Monthly Archives: September 2020

Jobs, News

ScS creates hundreds of jobs nationwide as orders rocket by 92%

ScS has created hundreds of new jobs around the UK to cope with a huge increase in orders since the easing of lockdown.

The sofa and carpet specialist hired 150 new employees in August and currently has 150 live vacancies for roles in various areas of the business.

The recruitment drive is in response to a recent surge in sales, with the company reporting a 92% increase in order intake for the period from May to July 2020. This trend has continued in August and September, with sales up by 51% over the last six weeks.

ScS is looking to fill a range of both permanent and fixed-term positions, with vacancies in its retail stores, distribution and contact centres.

Jobs available include:

● Sales professionals

● Delivery drivers

● Meet and greet roles

● Contact centre advisors

● Online sales team members

In August, ScS withdrew from the government’s furlough scheme and successfully returned all of its staff to work, having topped up their wages to 100% throughout the period. Those who continued to work over lockdown have been rewarded with an extra seven days of holiday entitlement.

Further showcasing its growth, the interiors firm recently relocated its distribution team from Warrington to a new warehouse in Knowsley, near Liverpool, which is 40% larger than the previous location.

David Knight, CEO at ScS, said: “Due to a sharp rise in orders, we are in the fortunate position of being able to add to our existing workforce. In the six weeks leading up to September, our like-for-like order intake grew by 51%, equivalent to £19m of additional revenue.

“We’re delighted to be able to invest some of this into new staff members, as we continue to navigate our way through these unprecedented times.”

For more information about the roles available and to apply, visit: https://www.scsjobs.co.uk/

 

Business Research, News

It’s harder to progress at work in prestigious companies, but promotion comes with a greater reward – new research into football reveals why

Highly talented workers join prestigious firms, according to new research by the University of Cologne, Bielefeld, Braunschweig and the California State University, East Bay.
The study, conducted by Professor Oliver Gurtler, confirms that it is harder to advance in a competitive firm, but the promotion is higher valued by the labour market.

This leads the most talented workers to join prestigious firms in an attempt to receive promotion, while less talented workers join less competitive companies where their promotion is more likely but less rewarded by the labour market.

The researchers used data from players who were newly transferred to the German Bundesliga between 2010 and 2017. They examine how the decision of players to join a specific club affects their chances of promotion and the development of their market values.

“We used football data in our analysis because the availability of detailed information regarding players’ characteristics and their performance allowed us to test the implications of out model in a very clean and direct way,” says Professor Gurtler.

Being promoted and receiving playing time is shown to be harder on talented rosters. Those players who still get promoted despite facing strong intra-club competition see their market value to increase the most. The positive signal of job promotion is the biggest for the youngest workers, as their talent is relatively unknown.

“Workers face different challenges in different firms – in some, workers may find it relatively easy to progress since the level of competition is low and while at first this seems beneficial, other potential employees would not be overly impressed due to the lack of competition,” says Professor Gurtler.

Deutscher, C., Gürtler, M., Gürtler, O., & DeVaro, J. (2020). Firm choice and career success-theory and evidence. European Economic Review, 103470.

Jobs, Logistics, News

ARROWXL launches National Recruitment Drive

Leading two-person home delivery company ArrowXL is expanding its workforce due to an increase in demand in 2020. Around 100 jobs will be created in the two-phase recruitment operation, which will take place in various cities and towns across the UK.

ArrowXL has seen hundreds of applications submitted after announcing the new roles focussing on warehouse operations and delivery. The recruitment drive comes after a 10% increase on budgeted volumes, and will create jobs in warehouses based in Airdrie, Wigan, Enfield and Worcester as well as a national delivery network.

Peter Louden, ArrowXL COO, said: “An increase in demand shows that our customer experience and operations are succeeding. We want to meet the demand ambitiously and create much-needed jobs across the UK, and we’re excited to increase our capability. We received more than 200 applications in 24 hours for warehouse and delivery positions and interviews are currently underway.”

The new warehouse operators will be responsible for unloading goods, storage, picking, and loading vans to support the extensive two-person delivery operation that delivers over 2 million customer orders every year. Over fifty new delivery drivers will also be appointed with crews making 35-40 deliveries per day to any room of choice The roles will be based in Worcester, Norwich, Peterborough, Portsmouth, Wigan, Newton Aycliffe, Doncaster, Enfield and Airdrie.

Reports have shown that Lockdown led to a boom in e-commerce, with nearly 30% of retail trade being conducted online during this period, with seemingly no indication that this trend will be reversed. ArrowXL have also won significant corporate contracts throughout the lockdown period, including Argos, WaterRower and fireplace specialist Fired Up.

Lockdown has also seen an increase in clients and customers utilising the recently launched award-winning askAXL tracking app, allowing customers to track orders in real time as a 2-hour slot dynamically reduces to just 30 minutes.

For more information on ArrowXL please visit http://www.arrowxl.co.uk

Construction, News

Demand for digital building product marketplace rises by 125%

Specification-led marketing and product data specialist, SpecifiedBy, has reported substantial quarterly growth in its online marketplace as COVID-19 accelerates the need for building product manufacturers to embrace digital transformation.

The Newcastle-headquartered company, whose clients include Dyson, VELUX, Tarmac and SIG, has seen a 125% increase in manufacturers signing up to its platform between April and June 2020, compared to the same period last year. During this time, traffic to the platform has also increased by 60% as architects and specifiers are among the professions that have moved more of their work online during the pandemic.

SpecifiedBy was launched in 2014 as an early digital platform for architect and design professionals looking to find and research products for any building, construction or refurb project. While it has enjoyed steady growth as the first-mover in industry-wide digital transformation over the last few years, the pandemic has acted to accelerate the move online not just for architects and specifiers but also for product manufacturers.

Rockwool, Franklite, Kingspan and ARDEX are just some of the manufacturers that have joined SpecifiedBy in recent months. ARDEX signed up to the service during the height of the pandemic when architects and specifiers were required to work from home. Mark Goater, product marketing manager, comments: “COVID-19 has been a testing time for manufacturers. The traditional ways of marketing and selling products, for example, became near impossible. We quickly recognised we needed to be more agile in the current climate which meant further digitising our sales approach. SpecifiedBy offered the perfect platform to ensure that our online presence would put us right in front of our customer base in a way that works for both the specifier and manufacturer. Over time we anticipate that we’ll be listing our full product portfolio on the platform as well as promoting our CPD programme, reaching more architects and specifiers than ever before.”

SpecifiedBy now has the largest registered network of architects, specifiers and product manufacturers in the UK. Its growing digital platform hosts nearly 100,000 building products and has been designed to connect its 2,500 manufacturers with over 70,000 architects and specifiers looking for products each month.

Darren Lester, founder and CEO at SpecifiedBy, says: “I started out as a specifier looking for building products and felt that the industry really lacked a central, digital source that could connect architects and specifiers with the product manufacturers. It was slow to change and lacked the digital leaders that we were seeing elsewhere, so SpecifiedBy decided to take that lead early on. While we’ve seen steady growth on the platform to become the largest registered network in the UK, this has been dramatically accelerated due to the impact of the pandemic.”

He continued: “COVID-19 has turned the building product industry on its head for good, accelerating the need for manufacturers to rethink the way they sell to architects and specifiers. This appetite for technology to transform the buying and selling process has had a significant impact on our business, providing a tipping point to our growth.

“I’ve no doubt that COVID-19 will change our industry for the better in the long-term. We will see manufacturers take a digital-first approach because, quite frankly, they can’t afford not to.”

The sales manager of FunderMax, which has been a customer of SpecifiedBy since July, agrees. James Dawson says: “We’re seeing the influence of the Google generation, where architects and specifiers expect to be able to easily find products and instantly access all the information they need, including clear technical details. SpecifiedBy provides the platform for our products to readily plug into specification projects, in a way that works for specifiers.”

Brexit, News

African and Eastern European Translations Increase as UK Businesses Expand Outside EU

New data suggests a surge in UK business growth in territories such as Africa and Eastern Europe, with business materials being translated into languages such as Zulu, Afrikaans, Serbian and Macedonian at least 2,000 per cent more than three years ago.

In comparison, translations to French (+17%), Italian (+1.9%) and German (+1.8%) have experienced minimal growth, while other languages – such as European Spanish (-5%) – have seen decreases in translation in the same period.

Data from translation and language specialist The Translation People reveals that translations into Macedonian (+3,500%), Afrikaans (+2,400%), Zulu (+2,300%) and Serbian (+2,000%), have the highest reported increases in the last three years.

Figures from The Translation People, which has over 40 years’ experience of delivering high quality translation services in 300 different language combinations, that the 10 fastest growing business languages between 2016 and 2019 were:
1. Macedonian – +3,500%
2. Afrikaans – +2,400%
3. Zulu – +2,300%
4. Serbian – +2,000%
5. Burmese – +1,800%
6. Turkish – +1,200%
7. Catalan – +870%
8. Indonesian – +428%
9. Kazakh – +352%
10. Tagalog – +329%
In comparison, the fastest decreases in translation have occurred in the following languages:
1. Punjabi – -75.5%
2. Galician – -75.2%
3. Gaelic – -67.5%
4. Urdu – -48.7%
5. Swahili – -47.2%
6. Latin American Spanish – -41.6%
7. Brazilian Portuguese – -27.3%
8. Welsh – -20.3%
9. Malay – -15%
10. Swedish – -14.4%

Commenting on the insights from The Translation People, Andy Cristin, finance director at Pareto Financial Directive Ltd who specialises in helping UK business expand overseas, said:

“It’s interesting to note these emerging trends in language translation, particularly that there is an increase in translation of UK business material into African languages.

“African and South-Eastern European countries are logical bases for physical supply chain partnerships. They have cheaper labour costs compared to the EU and for the South-Eastern European countries, shorter transport routes than India or China. shorter transport routes than India or China. The workforces are educated, skilled and multi-lingual and the time differences allow for better communications than with the Far East, putting them on a more level playing field with UK employees.

“Overseas expansion to these areas is particularly suited to medium-sized businesses from more traditional industries – manufacturing, automotive and professional services, for example – rather than those with specialist or highly technical operations. For these types of businesses, the sourcing of relevant expertise can work out much more expensive and instead become a drain on a business, rather than an opportunity.

“We expect to see more UK businesses expanding to these areas, too, as the years go by. Brexit is driving businesses to insure themselves with a second source of supply outside of EU territory; those who do so successfully won’t see any need to migrate back to Europe even when trade deals are established, and it will encourage more businesses to consider alternative options to those offered by our closest neighbours.”

Alan White, business development manager at The Translation People, said:

“Language trends such as those identified in our data are indicative of the ways in which UK businesses are changing. Brexit has caused a major shake-up for those that had originally planned to expand into Europe; the uncertain nature of what the future holds in countries such as France, Germany and Spain has seen fewer companies seek a new footprint here and instead they are looking further afield.

“When targeting a new territory, it’s essential to be properly equipped from a linguistic and cultural perspective. Whether a business plans to have a workforce overseas, or to sell to customers there, individuals will more readily buy from and work with brands which are fully localised and are supported by translated websites, videos and user instructions.

“Because we can translate B2B materials into over 300 languages, we are well positioned to help businesses launch their brands or operations into any country of the world, and have supported businesses in sectors as diverse as logistics, car rental services, manufacturing and online learning to do just that. Even in countries where employees and workers are more confident in English, for efficiency, accuracy and inclusivity, it’s always beneficial to have materials translated into the native languages the teams speak.
“This data shows that British companies are feeling more empowered to consider territories they may never have done before, which will continue to put the UK at the centre of global business.”

More information can be found here: https://www.thetranslationpeople.com/2020/09/translations-to-african-and-eastern-european-languages-vital-for-uk-business-growth/

Law, Legal News, News

Considering divorce during the pandemic? Here’s what you need to know

Couples looking to divorce during the pandemic can look to family law experts for answers and advice during this already difficult time.

There are plenty of aspects to consider during a separation; from financial assets, to the marital home, future shared contact arrangements of children and even pets.

Making circumstances even more difficult, the COVID-19 pandemic has posed plenty of personal, economic and financial challenges, putting a strain on relationships and livelihoods, which can magnify the already painful process of separation.

Head of family law at JMP Solicitors, Neil Remnant, said: “Separation and divorce are never easy and in most cases there will inevitably be disagreements during the process however long that may be. At present, divorce applications are taking longer than usual to process.

“The COVID-19 pandemic has certainly created a multitude of new and unprecedented challenges which could further exacerbate already uncomfortable circumstances. As family law experts, we have outlined how the pandemic will impact divorce proceedings, offering advice and support on how to navigate the separation process.”

Here is the list of factors to consider when divorcing during the pandemic:

Redundancy

In this uncertain economic climate, job security is certainly compromised and with the Government Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme coming to an end at the end of October, redundancy is a possibility for many. In terms of divorce, redundancy payment usually isn’t classed as a marital asset, as it was not in existence during the course of the marriage. However, in some circumstances a redundancy payment could be taken into account as a financial asset, particularly if it’s the only money available to support the family.

Furlough Leave scheme

During the COVID-19 pandemic, more than 25% of the UK workforce were placed on Furlough Leave. Many who have been placed on furlough leave, have had to take advantage of mortgage payment holidays and credit card payment holidays, so will have expenses like this affecting their finance. A drop in income could affect the way that assets are divided during a divorce if the individual has been placed on Furlough Leave.

Entitlement and finance

It will be down to the courts to decide who is entitled to what, and how a couple’s finances will be distributed. With many finding themselves struggling financially due to the current recession, this could affect the amount separated individuals are entitled to from their spouse.

If a separated party is ordered to pay maintenance liabilities to their spouse or the children, the drop in income could affect the amount of maintenance received. As well as this, the value of your family home also may have increased or decreased during the pandemic, so it’s important to know the most up to date value when negotiating the division of assets.

Child living and contact arrangements

Child living and contact arrangements are largely not affected by the pandemic from a legal point of view. Unless either party begins to develop symptoms or has a reason to self-isolate, child contact arrangements should be honoured. When a child does move between homes, current COVID-19 safety guidelines should be adhered to.

Any change in family circumstances should be handled as sensitively and compassionately by all parties, to minimise emotional damage for the separating couple and any children involved.

News

Biggest names in business and society back The Good Business Festival

Act 1 of The Good Business Festival takes place on 8th October, bringing together some of the biggest names in business and society to debate the big issues facing a post-pandemic world and promoting purposeful, ethical and sometimes radical approaches to doing business.

Commissioned by Liverpool City Region Mayor Steve Rotheram, and curated by Culture Liverpool and HemingwayDesign, The Good Business Festival aims to unite the growing global community of businesses and conscious consumers who believe business can deliver meaningful positive change in society.

The two-act structure for the festival was conceived as a response to Covid-19. Act 1 in October 2020 aims to ensure that the momentum gained over a year of transformative change in business isn’t lost – sessions will explore our learnings from this shared experience and consider the new directions the world will take as we emerge from the turbulence of 2020.

Act 1 will be a hybrid live and digital event, filmed from ACC Liverpool plus locations in Toronto and Melbourne and broadcast online. Audiences will have three channels of content to choose from over the day:
• Centre Stage – headline programming through the day from 10am to 9pm
• Good Thinking – sessions from experts offering inspiration and practical advice for SMEs, startups and individuals
• Open Source – a virtual workspace and resource library where content will be released throughout the day to support the live sessions with interviews, films, infographics, podcasts, supporting documents and exclusive reports

Joining Mayor Rotheram for Act 1 with be a host of senior business leaders from some of the world’s leading companies, cultural talent and big thinkers including Nishma Robb, Google; Ann Cairns, Mastercard; Douglas Lamont, Innocent; Danny Sriskandarajah, Oxfam; Frances O’Grady, TUC; John Sauven, Greenpeace; Sir Tim Smit, Eden Project; Ben Page, Ipsos MORI, Deb Oxley, Employee Ownership Association; and a string of young activists including Camden Youth MP, Athian Akec

Focused on Covid-19 response and recovery, The Good Business Festival Act 1 will unite giants in the fields of finance, tech, sport, and retail. These sessions are driven to make real change, with a focus on commitments and tangible plans of action, rather than empty debate. Core festival sessions will include:

• WTF Just Happened – a whistle-stop tour of key figures in business and society who’ll share their two cents on what just happened to all of us, the effect this year has had on their own businesses and a positive look at what happens next.
• 1.5% of UK business leaders are Black – bringing together black business leaders and change specialists to help identify how all of the good words of the last few months can translate into meaningful change for business.
• Take Me to Your Leader – Australasia and North America – with New Zealand and Canada being hailed as the poster children for how to swiftly and effectively deal with crises, we ask – do we have to choose between governance led by compassion or economics? Does supporting social impact mean risking economic growth or can compassionate leadership boost not only GDP but health, happiness and national image?
• What About The Workers? How to be a Good Employer – focusing on how businesses can remain good in a time of rapid change
• Raising the Game – focusing on the role of professional sport and sports business in society and what ‘good’ sport could look like

One year on from lockdown, Act 2 of The Good Business Festival will take place in March 2021. Bringing some of the smartest and most creative minds from around the world to the Liverpool City Region, it will challenge businesses and consumers to think bigger, galvanise ambition and continue to drive positive change as we start out on the road to collective recovery.

The Good Business Festival has mobilised a network of partners and ambassadors that are set to take an active role throughout the festival, with a call to action for business to take the lead role in tackling global societal issues. The ambassadors are both industry leaders and experts representing a diverse range of sectors, including Ann Cairns, Executive Vice Chair of Mastercard, Professor Denise Barrett-Baxendale, Chief Executive of Everton Football Club and Cephas Williams, Founder of 56 Black Men.

Partners confirmed for the festival include: ARUP, B Lab UK, British Council, British Fashion Council, LUSH, Centre for Cities, Coca-Cola, DCMS, Deloitte, Eden Project, Ellen MacArthur Foundation, Greenpeace, IBM, Iceland, International Fashion Academy Paris, Innocent, Ipsos MORI, Joseph Rountree Foundation, Mastercard, Met Office, Nesta, Patagonia, Royal College of Physicians.

Steve Rotheram, Metro Mayor of the Liverpool City Region, comments: “The past few months have shown that we need to press the reset button on our economy. The Good Business Festival is the perfect platform to explore how we build back better and ensure our economy works for everyone.

“I’m determined to build the UK’s fairest, greenest and most inclusive local economy, which is why I commissioned the Good Business Festival and it is so exciting to have it here in the Liverpool City Region.

“Bringing together major international business and thought leaders the festival will be a unique platform to stimulate debate and formulate ideas that can help make the UK a worldwide leader in successful, ethical business.”

Claire McColgan, Executive Director of The Good Business Festival, comments: “We’re proud to have Liverpool City Region as the backdrop for an international festival with such boundless ambition, creativity, and commitment to real change.

The feedback so far has been incredible, and Act 1 will be the beginning of a movement that we hope will energise a new generation of people in business, as we redefine what the world of business, and society at large, looks like in the world of tomorrow.”

Evan Davis, economist and BBC presenter, comments: “Business events need a fresh approach and would benefit from less pontificating and more purpose and outcomes. The Good Business Festival looks like it promises to shake things up and I will be there to hopefully help the festival achieve this”

Creative News, Diversity in Tech, News

The Industry Club launches apprentice scheme aimed at underrepresented groups to combat lack of diversity in creative sector

Leading provider of talent and training for creative industries, The Industry Club (TIC) has announced today the launch of its Marketing Debuts apprentice scheme targeted at 18 – 25 year olds within minority and low social mobility groups who might not consider marketing as a career and those looking to build one. adam&eveDDB are one of the first agencies to sign up to offer an apprenticeship starting from January 2021.

The scheme equips candidates with the skills needed to operate to post-pandemic ways of working. With over 12 years in talent solutions, TIC has developed Marketing Debuts with government-approved apprentice ‘standard’ into a highly relevant commercial programme created for disruptive times.

The Level 4 Marketing Debuts scheme will run in partnership with government-regulated apprentice provider The Opportunity Group.
Starting from January 2021, the 13-month programme consists of two unique and highly relevant commercial apprenticeships ‘Creative Project Management’ and ‘Social Media and Community Management’. Apprentice candidates can apply to Marketing Debuts through TIC website [link] by 19th October 2020.

Creative Project Management specialises in training managing creative projects in agencies or marketing departments. Learners could be placed in Project Management, Account Management, New Business or Production teams. The programme covers topics such as project scoping and risk mitigation, producing effective project documentation and evaluation, resource management and procurement and negotiation.
Social Media and Community Management specialises in successfully managing a brand’s social media channels and its communities. Candidates will acquire skills relevant for Social Media, Data and Community Management, PR and Crisis Management teams. The programme covers topics such as social media strategy, growing online communities, conflict management, social listening, neuro linguistic programming, data analysis and cybersecurity.

Training is provided through The Industry Club’s training arm, The Industry School. Trainers are industry experts who use real marketing case studies and practical methods to produce demonstrable ‘on the job’ skills.

Jemima Monies, Deputy MD, adam&eveDDB said: “We are thrilled to be participating in the inaugural Marketing Debuts programme. We strongly believe that supporting and developing the next generation of talent, who may have not previously considered advertising as a career or come from traditionally underrepresented backgrounds, is vital to our future success, and we cannot wait to welcome some new faces into the agency soon.”

Melissa Smith Founder and Managing Director of The Industry Club said: “We’ve worked in the industry for many years, being our clients trusted talent partner, and we recognise we have a responsibility to ensure that every gender, age, race, religion and sexual orientation are all given opportunities to work in the creative sector. Businesses have radically changed how people work and post-pandemic skills and ways of working will be crucial to building business resilience. We’ve trained thousands of school leavers and this scheme brings together our expertise in recruitment and training bringing underrepresented groups to our industry and into key roles.”

News

TALL Security Print secures Leading Financial Services Supplier Qualification

TALL Security Print, part of The TALL Group of Companies, the UK leader in the provision of secure printed and electronic payment solutions, has successfully achieved the rigorous Hellios Financial Services Supplier Qualification (FSQS). The Runcorn-based security print specialist achieved the certification which is required by major Banks and Financial Services Organisations when selecting suppliers.

FSQS is designed to improve the standard of suppliers through a common set of policy and risk areas including IT Security, Operational Risks, GDPR and Responsible Business Governance which are reviewed annually and updated to stay ahead of regulatory changes.

As the regulated environment becomes more complex, the rigorous qualification system provides a standardised way to manage requests for compliance and assurance information.
FSQS is currently used by 32 major Banks, Building and Insurance companies including Lloyds Banking Group, Metro Bank, Santander, TSB, Clydesdale Bank and The Bank of England.

Martin Ruda, Managing Director of the TALL Group of Companies, said: “We are extremely proud to have successfully achieved this certification, which reinforces our commitment and demonstrates our ability to consistently provide products and services that meet the compliance and regulatory requirements of our clients.”

“This certification also recognises the hard work our dedicated staff at Runcorn has made during the recent COVID-19 pandemic, operating throughout as a ‘key’ supplier to the financial sector, ensuring a continuous supply to our clients and their customers.”

HR News, HR Software, News

HR software provider Personio takes the paper out of paperwork with new integrated e-signature capability

Personio, the all-in-one HR software solution for SMEs, is helping to streamline HR processes with the launch today of its new integrated e-signature capability, allowing businesses to save more time and resources whilst minimising their environmental impact.
While many HR softwares currently require documents to be printed out, signed manually and scanned to access and share them digitally, Personio’s new feature allows businesses to fully digitise key administrative processes, such as those used in recruitment or Human Resource Management (HRM) – providing a vital service at a time when many are managing a remote workforce.

Using Personio, recruiters – and their candidates – can create, send and receive offer documents and contracts. Meanwhile, HR managers, supervisors, employees and other stakeholders can take the paper out of ‘paperwork’, making their processes more productive and sustainable.

Personio’s new e-signature technology has been created in partnership with SignaturIT, European specialists in e-signatures..