Guest blog: Work Wise Week can inspire new business owners - By Steve Byrne, Chief Executive of Travel Counsellors.→

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Guest blog: Work Wise Week can inspire new business owners - By Steve Byrne, Chief Executive of Travel Counsellors.

Work Wise Week does an incredibly valuable job. With flexible working on the rise, businesses and individuals alike need to be aware of the enormous potential that adopting modern working practices can offer. In particular, it sheds light on a growing trend which has already had an impact not just on our business, but across the travel sector as a whole.

A recent report stated that the number of people working from home in the UK hit a record 1.5 million last year, up by 20 per cent since 2006. I suspect that is under stated given the number of people who also work from home on an ad hoc basis, but simply goes to show the scale of the labour market currently either running their own business, or flexing the traditional definition of employment.

We have seen that this model of home working applies itself particularly well to the travel sector. Even working from a bricks and mortar environment, many agents try to make themselves available for customers beyond the traditional hours of a retail shop or even that of a call centre. For us, working from home has been the foundation for many of our franchisees’ customer relationships and enables them to provide a better level of customer service and care.

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Guest blog: I was fed up with having to pay extra to travel to work, just because I work part time - By Jo Rossi, Founder of the Get Us to Work Campaign.

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Guest blog: I was fed up with having to pay extra to travel to work, just because I work part time - By Jo Rossi, Founder of the Get Us to Work Campaign.

 I moved back to Kent after 20 years in London, to get a decent step on the housing ladder. Considering my options as I returned to work post baby, I was struck by the lack of flexible season tickets. Commuting from Ashford, and forced on to the high speed train due to unfavourable timetabling, I was faced with two choices. I could buy peak time returns, which cost around 50 per cent extra for each journey, or I could shell out over £6000 for an annual season ticket which I would only use three times a week.

I was lucky enough that my employer and I came to an agreement where I mainly work from home to get around the ridiculous costs of commuting part-time. I very much appreciated no longer having to pay such high travel costs, but I missed seeing my colleagues and being a part of office life.

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Guest blog: How I beat procrastination in one day - By Andrew Boswell, who is a Programme Director with more than 40 years experience in IT and Telecoms.→

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Guest blog: How I beat procrastination in one day - By Andrew Boswell, who is a Programme Director with more than 40 years experience in IT and Telecoms.

Today I’m going to show you how I finally beat procrastination. I stopped putting off those important tasks, the ones I delayed even when I knew bad things would happen if I didn’t do them. Before, I shied away from the most important tasks. To be honest, I was a bit of a ditherer.

How did I do it? The Staircase Technique. And in this case study I’m going to show exactly how I did it, step by step.

“You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step.” – Martin Luther King Jr.

How the Staircase Technique Kick-Started My Career

I was a programme manager in an international company. One of their key software developments was in deep trouble. All the releases were hopelessly late, and reliability was appalling. Things came to a head, and I was asked to take over.

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Guest blog: How can a reduction in travelling impact pollution levels in the UK? - By Stella Amoateng Asante - GreenMatch→

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Guest blog: How can a reduction in travelling impact pollution levels in the UK? - By Stella Amoateng Asante - GreenMatch

According to the Autumn Budget 2016, the chancellor of the Exchequer in the United Kingdom announced plans to invest £390 million into road and transport infrastructure by 2020-21. The funds are expected to ease road congestion's and reduce vehicle emissions under what the government term as ‘strategic road network’. This will also support the increase of ultra low emission vehicles (ULEVs), renewable fuels, connected and autonomous infrastructure.

Among other benefits, it is hoped that this will foster new ways of travel and commuting that will in turn address the ongoing air pollution problem that the UK is battling. The investment comprises the following: £80 million towards ULEVs charging infrastructure; £150 million to supporting low emission buses and taxis; £20 million for innovation of alternative aviation and heavy goods vehicle fuels; and, £100 million for a new UK CAV testing infrastructure.

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Chairman's blog: Work Wise UK Sets the Standard: A new collaboration with the University of the West of England, Bristol Business School - By David Lennan, Chairman, Work Wise Uk

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Chairman's blog: Work Wise UK Sets the Standard: A new collaboration with the University of the West of England, Bristol Business School - By David Lennan, Chairman, Work Wise Uk

Last year on 23rd June the UK made a big decision to leave the EU and we are now in full flow towards Brexit. The impact for most of us will probably  be felt in the Workplace, whetherthis is because of changes to the Law or because our Terms of Trade are affected.

This is our Twelfth year of promoting workplace efficiency by Smarter Working throughout the UK and helping Organisations to introduce modern working practices. Yet we still find that many Orgnaisations, small and large in the Public, Private and Not for Profit Sectors are still not embracing all that technology and modern people practices can offer. This has led us down the path of declining productivity. Declining productivity and reversing the trend will become an increasingly big issue for the UK as Brexit impacts and the Labour market becomes even more competitive.

We need our Industries to be fully prepared and able to attract the very best people and employ the very best working practices and processes.  Productivity is the key to success and to creating successful and growing businesses. Improving workplace productivity can produce enormous gains for any organisation and radically improve the bottom line.

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