Working Time Solutions’ directors Kevin White & Jim Whittam launch Personnel Today One Stop Guide to Managing Working Time, part of a series of One Stop Guides focusing on key employment topics.
Date: Monday 17 October 2005
Time for quality working hours – not quantity!
British workers are still working longer hours than almost every other country in Europe.
That’s the conclusion of a Personnel Today guide about to be published (October 2005) and authored by two of the UK’s leading Working Time experts, Jim Whittam and Kevin White.
In their detailed One-Stop Guide to Managing Working Time, being published by Personnel Today magazine, they warn that companies need to radically rethink the way they treat staff working hours.
Recent research shows that there are still nearly 1.4 million people working over 60 hours a week in Britain, and a ‘long hours’ culture remains in many workplaces.
But Jim Whittam, a director of Working Time Solutions, warns that long hours can send long and short-term absenteeism rates soaring.
Jim said: “Utilisation of overtime and long hours working as a means of achieving capacity and flexibility to meet demand is no longer a successful strategy.
“Employees are more and more interested in work life balance and there is frequently a high price to pay for long hours in other ways such as low productivity, fatigue, accidents and mistakes in the workplace.”
The guide includes 10 chapters and highlights challenges facing UK employers such as:
- The 48-hour working week.
- Competition from Eastern Europe and the Far East.
- Employees’ wishes for a greater work/life balance.
- Parents’ rights to request flexible working.
It also gives advice on creative ways to increase productivity and positive solutions such as:
- Annualisation and demand-led work pattern scheduling.
The guide to Managing Working Time is published by Personnel Today as part of its series of One Stop Guides focusing on key employment topics.
Kevin White, co-author, added: “Employers need to be looking at creative and effective ways of motivating the workforce and increasing performance
and productivity, rather than simply increasing the workload and working hours of their staff.”
Both authors of the guide are also directors of Working Time Solutions a Manchester-based consultancy and software house that is a leading authority
on labour planning and management.
They will be addressing key business leaders at seminars in Manchester on October 18, 2005 and Falkirk, Scotland on December 6th, 2005.
To order a copy of the One Stop Guide to Managing Working Time contact www.personneltoday.com or contact Working Time Solutions’ Press Office.
Working Time Solutions is also exhibiting at the CIPD (Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development) Conference and Exhibition in Harrogate, 26 to 28th October.
Notes:
Kevin White is a director of Manchester-based consultancy and software house Working Time Solutions, a leading authority on labour planning and management.
His fellow director Jim Whittam has been involved in the process of Working Time Regulations consultation with both the present and the previous government.
The company advises a wide range of large companies including Coca Cola Enterprises, Siemens Power Generation, Gillette and The Gleneagles Hotel.
For more information, please contact:
Telephone: 0161 929 3333
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