The positive impact volunteering or charity events will have on your team

· by Emma Browning
If I told you that approximately 70% of FTSE 100 companies have a volunteering programme, would you be surprised? I know I was! So, there must be a compelling reason why our biggest and most successful corporates do this. After all, they have budgets and performance targets like the rest of us.  How do they justify this ‘charitable’ financial commitment to their returns-hungry shareholders?  Because they know that engaged employees make happier and more productive employees, that’s why!  Making sure you have highly engaged employees at the moment, is absolutely…

Make sure stress doesn’t get in the way of your success

· by Emma Browning
Six things every manager can do to make sure stress doesn’t get in the way of success When your team’s happy, healthy and engaged in their work, they’re more likely to meet their goals and help you to meet yours. More good days for your team lead to more good days for you, as well as a healthier, happier work environment. On the other hand, when people are stressed or burned out, their performance and relationships with others will suffer. So, what can you do to minimise some of the…

Who wants to understand and develop employee behaviour?

· by Emma Browning
Personality Profiling Meraki HR have a number of HR professionals and coaches in their team who are accredited Thomas Practitioners. We chose to work and train in Thomas pyschometrics as they are easy to use, and provide great reports that are both helpful to the manager and the employee. How was it developed? In the late 1950s and early 1960s, Dr. Thomas Hendrickson developed William Moulton Marston’s DISC theory to produce the Thomas Personal Profile Analysis (PPA) for the work place. The Thomas PPA determines how individuals respond to workplace…

3 Top Tops to Help Remote Working

· by Emma Browning
It’s no secret that the number of remote workers is on the rise due to better technology, globalisation, and changing workplace culture. Add to this the recent changes to us all being asked to work from home if at all possible, it’s safe to say the number of remote workers is likely to accelerate even further. But with the scale of remote working we’ll likely see in the coming weeks and months, it’s never been more important to consider the impact it can have on your employees’ performance, development and…

Coaching for Success

· by Emma Browning
Given the myriad examples of successfully coached sports teams last Summer, I wonder how many of us have taken the very large hint that it may well be very worth investing in some training for your managers to help them to become coaches? You can help your employees improve their current performance, or in the case of an already effective employee, help them become even more effective. Performance coaching is a powerful tool when managers take advantage of its usefulness. There is no doubt about it – effective coaching can…

The 7 things you need to know about managing employees

· by Emma Browning
Have you built or are you building a successful business?  It’s stressful isn’t it?  Especially when you have to deal with tricky day to day employee matters. I’ve managed my own teams for over twenty years, and HR teams can be some of the hardest people to manage – I can’t imagine why! So I thought I would share my 7 tips on how to effectively manage your employees. What you should know about managing employees … So, you decided to start your own business because you’re creative, or you’re…

Engage for success

· by Emma Browning
We know that healthy, happy workers lead to healthy, happy and successful organisations. Are your people delivering the results you need? Is your business performing as expected? When was the last time you asked your people what they loved about their job? If your employees feel unhappy or unappreciated, you can be sure as eggs is eggs that they won’t be giving their all to the business that employs them. Just as in life, being engaged with something leads to so many great things including high energy, happiness, motivation and…

Are you ready to take the advice of Richard Branson?

· by Emma Browning
I talked about mentoring and coaching recently and for many of us, when you think of influential people from the world of business, Richard Branson is a name that’s likely to feature pretty high up on your list. He has talked many times about mentoring and recently quoted at an event hosted by Purple Cubed, ‘I am often asked what the link between a promising business person and a successful business person is, and mentoring always comes to mind. Giving people advice on how to achieve their goals is often…

Are you attracting the right people to your business?

· by Emma Browning
This week I am talking about recruitment. A 9-5 working week, 4 weeks holiday a year, and a corner desk were once considered perks to a job, creating satisfaction and loyalty. Not anymore. Today’s businesses need to be much savvier if they want to attract and retain key talent. These days prospective employees are searching for a better work/life balance, and a greater sense of fulfilment from their jobs. They are more discerning. The structure of work has broken down and shifted, and small business owners must take note of…

Managing Employee Performance

· by Emma Browning
At Meraki HR we work with lots of clients on what I call proactive HR. That’s helping them to design and implement a people strategy that helps them create great places to work which in turn means their people deliver great business results. But life isn’t always rosy, and we are dealing with people and things can and do go wrong – that’s life! I would say that in my experience, the most common problem that I am asked to help my clients with is underperforming employees.  I’ve not only…