Lifestyle
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Are you serving or selling?
Shivani Gupta | September 12, 2013High quality customer service can make or break your business. Shivani Gupta shares her tips for improved customer satisfaction.
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Managing an ageing workforce
Peter Fritz | May 9, 2013
Ahead of the Global Access Partners conference on Productive Ageing Peter Fritz asks some important questions in regard to working after the age of 65 and how best to prepare for participation of older workers.
When we talk about productive aging, the usual picture that emerges in one’s mind is someone 65, and, if a woman, 60 and over, the fixed ages of retirement. -
Is early retirement history?
Philip Taylor | April 30, 2013
As a new consensus around the notion of ‘active ageing’ is emerging internationally, Professor Philip Taylor from Monash University argues that Australia needs to widen the concept of ‘productive ageing’ for a complete strategy for our ageing society.
A vast range of policymaking on age and work among most of the industrialised nations for more than a decade has been concerned with reversing the previous two decades’ trend towards the early withdrawal of older people from the labour market. -
Telework – it’s time to let Dracula run the bloodbank
Tim Fawcett | February 19, 2013As our lives move online and become increasingly mobile, Tim Fawcett explains the benefits of telework and moving away from the traditional bricks-and-mortar approach.
The greatest success of Australian National Telework Week 2012 (12-16 November) was to put the idea of working from anywhere in the uppermost minds of employees who are increasingly looking to use their mobile devices in more and more aspects of their lives.
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Why women should love themselves
Shivani Gupta | February 14, 2013
Do you love yourself enough to ask for that pay rise? Shivani Gupta shares why it’s important to put yourself first in business.
In the 10 years I have been delivering workshops for women it is clear that the key thing most women are looking for in their busy life is balance. -
Telework: breaking down geographic barriers and strengthening real-world communities
Roger Dawkins | November 27, 2012
Following the success of the first annual national Telework Week, Roger Dawkins highlights how flexible working hours benefit not only the worker but their employer too.
Alan Woodward, executive director of the Lifeline Foundation, is a flexible worker. Flexible work, or telework, affords him the usual advantages: he doesn’t have to live in close proximity to work (so he lives on coastal NSW); flexible work’s more convenient because he travels a lot; and, if he chooses, Alan can adjust his working hours to fit in daytime family activities. But in addition to those benefits of working in a flexible environment, flexible work hugely benefits the real-world community where Alan lives. -
Working from home can increase productivity
Nancy Parker | September 11, 2012There are many advantages to allowing staff the freedom to work from home. Nancy Parker shares why you should let your staff set their own working conditions.
Lately there’s been a shift in what employees view as the typical office setting, with more and more agreeing that the standard office environment actually makes them less productive than they would be if they were allowed to work from home.
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Booking affordable boutique hotels
Helen Hull | March 17, 2011Finding the right travel accommodation to suit your company and its budget can be a challenge for any business.
There are endless opportunities in the marketplace from high end large five star hotels, those catering for the business traveller and budget hotels.
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All I want for Christmas…
Natalie Susman | December 22, 2010Give your clients a really great Christmas gift that will help them remember you all year round – and you could be giving someone a job too!
It’s that time of year again. When the streets become decorated in a sea of tinsel and holly and you can’t walk past a retail outlet without hearing a rendition of Jingle Bells.
It’s also that time of year when businesses like to show their appreciation of their clients and staff. Conscientious staffers frantically search the internet for that perfect gift… the one that doesn’t take a lot to coordinate, that falls within budget and might just even bring a smile to the faces of those that receive it.
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Last minute goodwill gift guide
Virginia Harrison | December 14, 2010
Despite jitters from retailers that Christmas spending will be down this year, Australians are expected to fork out nearly $40 billion dollars this festive season.
The estimate from the Australian Retailers Association also found that in the 6 week lead-up to Christmas, we’ll spend $3.4 billion in department stores and nearly $3 billion on apparel alone.
Pro-Bono Australia is helping you direct some of your festive spending to a good cause. Use its Ethical Giving Guide to find goodwill gift options and ways to support not-for-profit groups this Christmas.
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It pays to be flexible
Virginia Harrison | December 1, 2010Want to drain an extra 2 days’ work out of your staff each week? Let them set their own start times and embrace workplace flexibility.
Flexibility helps attract and retain staff, as well as boost discretionary effort by encouraging employees to go the extra mile.
“Managers in SMEs know the cost of losing an employee and the cost of recruiting again, and building someone up. If flexibility can help you retain a person for longer than you otherwise would have, then you have to put it onto the table,” Aequus Partner Juliet Bourke says.
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Style tips from a corporate image guru
Virginia Harrison | November 25, 2010For Robin Powis, the clothes really do maketh the man.
A corporate image stylist, Powis helps individuals seeking to take the next career step or simply polish their “personal brand.”
“I help people create a natural confident style. Everyone, no matter what industry they’re in has to think about what image they create,” Robin Powis, founder of Defining Style says.
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Banish workplace bullies
Virginia Harrison | November 23, 2010It’s a multi-billion dollar problem that affects more than half of Australia’s workforce. Find out how barrister Peter Gorman is acting to stamp out workplace bullying, and how you can make sure it doesn’t set foot in your organisation.
Gorman has worked with the law for more than 5 decades – first as a uniform policeman, and then detective before moving to the bar.
In that time he’s seen plenty of bad behaviour.
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Bookless library the next big thing
Virginia Harrison | November 23, 2010
I’m not ready for the death of the book.
Like many, I can’t imagine a world where Kindles line the bookshelf, or the latest title is downloaded rather than carried home from the bookshop.
Apparently I suffer from a sentimental objection to progress. Read this take on the two types of digital dissenters, sparked by the construction of a library-less American school.
