It’s important to recognise that leadership differs from management in many ways. The main difference is that leadership is about motivating and encouraging employees, while management is about ensuring tasks are completed as intended.

Whether you are a leader, manager or employee, it’s useful to understand the different types of leadership and how these can shape and change an organisation. This article explains six common leadership styles and the advantages and disadvantages of each, as well as which leadership style is considered the most effective.

What are the Different Styles of Leadership?

There are many different styles of leadership and various theories, with some overlap between these. Leaders frequently adopt a range of leadership styles and an effective leader will understand how to adapt their style depending on the situation. However, they will often have one particular leadership style that they use most of the time. 

We will be covering six common types of leadership here, though there are numerous others:

• Coaching Leadership
• Transformational Leadership
• Servant Leadership
• Democratic Leadership
• Authoritative Leadership
• Autocratic Leadership

Coaching Leadership

Coaching leadership focuses on the needs of the team by identifying the strengths and weaknesses of individual members and the overall team. This provides individuals with direction to work to their strengths and develop themselves in weaker areas. Coaching leaders are committed to getting the best from each individual in their team through clear direction and support. The leader works with individuals to help them to identify their strengths and weaknesses and to understand how they can improve.

The leader must support their team with their development and provide each member with constructive feedback to improve performance. They should encourage the team to consider solutions to problems they encounter by asking prompting questions, rather than the leader making all the decisions. In doing so, team members feel included and listened to and will develop their ability to find solutions themselves.

Advantages of coaching leadership include:

• Objectives are clear and team members understand what is expected of them.
• Team members enjoy working as part of a group towards a shared outcome. 
• Effective communication and collaboration is encouraged.
• Weaknesses are addressed and individuals are supported to improve.
• Team members feel trusted and empowered, resulting in them being motivated and productive.
• Organisations develop talent, creating a skilled workforce.

Disadvantages of coaching leadership include:

• It can be time consuming to successfully implement because it includes one-on-one time with all team members.
• The leader must have the necessary skills and experience. They must be an effective communicator to ensure they deliver feedback in an appropriate way so that team members feel encouraged to improve, rather than criticised and unmotivated.
• Some teams may not want to work together in this way or want this type of leader. Individuals may resist attempts at coaching leadership and be uncooperative which can cause problems for the wider team.

Want to Learn More?

Our Coaching and Mentoring online training course is designed to give you the practical tools and techniques needed to get started with successful coaching and mentoring. We also offer a range of articles on the topic, including How to Develop Coaching and Mentoring Skills and Coaching vs. Mentoring: What’s the Difference?

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Transformational Leadership

Transformational leadership is characterised by leaders who take control and influence others through emphasising change and transformation within people and organisations. They engage others by recognising their needs, motivating them to succeed and developing a relationship of trust and participation. This type of leadership involves strong communication to encourage team members to feel invested in a shared vision. As with coaching leadership, there is a focus on people, with each individual’s potential recognised and leaders working with them to achieve this.

Advantages of transformational leadership include:

• The organisation innovates and changes for the better. People are guided by the leader to adapt to change and the challenges that may come with it.
• Team members feel motivated and have a sense of purpose. They understand and believe in a clear vision established by the leader and the part they play in achieving it.
• Individuals are supported to develop and grow professionally, increasing their skills and capabilities.
• Relationships within teams and across organisations are strong due to the trust placed in the leader.
• As a result, performance and productivity often improves.

Disadvantages of transformational leadership include:

• Individuals may experience burnout and feel overworked due to the perceived pressure to perform. If a leader is highly committed to an organisation, team members may feel as though they need to display the same level of commitment by working unreasonable hours.
• Individuals may feel under appreciated if they aren’t motivated or the leader fails to recognise their achievements.
• Some team members may require more structure and support than being led by example.
• Unless the leader provides clarity on the tasks that need to be completed, team members may be confused about responsibilities. This can result in a decrease in productivity.
• Team members may not raise concerns. As transformational leadership involves promoting a shared mindset, issues or different approaches may not be recognised or raised. Individuals may not feel comfortable with raising concerns if these could be interpreted as going against the shared mindset.
• For the leader, maintaining a high level of enthusiasm and engagement can become time-consuming and emotionally draining. 

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Servant Leadership

This type of leadership originates from the idea that leaders serve their team. Instead of exercising all power themselves, the servant leader shares this power with others, putting their needs first and supporting them to develop and perform well. The growth and well-being of the team is at the forefront of decisions.

Successful servant leaders must have the ability to listen, empathise and be self-aware. Servant leaders lead by example and are willing to carry out any task that needs doing in order to help their team. They strive to include all team members in decisions, ensuring that everyone feels heard, and make decisions that benefit those involved.

Advantages of servant leadership include:

• Team members are encouraged to be creative and empowered to share their ideas, resulting in more effective processes and greater investment in the organisation.
• It creates strong working relationships within teams and a productive working environment.
• Teams are inspired by the example set by the leader and feel motivated to do their best.
• Communication is effective. Leaders take the time to listen to their team and take action with this in consideration.
• When combined, these advantages establish a people-oriented culture which results in a decrease in employee turnover.

Disadvantages of servant leadership include:

• As the main focus is on ensuring team members are happy and included, leaders may be less demanding which could result in targets not being achieved.
• Some individuals may need a leader who holds them to account in order to work most effectively.
• The leader may be perceived as weak and lacking authority, particularly by those who are used to a more traditional style of leadership.
• For the leader, the role can be time-consuming and require a lot of effort to succeed in.
• Decisions and progress may be slow due to the required input of many people.
• In larger teams or organisations, it’s difficult to have frequent, effective direct contact with every team member.

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Democratic Leadership

Democratic leadership is where team members play a participative role in decision-making. The leader makes or approves the final decision, but everyone is encouraged to participate by contributing their opinions during discussions. All team members have the opportunity to share their input, knowing they play an important role in the decision-making process.

As well as overseeing the final decision, the leader must direct and guide the team to ensure that they don’t dedicate time to planning decisions that aren’t feasible and stray from the objective. Leaders should facilitate these conversations and support the team to reach a joint decision.

Advantages of democratic leadership include:

• Individuals are empowered to contribute to the decision-making process and feel engaged. This can increase their job satisfaction.
• Employees have confidence in themselves and their capabilities and aren’t afraid to share their ideas.
• More suggestions are put forward which leads to greater innovation and creativity.
• Teams learn to listen to one another and respect their one another’s valuable input. This creates mutual respect and fosters more effective teamwork.
• Productivity increases when individuals are motivated and involved.

Disadvantages of democratic leadership include:

• Involving more people in decision-making can slow the process down and cause delays.
• If there are differing options within a team, it can be challenging to reach a consensus that everyone is happy with.
• Some members of the group may not have the knowledge required to contribute to decision-making discussions.
• It can be difficult to maintain a clear focus if many different ideas are put forward for discussion. This can lead to confusion unless the leader is able to steer the team in the right direction.
• Leaders have a lot of responsibility which can result in them feeling overwhelmed.
• Team members may become frustrated if a decision is made which they believe isn’t the best option or they don’t feel as though their ideas are given enough consideration.
• Employees may expect to be involved in all decisions. This could lead to conflict if they don’t understand why they aren’t included in some decision-making processes.

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Authoritative Leadership

Authoritative leadership is a hands-on style which involves the leader establishing targets and processes and overseeing them to completion. Instead of simply giving orders, they explain their thinking and manage expectations. If successful, an authoritative leader makes quick decisions that deliver effective results.

This type of leader is seen as a mentor who guides and inspires team members and encourages them to follow them to successfully achieve common goals. By getting to know each team member well, the leader can provide them with tailored guidance and support to motivate them to succeed.

Advantages of authoritative leadership include:

• Fewer mistakes are made because the processes and rules are clearly defined by the leader.
• Clear processes and structure improves productivity.
• Leaders can look ahead and present an actionable vision.
• Employees feel motivated to succeed and perform well as a result.
• Difficult decisions can be made quickly without the input of the whole team.
• Team members feel supported and recognised by the leader.
• It’s an effective leadership style if an organisation is undergoing significant change or uncertainty.

Disadvantages of authoritative leadership include:

• There is a risk of leaders micromanaging their team which can cause individuals to feel as though they aren’t trusted or fearful of doing something wrong.
• Leaders may become overbearing, causing teams to disengage with their work and lose enthusiasm for the vision. 
• Extreme pressure may be put on the leader if they have to always be seen as leading by example.
• Failures in projects or processes are the responsibility of the leader who must accept accountability.

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Autocratic Leadership

Autocratic leadership, also known as authoritarian, follows a top-down approach to decision-making processes. The leader makes decisions based on their thoughts and ideas, with limited involvement from others in the organisation. It is expected that team members will follow instructions given to them by the autocratic leader and there is limited room for discussion. Power is held by the leader and isn’t distributed in any way to the team members.

This type of leadership is used less frequently in organisations today, though it may be suitable in some situations. For example, if a critical decision needs to be made immediately.

Advantages of autocratic leadership include:

• Team members are given clear instructions and understand how to complete tasks.
• Results are delivered on time and to a high standard. 
• Work environments are highly structured with everyone knowing what is expected of them and others.
• For team members, pressure can be relieved in stressful situations.
• The leader provides clear direction to the organisation.

Disadvantages of autocratic leadership include:

• Team members are discouraged from sharing their ideas and lack a voice in decisions.
• Morale can be low across the team and wider organisation. Some may be fearful about speaking out about poor leadership practices.
• Creativity and innovation are suppressed. Individuals can feel as though they aren’t valued or able to grow professionally. New perspectives and ideas which could hugely benefit the business aren’t shared.
• The leader may be under immense pressure as they feel responsible for everything.
• There may be tension and conflict in the workplace. 
• Morale can be low. If team members don’t feel satisfied at work, they may disengage and underperform, or seek employment elsewhere.

What is the Best Leadership Style?

Research by Kurt Lewin and his team in 1939 established three core leadership styles – autocratic (authoritarian), democratic (participative) and delegative (laissez-faire). Lewin’s study identified democratic leadership as typically the most effective leadership style. Democratic leaders encourage input from team members, while giving guidance and having the final say in decisions. This empowers and encourages team members to contribute creative ideas and play a key part in processes, often resulting in individuals with higher job satisfaction.

Today, most theorists argue that it’s important to recognise that there isn’t one leadership style that works the best in all organisations and situations. Instead, a strong leader will know how to adapt their leadership style accordingly and incorporate different skills to ensure the best outcome for the team and task. This is called ‘situational leadership’. Situational leaders are able to identify and meet individual needs, adapt between different leadership styles successfully, gain their teams’ trust, analyse problems and guide towards a solution and know how to support individuals with feedback.

However, in some environments, a certain type of leadership style will likely be more successful than others. If you work as a teacher in a school, you may find that transformational leadership style is the most well-received. Using this style, you can encourage and inspire your students to achieve their full potential. While, for army conflicts, an autocratic leader may be the most appropriate type to relieve pressure in stressful situations.

To find out which leadership style you should adopt, you need to consider what you want to achieve and the organisational circumstances in which you operate within. You should also consider your personality and how you currently lead teams. With this in mind, you could determine which leadership style you currently use and what you want to change and improve on. As there are numerous leadership styles and none are superior, you can experiment and see which delivers the best results for you, your team and your organisation.

Recognising which leadership style is right for you will enable you to develop your skills further and become the most effective leader possible. You must understand which style is appropriate and actively seek out constructive feedback from those you lead to understand what works well and how you could improve. As well as providing successes for the organisation, effective leaders develop and improve their teams to achieve their potential too.

Further Resources:

• Leadership & Management Training Online Course
• Leadership and Management Quiz
• 10 Development Areas for Managers

The post 6 Types of Leadership: Which Leadership Style is Right For Me? appeared first on The Hub | High Speed Training.

In this article, we will explain some of the reasons why employees should return to the office, suggest some advice on how to encourage your workforce to return to non-remote work, and provide tips for employees heading back to the office to ensure a smooth transition.

Why Should Employees Return to the Office?

Although there were a myriad of studies released during the coronavirus pandemic that sang the praises of remote or hybrid work, suggesting that this form of working created happier, more productive employees, newer research from today’s post-pandemic world is starting to demonstrate that the opposite may actually be true. 

Whilst immediate results of changing to a more remote form of working may have seemed positive, we’re now starting to see the more long-term effects which paint an altogether different picture. To get a glimpse of how employees felt about home-working during the pandemic, read our article on the challenges and benefits of working from home, here.

Does Working from Home Decrease Productivity?

As we’ve had time to collect and monitor data from employees working from home over the past few years, more accurate insights into their productivity are now coming forth, and these show some interesting results. 

One example of this is a working paper published by two doctoral students from Harvard who, during 2020, found an 8% increase in the number of calls handled per hour by employees of an online retailer that had made the move to home working. Upon revising their study with more precise data in 2023, however, they found that this initial increase had actually become a 4% decline in productivity, with fewer calls being answered than in the office as well as lower quality interactions. So, what factors of remote working contribute most to this loss in productivity? 

Less Efficient Communication

We’ve all gotten used to dealing with the complexities of virtual meetings, and whilst it can seem nice to interact with colleagues among their pets and plants, with their favourite mug in hand, there’s no denying that speaking through a screen and at the mercy of your internet connection has its difficulties. 

Remote work strips colleague communication of the subtle non-verbal cues and natural flow of discussion that makes up the bulk of normal conversation. In fact, inevitable time lags and the inability to hear multiple people talk at once on virtual calls, makes truly effective collaboration nigh on impossible.

Difficulty Building and Maintaining Professional Relationships 

As well as decreasing the efficiency of communication, home working removes any spontaneity from workplace conversations. Whereas in an office it’s common to overhear and jump into conversations on impulse, remote conversations are mainly meticulously planned and are invite only. This makes it difficult to build solid professional relationships, as communication with employees outside of your team becomes sporadic if not scheduled in. Additionally, online meetings with strict agendas restrict the personal aspects of conversation that can help to build and strengthen workplace relationships. 

Inhibition of Innovation

Whilst online work inhibits relationship-building, it can prevent employees from being truly innovative. This is due to a restriction in focus, a key element of innovation. Constant work notifications, such as messages on slack, and distractions from family at home can make it hard to truly focus on one task and get the creative juices flowing. Without innovation, however, employees can feel like they’re running in circles and lacking in motivation. 

Decrease in Mental Health

The common consensus is that remote working has improved mental health by restoring workers’ work-life balance and giving employees more time to get outside, spend time with family, and exercise. In many cases, however, this may not be the reality. To start with, blurring the lines between work and home can make it difficult for many employees to ‘switch-off’. This lack of boundaries has been found to increase stress in home workers, with one study finding that 41% of remote workers felt stressed compared to only 25% of those continuing to work from an office.

Furthermore, it can be isolating to work from home in comparison to an office filled with people to communicate and connect with daily. As a result, remote working can increase feelings of loneliness, which can considerably impact mental health. 

Slower Development 

It’s generally agreed that regular feedback and advice is essential for growth and development, but home-workers are shown to receive significantly less feedback than those in offices. As a result, those working remotely are likely to progress in their professional development far slower. 

One recent study found that remote workers spend 25% less time on career development than their office counterparts. It’s also been noted that many skills, particularly soft skills such as leadership, are mainly learnt through observation. With home-workers being isolated from their colleagues, they’re less able to learn from their peers. 

How to Encourage Employees to Return to the Office

Although there are disadvantages to remote working, 82% of people say that they prefer working from home to going back to the office. Therefore, it’s evident that employees may need to be provided with motivation to return. 

Ultimately, many workers are reluctant to return to the office as they’re worried it’ll mean giving up the perks of remote working. Encouraging employees to return to the office is therefore mainly a case of outlining the benefits of an office environment, and adapting your workplace so that it proves a worthy rival to people’s own homes. 

Communicate Clearly and Honestly

Firstly, it’s essential to clearly communicate why you’d like employees to return to the office. Transparency is key to employee engagement, and therefore being totally honest about your reasons for making this change is likely to receive the best response. 

Use Factual Evidence and Statistics

As the quote goes, ‘you can’t argue with facts’. Using hard evidence for asking employees to return to the office will strengthen your case, particularly if some of your statistics are taken from your employees themselves; Why not create a survey for employees to complete and use the results in your line of reasoning. 

For example, being able to firmly declare that ‘X% of our team has shared that they feel lonely at home’, or that ‘X% of our team find collaboration easier in the office’ makes a compelling argument for returning to non-remote work. Including your employees’ own opinions within your decision will also help them to feel involved, rather than merely instructed. To find other methods of effectively motivating your team, read our article here.

Introduce New Benefits

Understandably, employees may be reluctant to give up the benefits of home-working without receiving any compensation or alternative advantages. Introducing new benefits such as a transportation or child care stipend may help to make office work more manageable for those who have gotten used to saving money in these areas by working from home. 

Additionally, creating new ways to make the office more enticing, such as social events, provided lunches or pet-friendly areas, may incentivise more workers to swap the perks of home-work for those of being in the office. Introducing regular team-building activities will help to strengthen bonds within teams and help to create a company culture that your employees want to experience in-person daily. You can find some ideas for team building activities which could help to incentivise employees in our article, here.

Optimise Your Office Space 

Returning to working in a closed office cubicle isn’t going to be an exciting prospect for anyone. Instead, to encourage employees to return to the office, it’s a good idea to ensure it’s an inviting space that people want to be in. 

Consider redesigning your office to maximise both productivity and fun. One idea is to separate your office into different areas designed specifically for various activities. For example, having designated deep-work sections, huddle areas, standing desks, social areas including games and comfy seating, and more. 

Create a Hybrid Work Schedule 

Asking every employee to immediately return to the office full time may be a difficult transition for many. Instead, try to phase in a return to the office and offer structured flexibility for those that need it. 

You could try a hot-desking system where employees sign up to work in the office on certain days, can book office space, and see which other employees will also be in the office at the same time as them. This encourages teams to coordinate their office time to get the benefits of collaboration and team-building on office days, whilst also reaping the benefits of sometimes still working from home.

Tips for Returning to the Office

It’s important to remember that returning to the office will seem like a big change for some, particularly as some newer employees may never have worked in an office environment before. With this in mind, here are a few tips for ensuring everyone is prepared to return to the workplace and are comfortable when doing so. 

Ease into the New Routine

Having to commute to an office involves more time management and preparation than having your workspace within your home. As such, it’s important to consider the extra time it will take to commute to work once you return to the office and slowly adapt to waking up earlier so that it’s not a shock to the system when you have to suddenly factor that extra time into your day. 

Additionally, it’s important to think about mealtimes at the office, as you may not have a full kitchen and your favourite ingredients readily available there as you would at home. It may be wise to plan what you will pack for your lunches and do some food preparation at the start of the week to avoid this becoming an added stress in your day.

Decorate Your Workspace

It’s easier to work in a space that you feel comfortable in, so don’t be shy in decorating your desk within the office to really make it your own. Bringing in a few home comforts such as plants and photos can help to make your workspace feel more joyous and motivational, and make the transition between working from home and at the office less of a leap.

Take Enough Rest Breaks

It can feel intimidating to take regular breaks whilst working in an office, as you’re constantly surrounded by other people who seem hard at work. But taking frequent breaks to relax and stretch your legs is just as vital in the office as it is at home, if not more so. 

To learn more about the importance of rest breaks and the regulations surrounding them in the workplace, read our article here. For employers, it’s essential to ensure that the office break room has everything that employees will need, such as comfortable seating and facilities to make drinks or snacks. 

Learn Methods to Help Manage Stress and Anxiety

Change is always scary, and therefore making the move back into the workplace from home-working may create or compound feelings of stress and anxiety. Although these feelings may seem overwhelming or unmanageable, there are a number of methods you can try to help deal with these emotions and avoid them from impacting your daily life. 

Want to Learn More?

To discover some suggested ways of dealing with difficult emotions, read our articles on coping with stress or anxiety at work. Additionally, you can discover more ways to promote positive mental health in the workplace, here.

One of the major downsides of remote working is that it restricts effective communication. If you’re making a return to office work, now is your chance to make the most of being able to discuss things face to face with your colleagues at any time. Getting to know the other employees in your company and widening your network of support will only enrich your working experience, make coming to work more enjoyable, and provide further opportunities for growth and development. 

If you have any concerns about returning to the office or have any suggestions for how to improve the workspace, you should voice these to the relevant person so that they can get resolved as soon as possible. 

There are many merits of working from an office that, if we’re being honest, just can’t be properly replicated when working remotely. As such, it’s time to start thinking about encouraging employees to return to the office. It’s important to do this correctly though, and ensure that employees are motivated and can benefit from this change. Remember, an immediate return to office-work full time may be infeasible for some, so consider taking a soft approach such as implementing hybrid or flexible working schemes. 

Further Resources:

• Weekly Working From Home Structure: Free Schedule Template
• Health & Safety For Home Workers
• Business Essentials Courses

The post How to Get Employees Excited About Returning to the Office appeared first on The Hub | High Speed Training.

• Personal Development Courses
• Using Key Phrases in Performance Reviews & Appraisals
• Communication Skills Training
• Negotiation Skills Quiz
• Minute Taking Quiz 
• How to Start a Presentation for an Interview
• How to Write a Business Letter & Envelope

The post Communication Skills Quiz appeared first on The Hub | High Speed Training.

In this article, we will explain what ataxia is and the different types and causes. We will also cover different prevention and treatment options, as well as providing guidance on supporting individuals with ataxia in the workplace.

What is Ataxia?

Ataxia can affect any part of the body and can cause difficulties with walking, talking, swallowing, vision and tasks that require control, such as writing. 

Ataxia is a condition in itself. However, it is also a symptom of certain diseases, such as a stroke, a tumour or multiple sclerosis. It is very common for people to experience ataxia as a symptom of another illness or condition, but much less common for people to have ataxia as a condition. 

Anyone can have ataxia, therefore it is important that everyone has an awareness of what it is. This is especially important for employers who may need to make adjustments in the workplace to ensure all employees with ataxia are fully supported. 

Looking to learn more?

Our Disability Awareness Training course is suitable for employers wanting to learn about different types of disabilities, how they can impact people’s work and how to make a more inclusive workplace.

There are a number of different causes of ataxia. Some types of ataxia are inherited, such as spinocerebellar, others are due to brain damage or drug side effects. 

Causes of Ataxia

Ataxia can develop over time or come on suddenly and there are many different causes. It usually results from damage to part of the brain called the cerebellum, which is located at the base of the brain and is connected to the brain stem. This part of the brain helps control balance, eye movements, swallowing and speech. Ataxia can also be caused by damage to other parts of the nervous system, such as the spine. 

Causes of ataxia can be split into three categories, they are:

Acquired causes

These include:

• Long-term excessive alcohol intake.
• Medication side effects, such as sedatives and some antiepileptic drugs. 
• Exposure to toxins, such as paint thinner or mercury. 
• Vitamin deficiencies, particularly low vitamin E, B-1 and B-12. 
• Thyroid problems.
• A stroke.
• Multiple sclerosis.
• Autoimmune diseases, such as celiac disease.
• Infections such as chickenpox, HIV or COVID-19. 
• Brain abnormalities.
• Head trauma.
• Cerebral palsy.
• Degenerative brain conditions, such as Parkinson’s disease. 
• Fatigue and stress. 

Degenerative causes

This means causes or conditions that progressively get worse, or decline over time and often refers to loss of function. One example is multiple system atrophy, which is a rare condition that causes damage to the nerve cells in the brain and affects adults around the age of 50. 

Hereditary causes

Some types of ataxia are hereditary, meaning they are passed down from biological parents. Certain genes cause different types of ataxia and you can inherit these genes from one or both parents. 

The various causes that you can see above can lead to different types of ataxia depending on where the individual is affected, for example, their senses or balance.

What are the Different Types of Ataxia?

There are three main types of ataxia, they are:

Cerebellar 

This happens because of a problem in the cerebellum, a part of your brain that manages how different parts of the brain work together.

Sensory 

This disrupts your “self-positioning” sense, which lets your brain track where each body part is. For example, this is how you know where your hands and feet are, even if you can’t see them (such as with your eyes closed or in a dark room). Sensory ataxia disrupts this. 

Vestibular 

This involves a problem with your inner ears, which are needed to help you maintain your sense of balance. If your sense of balance is disrupted, it’s hard to coordinate how you move. 

Other types of ataxia include:

• Episodic ataxia.
• Spinocerebellar.
• Ataxia – telangiectasia. 
• Friedriech’s ataxia. 

Symptoms of Ataxia

Ataxia can develop over time or come on suddenly and can cause many different symptoms. Any part of the body can be affected, but people with ataxia usually experience the following:

• Poor coordination.
• Unsteady walking.
• Poor balance.
• Difficulty with fine motor tasks such as eating, writing or fastening buttons.
• Changes in speech.
• Involuntary eye movements.
• Difficulty swallowing. 
• Problems with vision. 

The exact symptoms and their severity depends on the type of ataxia the person has. For example, people with Friedriech’s ataxia will commonly experience slurred, slow and unclear speech. 

When it comes to treating ataxia, there are a couple of things you can do. One option is to treat the underlying cause. For example, those that have ataxia due to a vitamin deficiency can take supplements, or those with ataxia caused by infection can take medication, such as antibiotics. 

However, if the ataxia is caused by brain damage, hereditary causes or degenerative causes, it is not possible to treat the underlying cause. Instead, there are ways to control the symptoms. Some ways of doing this can include:

• Speech and language therapy to help with slurred speech and swallowing.
• Occupational therapy for support with a loss of mobility, for example teaching you how to use a wheelchair.
• Physiotherapy can help with preventing your muscles from weakening or getting stuck in one position. 
• Various medications to help with eye problems, bladder problems and nerve pain.

As well as treating ataxia, in some cases it can be prevented altogether. Preventative measures include:

• Drinking alcohol in moderation, or not at all. 
• Wearing helmets and the necessary safety equipment to avoid concussions and traumatic brain injuries. 
• Prioritising rest and managing stress levels to avoid fatigue-related ataxia.
• Treating infections as early as possible, such as ear infections, before they affect your nervous system. 
• Maintaining a healthy weight and diet to reduce the risk of stroke or heart disease. 
• Eating a healthy, balanced diet to ensure you’re getting all the necessary vitamins and nutrients. 

How to Accommodate Ataxia in the Workplace

It can be hard to manage the symptoms of ataxia alongside the stress of a job. However, for some people, working is highly important for their mental and physical wellbeing. Consequently, it is important for people with ataxia to have access to fair employment and reasonable adjustments made where necessary. 

There are certain considerations that should be made in the workplace to ensure people with ataxia are fully supported, they include:

• Considering the limitations facing the employee, such as struggling with writing. 
• How do the limitations affect the employee and their job performance?
• Which specific tasks are affected?
• What adjustments can be made to help and support the employee?
• What resources are currently used to help the employee?  
• How effective are the current adjustments and resources that are being used? 
• Do employees need ataxia awareness training? 

Symptoms of ataxia can make working in many environments difficult. However, it is important to remember that people with all types of disabilities share the same rights as other job-seekers and employees. It is therefore important that employers follow the rules which include all aspects of employment from recruitment to termination.

Looking to learn more?

Our Equality and Diversity Training explains the law in regards to preventing discrimination and harassment, and giving everyone the same opportunities whoever and wherever they might be.

Having a job has a multitude of social and psychological benefits and helps people to feel a sense of purpose. Therefore, it is crucial that people with ataxia are fully supported in the workplace. 

Ataxia is the term for a group of disorders that affect coordination, balance and speech. It has many different causes, including genetics, brain trauma and vitamin deficiencies. There are also different types of ataxia, which affects the symptoms the person will experience. Employers should make reasonable adjustments in the workplace to ensure that all employees with ataxia are fully supported in their work.

Further Resources

• Equality and Diversity Training Course 
• How to Support Hidden Disabilities in the Workplace 
• Workplace Adjustments for People with Disabilities: Employer Responsibilities 

The post How to Accommodate Ataxia in the Workplace appeared first on The Hub | High Speed Training.

What is Retail Customer Service?

Retail customer service is about providing customers with relevant (and timely) assistance, to help them solve their problems and to meet their needs and expectations. There are various types of retail environments to which retail customer service applies, including physical premises like supermarkets, newsagents and chemists, as well as countless online retail spaces, apps and websites. It also applies to sales environments where phone lines alone are used to interact with customers, such as warehouses, catalogues or wholesalers.

There are many ways in which you may interact with a customer, including:

• Customer-facing roles where you interact with someone in-person, such as over a counter in a shop.
• Interactions with someone over the phone, such as in a customer advisor role or taking phone orders.
• Responding in writing to customer emails or letters.
• Written interactions with a customer via social media posts or a live chat facility.

Exemplary retail customer service involves resourcefulness, initiative and strong people skills – as highlighted in our article on transferable skills – as you’re often required to think on your feet to maintain high levels of customer service. What’s perhaps most important, however, is providing a seamless experience – caring for your customer before, during and after the sale to ensure their expectations are always met at all times, without exceptions.

What is the Importance of Customer Service in Retail?

Commendable customer service brings benefits to everyone involved in the transaction, including you, your customer and your business, making it something that shouldn’t be ignored. Furthermore, many consumers often cite high levels of customer service as a reason why they would favour one company over another, or even pay more for the product or service on offer.

The overall customer experience plays a key role in determining whether shoppers will return to your business – or take their money elsewhere. In fact, excellent customer service in retail is no longer seen as an added bonus for many customers; rather, it’s something they expect. So much so that, 9 out of 10 consumers go so far as to say that they would pay more to ensure excellent customer service from a company.

The most recent UK Customer Satisfaction Index (UKCSI) shows that organisations in any industry have the ability to provide exceptional customer service. A few examples of UK businesses proven to provide good customer service are as follows:

• Pets at Home – a popular retail company that puts customers at the centre of its strategy. It does that by offering a VIP Club for customers with special offers, the convenient option to click and collect orders the next day, and a vast range of knowledgeable and trustworthy online articles to help customers care for their pets.
• First Direct – an online bank that focuses on customer trust, retention and recommendation. Joe Gordon, Head of First Direct, said, ‘First Direct fundamentally believes speed, ease and consistency are key when it comes to providing an exceptional customer experience.’
• Jet2 Holidays – prides itself on ‘continued investment into customer service and delivering our family-friendly formula.’ They achieve this by investing in their call centres which have industry-leading response times, offering a free 24/7 emergency helpline for customers, hiring more staff in the UK and abroad to assist customers, and investing heavily in their website to ensure the customer booking experience is easy and fast.

It’s clear that if you provide good customer service in retail, the customer is more likely to shop at your business again and also recommend you to their friends and family, or leave a positive review online. This word-of-mouth recommendation is vital in today’s retail world, where shoppers often rely on reviews and testimonials from other customers before they make a purchase.

Looking to Learn More?

Our Retail Customer Service Training Course ensures that retail staff are constantly and consistently achieving and exceeding their customer’s needs and expectations. You could also take a look at our Customer Service Training Course.

How to Improve Customer Service in Retail: Our Top 10 Tips

Looking for some examples of good customer service skills in retail? The following actionable tips and advice will help you to improve the customer service you offer, whether it’s in-person, over the phone or online:

1. Always offer a friendly face (or avatar)

Remember to greet customers with a smile and a friendly hello when they enter your retail premises and say thank you and goodbye to them when they leave. If you’re talking on the phone, smile whilst you’re speaking, and on social media or live chat try to be personable and not corporate – or worse, scripted. Furthermore, ensure you’re looking presentable if you’re meeting customers in person: polish your shoes, iron your clothes and brush your hair. Obvious, maybe, but essential for a good first impression.

2. Be available, all the time

Our instant, on-demand lifestyle means customers expect answers to their queries and problems quickly, if not immediately, and at any time of day or night. For retailers, this can be a challenge, especially if you only work 9-5. Having a social media page or a live chat facility that’s monitored as close to 24/7 as possible will help – could you take it in turns to check your company Facebook page on an evening, to ensure comments and questions don’t go unanswered?

3. Know your product, service and company inside out

Just as customers expect you to be there 24/7, they also expect you to know everything. There’s nothing more frustrating than having a question about a product and being unable to obtain an answer. In most cases like this, the customer will simply remove the item from their basket and take their business elsewhere. That’s not to say you literally have to know it all but you should have a comprehensive knowledge of what you’re selling. If it’s something you can’t answer straight away, or need to go away and look into or fix, then it’s vital that you keep the customer in the loop about what’s happening. The customer will tolerate a longer wait time if they’re kept informed. If they’re not, they’ll abandon the transaction and head elsewhere.

4. Avoid being negative

You might not know the answer, you might be having a bad day or the customer might clearly be wrong, but it’s part of your role in customer service to keep these less-than-positive thoughts to yourself. If you have to say no to a customer, phrase it politely and positively: “I’m sorry you’re unhappy and I’m not sure of the answer myself, but give me one moment and I’ll do my best to find out for you.” If the customer service you provide is worded negatively, rudely or unhelpfully, you can guarantee the customer will tell their friends or leave a bad review about your business online, and bad reviews can spread like wildfire.

5. Fix problems and issues, immediately

People complain because they haven’t had their needs or expectations met and, in today’s world of review sites, direct messaging and social media posts, it’s unlikely that the issue will go unseen or unheard. Therefore, it’s important that your organisation makes it easy for people to complain – if it’s hard, the customer will only get more annoyed. To ensure the customer service you provide is exemplary, a speedy response is also vital – don’t leave people hanging for days, they’ll only get more frustrated – and professional in tone. Be mindful of what you say in response to complaining customers, especially if it’s in the public arena and visible to the whole internet. This means being polite, apologetic and helpful, just as you would if you were dealing with a customer in-person.

6. Remember your regulars

People love to be remembered. It makes them feel unique, cared for and valued as a customer. If a customer you’ve seen before enters your retail premises, greet them by name if you know it or simply welcome them back – they’ll be delighted you’ve remembered them. If your retail space is online, then make use of personalised email communications that use customers’ names at the start of them. This makes your emails or messages feel more human and less robotic. It can also be impressive to a customer if you can quickly recall details from past conversations – most live chat software will capture data from previous interactions that you can use.

7. Good manners cost nothing

First impressions play a significant role in good customer service in retail. Being polite, saying please and thank you, being respectful and smiling are small gestures but they all add up. Remember to always keep the focus on the customer too – don’t be distracted by chatty colleagues, your phone or your pile of stock. Give the customer your full attention and your business will reap the rewards. 

8. Stop, look, listen

It doesn’t matter what you’re doing – stocking shelves, writing an email or catching up with a colleague – your number one priority is to listen to your customers. This doesn’t mean half listening to their query whilst you formulate the perfect answer in your head, nor does it mean getting ahead and saving some time by copying and pasting a stock response into an email ready to hit send. Listening means being patient, giving the customer time to speak without jumping in and ensuring you understand everything they’ve said before responding. How often can you say you’ve truly listened to what someone’s had to say before interrupting with your own thoughts on the situation? Have you ever preempted what someone is going to say and then replied with the wrong information because you’ve not waited to hear the whole story? This is called active listening.

9. Let the customer help themselves

Many people (especially us Brits) prefer to try and solve their own problem before asking for help, so empower customers to help themselves by giving them information upfront. For example, clearly display things like return policies, postage costs, payment options, shop locations and opening hours, etc. on your website. Similarly, it’s a good idea to curate a frequently asked questions list to encourage self-service and reduce the amount of time spent answering the same queries. Empowering your customers in this way means you can focus on providing excellent customer service in other areas of your business where the time is better spent.

10. Don’t forget about the internet

Often, the feedback you receive from a customer will be in the form of a review online, whether on a social media page, a reviews website, an online forum, a local listings page or a comments section on your company website. If you work in a bricks-and-mortar retail premises then it can sometimes be easy to forget about your online presence, but a negative comment on the internet can be highly damaging to your business’s reputation. Responding quickly to these online reviews shows your customers that they are the most important aspect of your business. Be empathetic and understanding – never use a copy-and-paste stock response – and do what you can to help. Although you might want to move the conversation offline or into private emails, it’s important to respond publicly as this is a great opportunity to show others just how much you value your customers and the effort you’ll put into fixing issues.

Further Resources:

• How to Improve Active Listening in Communication
• Transferable Skills: What Are They and Why Are They Important?
• Customer Complaints in Hospitality – From Our Very Own Experts
• How to Promote Equality and Diversity in Customer Service
• Complaint Handling Quiz
• Retail Customer Service Training Course

The post What Defines Good Customer Service in Retail? appeared first on The Hub | High Speed Training.

For meetings to run smoothly, it is crucial to have someone to act as the meeting chair. In this article we will outline the responsibilities of a chairperson, explain some of the skills required and discuss how to chair a meeting effectively, along with providing some useful tips.

What are the Roles and Responsibilities of a Chairperson?

The role of a chairperson is to help meetings run smoothly and efficiently, while ensuring the agenda is followed. It is their responsibility to lead the meeting, maintain order and ensure everyone gets to have their say. Furthermore, if the meeting goes off topic, it is the chairperson’s responsibility to guide the conversation back to the agenda and stick within the time constraints of the meeting. 

The chairperson is important because all meetings, even if they’re small or informal, need some direction and organisation. Without a chairperson, meetings can run late, lead off topic and prevent people from having their say. 

The main roles and responsibilities of a chairperson include:

Getting through the agenda –  the chairperson needs to work through the agenda, introducing and covering all items whilst keeping an eye on the time and moving the discussion along if necessary. They must be able to guide ‘off topic’ conversations back to the main points of the meeting while ensuring that everyone has a chance to contribute. 

Involving everyone – meetings should involve discussion and debate, however, as a chairperson, you need to ensure everyone is heard. This can often involve encouraging those who are quieter in meetings to have their say while sometimes restricting those who over talk. 

Reaching decisions – it is the chairperson’s responsibility to pull together the points discussed and reach a decision. If there are different points of view, they should be summarised and the potential decisions should be presented clearly. Before moving to the next agenda item, the chairperson should clarify and confirm the decision that has been made. 

Maintaining order – sometimes the chairperson will have to deal with challenging people or heated discussions. It is their responsibility to be firm, consistent and remind people of the meeting rules. 

It is important to note that meetings might take place face-to-face but also virtually as remote working is becoming increasingly popular. How the meeting takes place can affect how the chairperson carries out their role. 

The following can impact how smoothly a virtual meeting runs:

• Being unable to see people’s body language. 
• Missing verbal queues, for example, a pause for thought might be interpreted as the person finishing what they were saying. 
• Difficulty knowing who will talk next and when. 
• Technical difficulties, such as drops in signal, interrupting the flow of the meeting. 

The chairperson may have to work even harder during virtual meetings to ensure they run smoothly. Remember, if you are the chairperson, you have been given a role to fulfil and you must remain in control of the meeting – even if it is virtual. 

In some cases, you may want to have a rotating chair. This means that each person gets a chance to be the chairperson and the role is swapped each time there is a meeting. This method spreads out the responsibility and gives everyone a chance to run the group. It can also result in people being more understanding of the chairperson once they have had to fulfil the role themselves. 

What Skills Do You Need to Chair a Meeting?

A good chairperson helps meetings to run smoothly and efficiently. To ensure that the chairperson can fulfil their role and responsibilities, there are certain skills that are needed. 

Some of the skills that a good chairperson will have include:

• Remaining attentive to what is being said in the meeting, this involves active listening which is a very useful skill to acquire. 
• Time management as the chair is in charge of covering the agenda within a particular space of time.
• Note taking, the chairperson is sometimes required to take minutes of the meeting, or at least take note of the actions for the next meeting. 
• Being fair and drawing a balance between hearing everyone’s views and getting through the agenda. 
• Preparing for the meeting, this involves making the room ready (if the meeting is face-to-face), ensuring the agenda is correct and making attendees aware of what is expected of them. 

Looking to learn more?

Our Business Essentials Courses cover the fundamentals that every business needs, including Communication Skills, Minute Taking and Equality and Diversity. Take a look if you want to learn how to make your business even more successful.

How to Chair a Meeting with Confidence

As mentioned, there are many useful skills that a chairperson should have to ensure meetings run smoothly. There are also some tips you can follow to help you, however confidence in your role will come with time and practice.

Before the Meeting

There is a lot of preparation involved in running a meeting to ensure it will be successful. If you are the chairperson, there are a few things you need to do to prepare for a meeting:

• It is paramount that you understand the purpose of the meeting and the overall goal so you can ensure that the discussion is productive. 
• You should prepare the meeting agenda and ensure you understand each point. The agenda should be based on the main purpose of the meeting that you identified beforehand.
• Ensure any presentations, electronics and other devices are set up and tested in advance. 
• Prepare any food or drinks that will be served during the meeting. 
• Send a reminder to all attendees before the meeting, if necessary. 

During the Meeting

One of the responsibilities of the chairperson is to let everyone have their say, therefore, you want everyone to feel welcome and comfortable about speaking and putting their point forward. Here are a few tips:

• Welcome people as they arrive.
• Make sure everyone has an agenda (put them on the chairs or hand them out at the door). 
• Introduce yourself and any speakers.
• If it is a small meeting, ask everyone to introduce themselves.
• Explain to everyone what the meeting is about and outline the rules of the meeting. For example, don’t interrupt people and respect other people’s views. 
• Take notes and minutes throughout so you aren’t relying on your memory and don’t forget anything after the meeting. 
• Ensure everyone has their say, this includes not allowing interruptions from other people whilst someone is talking. 
• Keep moving forward and stick to the agenda. 
• Keep your eye on the time to make sure all agenda points are covered sufficiently, this can mean bringing the conversation about one agenda item to a close. If necessary, you can organise a future meeting about certain topics that require further discussion. 
• Direct people to make a note of any questions they have so they can be discussed after all agenda points have been covered. 

After the Meeting

After all the agenda items have been covered, you should open the meeting for questions and AOB (any other business). Following questions, you should outline clear actions for the next steps. These should include who is going to carry out each action, what each person is going to do and when this will be completed. 

When everyone is content that their questions have been answered, you should thank all attendees for their attendance and end the meeting. 

After the meeting you should check through the minutes and notes taken, then email them to all attendees. This should include the purpose of the meeting as a reminder and outline the agreed next steps. 

Tips for Chairing Meetings

Chairing a meeting can be a daunting role to undertake, especially if you have never done it before. We have discussed the skills required for the role and outlined what to do before, during and after a meeting. Below are some general tips for chairing a meeting:

• If there are conflicting ideas, summarise the points on each side and ask for other people’s thoughts. If someone is continually critical, ask them for their ideas about how to approach the situation. 
• It’s important to stick to the agenda to keep things moving and ensure each point is touched upon. However, this doesn’t mean that you can’t allow the meeting to stray away from the agenda once every point is covered. Try to strike a balance between accepting input that falls outside the agenda without allowing the meeting to become side-tracked. 
• If it’s a larger meeting, you might want to assign some roles and responsibilities to others. For example, asking someone else to write the minutes.
• Don’t be under-assertive. You’ve been given a role, and people will be looking to you for guidance. Don’t be afraid of speaking out.
• If lots of people want to speak, keep a list of whose turn it is to speak next to remind you. Make sure people know you have noticed that they want to speak.
• Stop people from talking for too long. Be firm and consistent but not aggressive. If someone is talking for a long time, interrupt them and say something like “thank you for your contribution, you’ve raised some interesting points. I’m going to stop you there for the moment so other people can comment on this issue.”
• Give preference to people who haven’t spoken before. Say something like “I know you’ve got your hand up, John, but I’m going to take Mary first as she hasn’t spoken yet.”

The purpose of any meeting is to determine a successful outcome. The best way to check if you have chaired an effective meeting is to determine a clear outcome and a way to move forward. After the meeting, refer back to the purpose that you identified before, did you achieve this? 

You could also ask attendees for feedback when you send them the meeting minutes, to check on how successful you were in your role as chair. 

What Should You Do if the Meeting Overruns?

Always start meetings on time. Delaying the start to wait for late comers is disrespectful to those who arrived on time, and it reinforces unprofessional behaviour. You should start on the dot and any late arrivals will get the message if you consistently start without them. 

Be prepared and aware of when to move on from one agenda point. The most common cause of meetings overrunning is prolonged debate. If you are struggling to reach an outcome, it is generally a sign that the attendees need further information or time to research the issue. The best approach is to stop the discussion and reconvene at the next meeting.

Any new issues that are raised under AOB, should not be discussed at the meeting if you are short of time. They belong on the agenda of a subsequent meeting.

A chairperson is crucial for a meeting to run smoothly. It is their responsibility to ensure all agenda items are discussed and to maintain order throughout. There are certain skills that are beneficial to have if you are fulfilling the role of chairperson. Some general tips include keeping an eye on the time, being assertive and sticking to the agenda. 

Further Resources:

• How to Improve Active Listening in Communication
• How To Take Useful Minutes Of A Meeting
• Minute Taking Quiz
• How to Write a Business Letter & Envelope
• 6 Types of Leadership: Which Leadership Style is Right For Me?
• Online Business Essentials Courses

The post How to Chair a Meeting Effectively appeared first on The Hub | High Speed Training.

There are many negative consequences of poor staff retention, and HR leaders are increasingly recognising the importance of having robust retention strategies in place, with this issue set to become a top priority going forwards. 

This article will look at what employee retention is, why it is important and how employers can attract and retain talent. We will also provide some examples of strategies you could implement to help improve employee retention and increase motivation. 

What is Employee Retention?

Employee retention refers to an organisation’s ability to prevent undesirable levels of staff turnover and sustain a workforce that chooses to remain in their employment rather than to leave and seek opportunities elsewhere. 

A company’s retention can often be shown by a simple statistic, such as a percentage of how many employees left and remained during a set time frame and results can be looked at comparatively year on year.

Sometimes, a more in-depth view may be needed to gain a clearer picture of how problematic the situation is. For example, those that retired during the set time frame may be excluded when analysing retention levels and causes of concern. 

Regardless of industry or organisation type and size, understanding how to retain staff is necessary for all employers. Gaining an understanding of why staff leave can help inform new strategies and processes that aim to encourage staff to stay. Everyone from employers and employees to customers and partnerships can benefit from a well motivated and productive workforce. 

Want to learn more?

Having people within your organisation that understand how to support others to be the best they can be is an invaluable asset. We offer courses in Leadership and Management, Professional Development and Coaching and Mentoring to help you achieve your retention goals and make the most of your workforce.

There are many reasons why staff choose to leave their employment and whilst some are personal and can not be prevented, there are some common themes that every company would benefit from considering when it comes to improving employee experience and increasing retention. Causes of employee turnover can include:

• Poor work-life balance.
• Lack of flexible working.
• Low staff morale.
• Poor management and leadership support.
• Low pay.
• Lack of career progression.
• Not enough training and development opportunities.
• Poor working conditions.

Each of these causes can be addressed and improved with some time and investment. Investing in these areas and current staff are just some of the ways your business can show the importance it places on valuing its employees.

Why is Employee Retention Important? 

The quality and contentment of a workforce is often seen as a reflection of the business itself. It is easy to think that a company with a high staff turnover does not value their staff and therefore may not value their clients, customers and partnerships either. 

There can be many negative implications of poor employee retention, including:

• Increased recruitment costs – this can come from the time and resources required to advertise, interview and induct new recruits, as well as the advertisements and/or agency costs involved. 
• Poor reputation – this could come from word of mouth or via reviews from past employees or customers that have had negative experiences.
• Reduced productivity – depending on the nature of your business, this could mean being unable to meet project deadlines, not keeping up with stock and delivery demands, or struggling to maintain customers etc. 
• Poor team morale – this could come from the underlying reasons for staff leaving, becoming disheartened to see colleagues go, or from the added work pressures that come from being under-staffed. 

Employee retention is incredibly important to not only avoid these negative issues, but to reap other benefits that can lead to a more successful business. Some of which include:

• Reduced recruitment costs – the time and money required to recruit new staff can be incredibly costly, money saved could be used to invest in current staff. 
• Increased employee loyalty – having long-term staff can increase loyalty and promote a workforce who are more likely to believe in and work toward the company’s goals. Loyal staff tend to be more productive, engaged and responsive to the needs of the business.
• A more skilled workforce – the longer staff remain with the business the more knowledgeable and skilled they can become, invest in their training and development and consider promoting internally. 
• Better working relationships – staff who have worked together for longer will better understand each other, this can benefit teamwork and collaboration and create a more open and supportive network.
• Improved culture and working environment – when staff are happy, the working environment is more positive. Positive, long-term employees support and encourage a good working culture. 
• Increased productivity and revenue – by retaining staff and avoiding frequent periods of understaffing, the business is likely to be more productive, leading to increased revenue. This productively not only comes from a consistent workforce, but also happier staff. 
• Happier customers – having more consistent and experienced staff and good staffing levels can lead to better relationships and a higher-quality service being delivered to customers.

As technology continues to develop and change both our working and day to day lives, employee retention becomes more important than ever. Businesses need a stable and skilful workforce to support and navigate the future before us. 

How prepared is your business for the rapidly changing future of work? Download our latest report to discover the key to keeping up in an age of digital transformation.

Impact of Technology on Employment 

One of the first steps to successful staff retention is the recruitment process itself. There are many ways to help ensure the most suitable candidates are targeted and recruited, and technology now plays a large role in that process.

From the numerous job sites and apps available to the applications and interviews themselves, technology can be involved throughout.

The way technology is used within your business will likely depend upon its nature and size, but for many, its use is becoming an integral part of daily life and utilising its benefits can help improve many areas of business.

For example, it is well known that the onboarding process has a significant impact on employee experience and retention, and therefore harnessing the benefits of technology to improve training, communication, contact and support during this time can be a great asset. 

The right technology can also help staff to work more autonomously, which often helps them to work more flexibly, and gain greater satisfaction and motivation in their work. 

As new developments in areas, such as automation, machine learning, robotics, analytics, and connectivity become more accessible, it is important for employers to think about the role technology will play in the future of their business and what new skills their workforce will need going forward.

This can be a great opportunity to challenge and develop staff and  improve engagement and interest whilst renewing motivation. 

Reskilling and upskilling staff can be an important part of continuous professional development. For further insights into the impact of technology on employment, take a look at our articles – What are the Skills for the Future of Work? and What is the Importance of Digital Skills in the Workplace?

When looking to teach new skills, technology can provide access to a range of training and support opportunities, whether via text, video calls, websites, e-learning or apps.

It can improve internal communications and help employers to reach out to employees in an accessible and flexible way, particularly useful for those working remotely and unsociable hours. It can also be utilised to seek out and attract new talent for the business. 

How Might Employers Better Attract and Retain Talent?

It is important to attract the right candidates for both the vacancy advertised and for the organisation as a whole. Recruiting in this way helps to avoid wasted time and resources on recruiting those who are unlikely to go the distance and have a long, successful employment with you. 

To help attract new talent:

• Clearly set out the company’s values and culture.
• Provide an accurate and informative job description.
• Be clear on what skills and experience you require from the candidate.
• Showcase the benefits and perks on offer.
• Highlight a commitment to learning and development.
• Show that you understand the importance of staff wellbeing. 

To retain both new and existing talent:

• Encourage continuous learning and development.
• Have retention plans in place.
• Recognise and reward good work.
• Ensure good working conditions.
• Implement a workplace health and wellbeing programme.
• Listen to staff and encourage honest and open communication. 

Successful retention requires planning and the implementation of strategies designed to motivate, develop and drive employees in successful employment within the business.

Strategies to Improve Employee Retention and Motivation

When developing strategies to improve retention and motivation it is important to understand the needs of the workforce. Often there can be benefits and rewards in place for staff that do not reflect their needs and therefore provide them with little motivation. You can not improve people’s desire to stay if you don’t have processes in place to learn why they leave. 

One way to improve retention and motivation is to provide staff with opportunities to give feedback as it can be a useful tool in detecting areas for improvement. This could come from discussions during a one-to-one, staff surveys or exit interviews.

Look out for patterns and repeated themes, have staff members left for more progressive roles? Are you receiving and declining a number of training requests? Is time off for stress related issues a common occurrence? 

Aside from focussing on the reasons for leaving, there are several ways to help motivate staff and increase their engagement, loyalty and satisfaction within their role and the company as a whole. When setting out a retention plan, consider:

• Having clear career progression pathways.
• Providing training and development opportunities.
• Supporting both personal and professional development.
• Ensuring quality and effective management and leadership within the organisation. 
• Having staff recognition programs in place.
• Promoting a healthy work/life balance.
• Fostering a supportive and inclusive environment.
• Providing flexible working opportunities e.g. flexitime, remote working, flexible hours and job shares.
• Utilising and encouraging specialised skills, for example being a T-shaped employee- What Does it Mean to be a T-Shaped Employee?
• Working with a purpose and developing a culture that employees can feel passionate about being a part of.
• Offering a benefits and perks package informed by the needs of staff.

Ensuring there are processes in place to help recognise and retain employees and their value within the business, such as investing in their training and development and providing effective leadership, helps to create and maintain a happy, productive and successful workforce. 

Further Resources:

• How to Upskill Yourself 
• Resilience Training Course
• Transferable Skills: What Are They and Why Are They Important?
• How to Develop Coaching and Mentoring Skills
• Tips for First Time Supervisors
• Report: The Future of Work
• Employee Turnover in Hospitality: Causes and Retention Strategies
• Leadership and Management Quiz
• 6 Types of Leadership: Which Leadership Style is Right For Me?

The post Employee Retention Strategies: Guidance on Retaining Staff appeared first on The Hub | High Speed Training.

But this isn’t a time to sit back and wait for events to unfold. You can harness these ever-changing opportunities. No matter what career path you choose, upskilling and reskilling will help set you on the right track. In this article, we will outline what the future of work could look like, which key skills are likely to be useful to any workplace, and provide guidance on how you can be better prepared.

Want to prepare for your future?

Harness the future of work changes today with the help of our Business Skills courses. Or discover more about the benefits of transferable skills and how to upskill yourself through continuous learning here.

What Does the Future of Work Look Like?

The future of work consists of a new generation of jobs, brought about by vast technological enhancements. Automation is accelerating as machines evolve and robots take over roles traditionally performed by humans. 20 years ago offices were filled with filing systems, fax machines, and desktop computers. Nowadays, new technology allows us to work flexibly, store data securely and create more agile workplaces. 

Disruptive technologies promise new solutions, further innovation, and new ways to connect with customers and markets. The growth of artificial intelligence (AI), robotics, and other forms of smart automation has the potential to create great economic benefits. However, some of these dramatic changes in today’s working environment have resulted in organisational and human resource challenges that mirror wider social and political upheaval.

The future of work centres around two recurrent themes: investing in your education and focusing on skills training. More detail on the modern need to upskill can be found here.     

Automation and other key technological changes will transform the workplace as people increasingly begin to interact with ever-smarter machines. This brings with it both benefits and risks for the future workplace. 

Some of the benefits include:

• Higher productivity.
• Enhanced communication and collaboration.
• Improved efficiency.
• Potential increase in GDP.
• Improved corporate performance.
• Better decision-making. 
• More opportunities for personal development.

 On the other hand, automation poses risks relating to:

• Compliance and risk mitigation.
• Data breaches.
• User privacy.
• Reputational risk.
• Ethical and legal concerns. 

It’s important to consider both the risks and benefits as you look to prepare for the future of work. By familiarising yourself with these modern attributes you can get the most out of your career. 

How prepared is your business for the rapidly changing future of work? Download our latest report to discover the key to keeping up in an age of digital transformation.

What are the Future of Work Skills?

Future of work trends continue to shine a spotlight on health and wellbeing, equality, and workplace safety. The notion of becoming T-shaped is another quickly emerging trend in the world of employment. Those who possess T-shaped characteristics can be highly valuable to any company. 

As the demand for physical and manual skills falls, the need to learn new technological, social and emotional skills is likely to be greater in the future. No matter which career path you choose, there are a number of skills you should look to develop. 

Desirable future of work skills include:

• Cognitive flexibility – the ability to switch between thinking about different concepts or to think about multiple concepts at the same time.
• Digital literacy.
• Computational and analytical thinking – taking a complex problem and breaking it down into a series of smaller problems that are easier to understand and solve. 
• Communication. 
• Complex problem-solving – a series of observations and informed decisions used to find and implement a solution to a problem. 
• Judgment and decision-making.
• Emotional and social intelligence – the awareness of your own and others’ feelings in the present moment.
• Creative and innovative mindset – forward-thinking that allows you to be open to testing new methods, making mistakes and working collaboratively.
• Self-management.
• Resilience.  
• Active learning – actively participating in the learning process rather than passively taking in information. 
• Stress tolerance.
• Flexibility.
• Leadership and social influence.

Developing your skills in these four key areas – cognitive, interpersonal, self-leadership, and digital – will help kickstart your future in any given career. 

If you’re interested in developing your skills, why not take a look at our Personal Development Courses. Find everything from Communication Skills to Leadership and Management.

How to Prepare for the Future of Work

As the nature of work continues to change, the education we obtain in early adulthood may not equip us all of the knowledge and skills we need for our careers. According to the World Economic Forum’s report on the future of work, improving the access and delivery of reskilling and upskilling opportunities is critical.

With these findings in mind, it’s crucial to begin adapting your skill set to ensure you are prepared for the future of work. You may need to refocus your goals and vision to align with future innovation and create a personal development plan. 

Upskilling brings many benefits for both you and your employer. It demonstrates a commitment to your professional development and career progression and opens up new doors to potential work opportunities. From increasing staff morale to avoiding high employee turnover, being part of an aspirational and ambitious culture has the potential to help everyone in the long run.

It’s important to embrace the changing nature of careers. Where there was once a comfortable and reliable path with the three-stage life approach – find a job, climb the corporate ladder, then retire – now, there are more flatter, fluid career paths you may choose to take. This allows you the opportunity to pivot and reinvent yourself over and over if you so wish. 

There are four key steps anyone can follow to ensure you are prepared for the future of work. Here are some tips to get you started:

1. Evaluate your current skills and work out if there are any you lack. Through self-reflection you are able to better understand your development needs and identify which skills to work on. 
2. Search for potential learning opportunities. This could be through finding a mentor, reading more, or taking an online training course.  
3. Reskill and look at transferable skills. Prioritise the skills you need right now, create a personal development plan, and commit to it. 
4. Learn. Continuous learning is your best chance at keeping up with a world that is constantly changing. 

If you wish to learn more about how you can upskill yourself, take a look at our article here.

Although technology and automation are accelerating rapidly, they are also creating a multitude of opportunities for you to grasp. New skills will continue to emerge, but by growing and upskilling yourself today, you will be better prepared for the future of work.

Further Resources:

• Transferable Skills: What Are They and Why Are They Important?
• Leadership and Management Training
• What is the Importance of Digital Skills in the Workplace?
• Report: The Future of Work
• Time Management Matrix – Free Template

The post What are the Skills for the Future of Work? appeared first on The Hub | High Speed Training.

Communication takes many forms, including verbal (both face-to-face and distanced, such as over the phone), non-verbal (conveying and understanding non-verbal cues such as body language), written, and visual (such as graphs and visual signage). All these forms of communication are essential and it’s important to understand their importance and know how to use them effectively.

Work in construction?

Our Health and Safety training courses provide you and your workforce with a thorough understanding of the different aspects of health and safety you may encounter.

What is the Role of Communication in Construction?

There are several costly impacts that poor communication can have on an organisation and the success of its projects, including:

• Increased health and safety issues. Work in the construction sector presents many potential hazards, including work at height, hazardous and dangerous substances, and on-site vehicles. Poor communication of health and safety information can significantly increase the number of accidents and incidents, which has a direct impact on productivity, turnover, morale, legal and compensation costs, and reputation with customers.
• Low morale. Poor communication can cause increased stress levels, poor motivation and decreased morale in workers. Additionally, conflict can also arise when different parties in the project are not kept fully informed of all decisions. This can have a significant impact on the happiness and motivation of employees, and working on a site with poor information flow and conflicts is not a pleasant environment. This is often accompanied by feelings of resentment, high staff turnover and increased absences. To learn how to improve teamwork in construction, read our article How to Build Relationships in Construction.
• Lack of clarity around goals. This can result in significant misunderstandings between different stakeholders. This can impact the success of a project as all parties have competing and inconsistent goals. 
• Delays, decreased productivity and profitability. Poor communication and ineffective communication streams can decrease the speed with which information is transferred within a project and can also cause information blocks where information is transferred to the wrong person. This can cause delays and reduced productivity, both of which may affect profit.
• Increased costs. All of the factors above can have a direct impact on costs. For example, accidents and incidents can cause increased staff turnover, increased costs covering absent workers and hiring replacements, increased insurance premiums, and legal costs. Additionally, delays can result in  significant additional costs including increased labour costs and increased rent hire for machinery and tools. Even poor communication around project specifics, such as materialis, project or site specific information, and quantities, can result in the purchase of incorrect, unusable or excess materials – all of which will increase costs.
• Decreased reputation with customers. Poor communication resulting in delays, disruptions, conflicts and high levels of accidents and incidents can develop a negative reputation for an organisation. This can impact an organisations ability to remain competitive.

Poor communication can have serious impacts on an organisation and its employees in many ways. Therefore, it’s essential to maintain effective communication across an organisation, to limit any negative repercussions. However, there can often be barriers to communication, especially in the construction sector, which poses unique challenges that need to be overcome.

What are the Barriers to Communication in Construction?

If you are experiencing poor communication in your organisation, a good place to start is to understand why this might be the case. Detailed below are some common barriers to effective communication within the construction industry. It’s important to note that this is not an exhaustive list. 

Methods of Effective Communication on Construction Sites

There are several ways that you can help to improve communication in your workplace. When considering how to do this, think about the following:

• Effective communication starts from the top down. Therefore, it’s essential that managers and supervisors communicate effectively, listen to their employees and never ignore policy or procedures. By doing this, you’ll start to develop a positive culture across your organisation and quickly start to see employees follow suit. Additionally, it’s essential that your safe working policies, procedures and practices are the same for everyone. There should not be one rule for some and a different rule for others. This will help to ensure everyone communicates and follows the correct methods.
• Ensure formal communication channels are enforced. Communication needs to be effective from the top-down, but also allow employees to raise and report concerns. You should request and actively listen to feedback, both about work and around your communication style. There might be something you can do more of to help ensure your message is heard.
• Be selective when choosing how to communicate. One size does not fit all with communication. Sometimes a ‘tool-box talk’ may be the best way to share information, other times it may be an email or visual sign. It’s important to choose the right communication method to ensure you are properly understood and that your message is received the way you intended.
• Be professional, clear and concise. Don’t over complicate your message and explain your meaning as clearly and concisely as possible. This will help to ensure that your message is understood and the appropriate actions are taken.
• Provide accessible information. For example, health and safety information and other policies and procedures should be widely and easily available for everyone in accessible formats. It’s essential that staff are properly briefed on any updates to health and safety procedures to ensure that staff can work safely and effectively.
• Ensure information is communicated in a timely manner and delivered to all necessary parties. While being open and transparent is an essential part of effective communication, it’s important not to overload everyone with too much information. Sometimes, you may need to share communication with everyone in your organisation, other times, this is not needed. Where possible, it’s better to be specific with communication and target those impacted.
• Identify the linguistic strengths and weaknesses in your organisation. It’s important to consider the current reality and the future needs of your organisation. When hiring, consider the language and communication skills of workers. Do they have skills that would benefit your workforce and help to close the language barrier gaps? You should also ensure that your written materials are properly and accurately translated and provided to workers who need them. It’s important that you ensure these are accurate translations done by professional construction translators, as you do not want to cause misunderstandings. 

Throughout this article we have emphasised the importance of communication in the construction workforce. Effective communication is essential to the successful and safe completion of your projects. Therefore, you should consider communication as a key skill that you want your employees to demonstrate. 

Communication skills may easily be forgotten, as they are seemingly not as important as health and safety or specific speciality skills, but they underpin safe working on your site. High Speed Training offers Communication Skills Training, that can help you train your workers in communication and teach them how to apply their communication skills to reduce communication barriers in your workplace.

The post What is Effective Communication in Construction? appeared first on The Hub | High Speed Training.

T-shaped employees are valuable members to have on your team and as a manager you should be looking out for these qualities. In this article, we will provide a brief explanation as to what a T-shaped employee is, what are considered T-shaped skills, as well as how to create T-shaped teams.

Looking to become T-Shaped?

We offer a range of Business Skills courses and Personal Development training, each designed to provide you with the knowledge needed to help you upskill and grow.

What is a T-Shaped Employee?

A T-shaped employee is someone who has specialised knowledge and skills in a particular area, as well as the desire and ability to make connections across different disciplines. 

The notion of a T-shaped employee is a quickly emerging trend in the world of employment. Now more than ever, transferable skills are invaluable to many companies and those with a combination of expertise and broad ability to learn and develop are at an advantage. To find out more about the importance of transferable skills, check out our article here. 

With the right support and guidance, everyone has the potential to grow and to become more T-shaped. You, as a manager, have the opportunity to educate individuals on the benefits, both personal and professional, of T-shaped characteristics. 

In addition to technical skills – for example proficiency in programming or design expertise – T-shaped people also possess cognitive skills like emotional intelligence and creativity. Those with T-shaped characteristics often have the ability to form lasting relationships and connections, contribute and problem-solve. This makes them high-performers who can boost your organisation’s overall productivity.

With the right resources and attitude, anyone can become a T-shaped individual. If you can see that an employee already has an area of expert skill alone, perhaps consider looking into helping them broaden their knowledge across other avenues. If they have a wider breadth of knowledge in a number of skills, you could work with them to choose one and commit to making it an area they excel in.

What are T-Shaped Skills?

Of course, everyone is born with different skills and abilities. Some people are a one-trick pony, contributing their expertise alone, while others seem to take to a hoard of skills – the jack of all trades. A T-shaped employee falls neatly in the middle of these two opposites. Landing on either side of the spectrum, though, is not necessarily a bad thing and you can provide your employees with the support and resources to become more T-shaped. 

As we have already discussed, T-shaped employees are highly valuable to any company. Examples of skills evident in many T-shaped people include:

• A broad knowledge about a particular topic. 
• A broader context for your specialised skill set. 
• A basic knowledge of how humans and society work.
• Understanding of the industry you work in.
• Basic knowledge of how the business world works.
• Soft skills – sometimes referred to as ‘interpersonal’ or ‘people’ skills. These are subjective and harder to measure – for example:
  • Teamwork.
  • Communication is essential in any team. To find out more, check out our course here.  
  • Time management. To find out more you can take our Time Management Training course. 
  • Basic IT skills. 
  • Tolerance and open-mindedness.

Advantages of Hiring T-shaped Individuals

Employing T-shaped individuals is widely understood as being very beneficial not only on an individual level – perhaps as a manager – but also company wide. Core skills and the ability to learn quickly are just a few reasons why T-shaped employees excel in their main responsibilities, but they also perform other tasks throughout the business effectively. Thus, they contribute to the growth of the business.  

Specifically, they offer these advantages:

• Core skills. T-shaped employees excel in their main responsibilities within their job role. This also means they are great resources. The deep expertise that a T-shaped employee will display to push discussion forward and encourage movement is undoubtedly a huge benefit to the organisation as a whole.
• Better communication. Largely due to their interpersonal skills, they are able to empathise with people and understand their needs – across the company as a whole. 
• Better collaboration skills. This goes hand in hand with an ability to communicate well across the company, as they can discuss matters and work well over the entire organisation. 
• Flexibility. T-shaped employees are flexible enough to take on new tasks alongside their workload without compromising on the quality of work – achieving their immediate goals whilst helping out around the company. 
• They see the whole picture. Those who chiefly possess a very specific skill set (I-shaped employees) are of great value. However, they can often fall into a habit of tunnel vision – drilling down on their own subject area and neglecting other areas of importance. T-shaped employees, on the other hand, are able to apply their specialised knowledge and desire to learn to other areas of the business and projects they may be working on. 

How to Create T-Shaped Teams

T-shaped teams are highly beneficial to companies but they have previously been seen as difficult to create as historically, companies are built from a foundation of specialist individuals. This is no longer the case, especially as it becomes more widely accepted that transferable people and skills are actually synonymous with success. In fact, reports show that a UK worker will change employer every five years on average. 

T-shaped teams add value to the wider company by:

• Providing agile ways of working.
• Becoming more cross functional and balanced – in their formation and growth.
• Increasing team stability and security. 
• Promoting diversity, which is inevitable when you combine skills and expertise from different people and walks of life. 
• Giving employees the ability to rotate their jobs so they don’t get bored in just one rigid role. 
• Providing greater collaboration. More minds with more transferable skills and many areas of expertise breeds innovation. 

Each of these can help your team to become more collaborative and productive which, in turn, will benefit the wider business. But how to work towards building a T-shaped team? Unless by some luck you end up with a team of flawless ‘T-like’ individuals, it may take some time and effort. 

Firstly, you should try to understand what employee types you do have and their given skills. Utilise the positives that you currently have within your team, and build on weaker areas. 

Self-assessments can be key here; you could ask your employees to rate themselves in how confident they feel in certain topics. After employees undergo this, you must then determine:

• Where you want staff to improve their knowledge and/or ability.
• What level of skill should be maintained. 
• What you want to add to the team by increasing breadth of knowledge.
• Any areas you feel would benefit from specialist expertise. 

Encourage your employees to develop a mix of both soft and hard skills; these are invaluable and allow for greater transferable talents. You should regularly evaluate progress and ensure regular communications and 1-2-1’s with staff to maintain momentum, and be available to assist where you can. 

Encouraging growth in breadth and depth of knowledge will be hugely beneficial for your employees on an individual level in their own personal development, but it will also be of great value to the wider company. For more information on leadership and management, check out our course, here. 

Benefits of a T-Shaped Team

As mentioned above, a team which possesses a mix of skills is far more likely to be successful – lending itself to a more diverse and stable workforce. If your team holds a range of skills rather than one specific skill set, your organisation will be able to:

• Minimise dependencies between teams, resulting in fewer challenges with coordination and differing priorities.
• Reduce handoffs between knowledge silos, avoiding information loss.
• Broaden and deepen the individual team members’ skills over time through collaboration.
• Foster team ownership of the whole solution.

The future world of work is likely to become more T-shaped and transferable skills are widely recognised as holding the same status as technical skills. Utilise our top tips and become T-shaped to get the most out of your job, your team and your company.

For any more information, feel free to get in touch. High Speed Training offers a wide variety of courses and resources that can help.

Further Resources:

• What is the Importance of Digital Skills in the Workplace?
• Transferable Skills: What Are They and Why Are They Important?
• A Personal Development Plan (PDP) Guide & Template
• How to Upskill Yourself
• Why is Continuous Learning Important?
• Time Management Matrix – Free Template
• Business Skills Courses

The post What Does it Mean to be a T-Shaped Employee? appeared first on The Hub | High Speed Training.