children’s Day: Why child rights are good for business – ACCA Comment November 19, 2014 If firms fail to protect children in the supply chain, they risk harm to their bottom line. Today is the UN’s Universal Children’s Day. Held on 20 November every year, this occasion recognises the welfare of children around the world and commemorates the adoption of the Declaration of the Rights of the Child in [...]
Tips from the celebrities turned bosses: What Sean Combs, Jessica Alba and the Olsen twins can teach us about business November 19, 2014 Making sure you’ve got a product people will buy still matters. The “world's first global cannabis brand,” Marley Natural, was unveiled yesterday by Bob Marley’s family. It’ll sell cannabis-infused creams and accessories, marketed as medicinally beneficial. But however good the products turn out to be, no-one’s going to argue that much of the [...]