Manager/employee relationships require four components to work in sync in order to thrive and boost business outcomes, says business psychologist Sebastian Salicru.
According to a recent Australia Institute study, millions of workers "donate" unpaid overtime to their employers on a regular basis - but employees who work longer don't necessarily work harder, warns RMIT professor of employment relations Dr Sandra Jones.
Spreading compensation evenly lets managers avoid difficult conversations with average and low performers, but can cause top contributors to lose motivation and leave, say remuneration experts at Taleo Research.
Very few organisations are effectively interviewing employees after their first three months in a job to determine whether they are likely to stay, according to organisational psychologist Lenore Lambert.
2010 was an interesting year for HR professionals - the economy was in recovery-mode, but this brought with it the challenge of how to quickly boost depleted teams and motivate disengaged staff to better performance. The remaining provisions of the Fair Work Act came into effect, adding a whole layer of uncertainty to HR's responsibilities, along with new legal risks.
Good communication to employees about pay and rewards can provide the same - and more - benefits to employers as actually increasing pay levels, new research shows.
One of the reasons why many large-scale engagement initiatives are "hit and miss" is that what is motivating for one worker might be "de-motivating" for another, says leadership consultant Silvia Damiano.
HR professionals can learn a lot from neuroscience about how to design and implement successful workplace programs, says PageUp People's Sylvia Vorhauser-Smith.
Creating a new business culture following a merger and acquisition requires "pace over perfection" and a willingness to make some mistakes, says Bupa Australia's director of HR, Penny Lovett.
