Tag Archives: businesses

Business, FInance, Finance News, Wellbeing

Quantum launch SME tailored employee benefit solution

Quantum Advisory, the leading independent financial services consultancy, today announced the launch of a new solution designed with small to medium (SMEs) employers in mind.

The service, which has only been available to a handful of existing clients to now, will advise SMEs on group risk, healthcare and wellbeing solutions tailored to them, and to best meet the evolving needs of their employees.

Commenting, principal consultant Graham Yearsley, who leads the employee benefits team at the firm, said: “Although gradually improving, the experience of small to medium employers in the market is generally still poor – they are often overlooked, cannot access the same resources and opportunities as larger organisations, and the quality of advice and consultancy they receive can be lacking. With SMEs by far the majority of the market, the disparity in service levels is unacceptable.

“According to government statistics, in the private sector 5.51 million businesses in the UK have less than 49 employees – this accounts for 99.2% of the total business population. Around 37,000 are medium sized and have 50-249 employees and only around 8,000 are large at 250 employees or more. And it’s growing, in 2023 there was a 0.8% increase of SMEs from 2022.

“Employee benefits programmes are critical attraction and retention tools – meeting employee expectations, ensuring the wellbeing and ongoing loyalty of staff, as well as optimising engagement. Getting it right is important whatever your size, but for SMEs it’s crucial.

“Recruitment is extremely competitive at the best of times and offering ever increasing salaries simply isn’t an affordable option, and neither does it address the overall wellbeing of staff. Frequent staff turnover can also be a real issue for a small employer, and difficult to manage. An expertly executed benefits package can have a big impact on an employment decision and, by proxy, the quality and loyalty of a team.

“It has to include honest investments in employees’ financial security, total health and career growth. As well, of course, as being accessible and affordable for an employer.”

Yearsley continued: “Our independent status means we can act nimbly and innovatively, creating truly bespoke solutions that are fit for purpose. We are able to access new and interesting things and act upon them quickly without the shackles of external shareholders – resulting in direct benefits to our clients and to their employees.”

 

FInance, News

Redgate survey identifies key database monitoring challenges businesses should focus on in fast-growing Financial Services sector

A sector analysis of the results from a major database monitoring survey has revealed how and why the growth, complexity, and management of database estates in Financial Services is different to other industry sectors. The results clarify the areas businesses in the sector should consider when including their database estates in digital transformation initiatives.

The global monitoring survey of 2,500 IT professionals and C-level executives was undertaken by Redgate in 2021 to discover the scenarios and challenges organizations face when monitoring their database estates. The large number of responses also provided the opportunity to dig a little deeper and compare the similarities and differences across industry sectors.

Financial Services in particular emerged as an outlier in the newly published sector insights report in four major areas:

  • The size and complexity of database estates is different to other sectors, with a nuanced difference between smaller firms and those with very large database estates.
  • There is a far wider use of monitoring tools and the data gained from those tools is shared with more teams across the business.
  • There is a need to manage people and compliance much more closely, probably prompted by the move to remote working.
  • The sector is ahead of the curve in the requirement to monitor cloud and hybrid database environments.

The insights are even more pertinent, given the recent big increase in investment in the sector. KPMG’s January 2022 Pulse of Fintech report revealed global investment in the fintech market topping $210 billion in 2021, a 173 percent increase on investment activity over 2020. Notable, one of its four trends to watch out for in 2022 is an increasing focus on the modernization of core banking platforms to reduce the reliance legacy infrastructures and facilitate better customer experiences.

While the investment is there, and there is a willingness and an urge to upgrade IT systems and process, issues remain. As Deloitte’s 2022 Banking and Capital Markets Outlook report observes: “Even though digital transformation is going ahead at full speed, these efforts tend to be incremental, localized, and fragmented, resulting in a pervasive and pernicious ‘technology trap.’ This is preventing many banks from realizing the full potential of their investments.”

Hence the value of the Redgate insights report in giving businesses in the sector a deeper understanding of the issues and the challenges they face when monitoring their database estates. By providing a benchmark of results businesses can use to compare their own efforts against those of their peers, future investment in their database estates can be directed more wisely.

Businesses in the sector can gain a full picture by downloading The State of Database Monitoring in Financial Services insights report online.

Broadband, News

Homes and businesses turning to independent providers for broadband connectivity, new report reveals

More than 5.5 million homes and businesses in the UK can now connect to an independent fibre broadband network, according to new figures published today. For the first time, the total number of live connections provided by the ‘alt nets’ is above 1m.

Compiled for the Independent Networks Co-operative Association (INCA) by Point Topic using data provided by independent network operators across the country, this year’s ‘Metrics for the UK independent network sector’ report shows that the sector has again doubled in size over the previous year.

The independent sector continues to pull in significant sums of private funding with investment and expenditure commitments predicted to reach £17.7bn by the end of 2025. When combined with the £12bn announced by BT Group, the £5bn announced by government, and £2bn planned by VM02, investment levels will exceed the previous estimates of £30bn for bringing next generation networks to every property in the UK.

INCA’s Chief Executive, Malcolm Corbett said: “This continued high level of investment, coupled with commitments from others in the private sector like BT and Virgin Media, and the money being put in by government, shows that the UK is on track, for the first time in its history, to have proper broadband infrastructure competition. Independent network operators are a key piece of this connectivity jigsaw which will offer consumers real choice and drive innovation in the broadband services they consume.”

The report also details operators’ concerns, which include;

  • planning and streetworks delays
  • the threat of overbuild from taxpayer-funded, Project Gigabit procurements
  • delivery times for services from Openreach or other operators (e.g., EAD circuits, PIA)
  • getting wayleaves
  • the impact of BDUK’s pause on community-led ISPs Gigabit Vouchers; and
  • access to skills and labour.

“This report shows the increasing maturity of the independent broadband sector”, commented INCA Chairman, Alex Blowers. “It is now transitioning from fundraising and planning mode to delivery and execution stage and is undeniably a key partner in the delivery of a 21st century digital UK. It is now crucial that the government and Ofcom ensure momentum is maintained, by evolving the underlying policy and regulatory framework in support of the infrastructure competition that has now arrived in the UK,” Mr Blowers continued.

The full report can be viewed at- https://www.inca.coop/2022-altnet-metrics.

For more information about their work or of INCA in general, please visit: https://www.inca.coop/.

Cloud Migration, News

The sustainable advantages of cloud-native solutions are overlooked by businesses

London, UK, 31 May 2022 – While many businesses are looking to cloud native solutions to improve efficiency, save money and to provide better experiences to their customers, the environmental benefits of operating in the cloud can often be overlooked, according to Zoosh’s Chief Revenue Officer, Souvik Dutta.

Mr Dutta said: “Post-pandemic, many businesses will be focusing on digitalisation but that doesn’t mean the quest for sustainability needs to be pushed to the side. In fact, being cloud native automatically brings with it a host of environmental and social benefits that some companies are not recognising or quantifying”.

All businesses are now falling subject to sustainability targets, with many showing their sustainability campaigns publicly, as a result of the growing pressure to ‘play their part’. However, this responsibility doesn’t have to be a burden, but a blessing. According to the HSBC Navigator: the voice of business 2021 report, 78% of businesses say that a more sustainability-driven business model would have a positive impact on overall growth.

As a physical storage solution, data centres require upkeep and maintenance which results in downtime. Cloud native offers businesses an efficient and clean way to scale and adapt, meaning less maintenance and parts, which harm the environment and the business.

Cloud native solutions create a more scalable, and adaptable solution, lowering infrastructure and maintenance costs in the long term, but will also provide a more flexible working environment for employees in the new work-from-home era. This solution has proved invaluable for businesses looking for a secure solution for their new working environment, but businesses need to also focus on the sustainable benefits that cloud-native solutions have to offer, in order to realise its full potential and stay ahead of their competition in their sustainability and business goals.

Measuring a company’s success in sustainability will depend on how proactively it can adapt and invest in technology, as digital transformation continues to be at the forefront for many businesses. Many companies aren’t aware of the sustainability benefits of going cloud-native, instead they are fixated on the business benefits (cost savings, efficiencies, customer experience etc. Companies should look at the sustainable benefits, and use them as a competitive advantage.

Dutta went on to outline how it is essential for businesses to start considering cloud native now, to stay ahead of the curve for sustainability targets and prepare for future business growth. On-site and off-site data centres can be extremely costly to manage, maintain and upgrade, so by investing in cloud native solutions now, businesses will save money in the long term, as well as playing their part in saving the planet.

“It is well-known that data centres play a core part in carbon emissions, globally. Businesses need to not only think about their travel, waste, materials and energy, they need to think about how they are storing all of their data. Cloud native solutions are a sustainable, secure and future-ready opportunity for businesses to reach their goals.

Business

The C-Suite Innovation Club launched to help mid-sized businesses thrive

New space for the C-suite to network and share insight into an all-too-often forgotten space in the market

A new networking and innovation platform for C-Suite and IT leaders of mid-to-large sized enterprises has been launched by the CEO and founder of a leading managed-IT company. The platform will be used by its members to share advice and insight on how the mid-market can navigate today’s greatest challenges and use technology to scale effectively.

The C-Suite Innovation Club is available through invitation or application – and only to individuals who identify as C-Suite, as well as IT leaders, and will provide an opportunity for both online and in-person discussion and resource-sharing.

Tarek Meliti, Interim Chair, commented: “The past few years have been without the hardest for many in business. Leadership – from the IT department through to finance– have lost vital insight as many of the traditional routes to gaining knowledge have either withered on the vine, or simply seized up. We believe that the power of experience and insight is one of the most important learning tools business leaders can turn to.

“IT teams, the businesses that rely on them, as well as the strategists that define their direction, have faced a myriad of problems over the last few years. Covid-19 and hybrid working have both supercharged the rate in which private and public organisations have had to digitally transform, and economic turbulence has made scaling a vital yet unpredictable undertaking.”

Tarek Meliti, the CEO of TDM Group, identified the deficiency in the market and bought together a number of his peers to form the group.

“I felt that the one market so often overlooked is what I would define as the mid-market, those businesses with 100 to 1,000 employees, often owner-run and founded. As with many businesses in this bracket, the question of who to turn to for advice and guidance is often blurred. For many business owners the solution is to turn to colleagues through networking and other such face-to-face forums.

“With the pandemic looking like it is evolving into an endemic, my peers and I felt the time was right to launch the C-Suite Innovation Club for business leaders to come and share ideas and experiences, as well as looking for help and guidance from those who have been through a particular experience themselves,” added Meliti.

The Club itself will only be available to the most dynamic of mid-to-large scale organisations and registration or invitation is via LinkedIn, providing the ideal online platform to meet and network.

“The aim has always been to create a space for continuous innovation and collaboration – and we soon hope to do this both in-person at networking events as well as on LinkedIn. This is firmly a members led organisation so we will be looking for active members who can form part of a management board, as well as make recommendations for events and speakers,” concluded Meliti.

The Club, as well as the details on how to apply for membership, can be found here: https://www.linkedin.com/groups/7407369/

Business

The C-Suite Innovation Club launched to help mid-sized businesses thrive

New space for the C-suite to network and share insight into an all-too-often forgotten space in the market

A new networking and innovation platform for C-Suite and IT leaders of mid-to-large sized enterprises has been launched by the CEO and founder of a leading managed-IT company. The platform will be used by its members to share advice and insight on how the mid-market can navigate today’s greatest challenges and use technology to scale effectively.

The C-Suite Innovation Club is available through invitation or application – and only to individuals who identify as C-Suite, as well as IT leaders, and will provide an opportunity for both online and in-person discussion and resource-sharing.

Tarek Meliti, Interim Chair, commented: “The past few years have been without the hardest for many in business. Leadership – from the IT department through to finance– have lost vital insight as many of the traditional routes to gaining knowledge have either withered on the vine, or simply seized up. We believe that the power of experience and insight is one of the most important learning tools business leaders can turn to.

“IT teams, the businesses that rely on them, as well as the strategists that define their direction, have faced a myriad of problems over the last few years. Covid-19 and hybrid working have both supercharged the rate in which private and public organisations have had to digitally transform, and economic turbulence has made scaling a vital yet unpredictable undertaking.”

Tarek Meliti, the CEO of TDM Group, identified the deficiency in the market and bought together a number of his peers to form the group.

“I felt that the one market so often overlooked is what I would define as the mid-market, those businesses with 100 to 1,000 employees, often owner-run and founded. As with many businesses in this bracket, the question of who to turn to for advice and guidance is often blurred. For many business owners the solution is to turn to colleagues through networking and other such face-to-face forums.

“With the pandemic looking like it is evolving into an endemic, my peers and I felt the time was right to launch the C-Suite Innovation Club for business leaders to come and share ideas and experiences, as well as looking for help and guidance from those who have been through a particular experience themselves,” added Meliti.

The Club itself will only be available to the most dynamic of mid-to-large scale organisations and registration or invitation is via LinkedIn, providing the ideal online platform to meet and network.

“The aim has always been to create a space for continuous innovation and collaboration – and we soon hope to do this both in-person at networking events as well as on LinkedIn. This is firmly a members led organisation so we will be looking for active members who can form part of a management board, as well as make recommendations for events and speakers,” concluded Meliti.

The Club, as well as the details on how to apply for membership, can be found here: https://www.linkedin.com/groups/7407369/

News

Laserfiche launches package to support post-pandemic Digital Reopening

Laserfiche — the leading SaaS provider of intelligent content management and business process automation — has today announced the introduction of a Digital Reopening package of prebuilt process templates aimed at supporting organisations’ efforts to restore, recover, reimagine, and rebuild work in a post-pandemic world.

The new package is an expansion to an existing collection of over 100 solution templates that allow Laserfiche users to download process diagrams, workflows, template fields and reports, all of which can be configured to fit an organisation’s specific operational requirements for rapid solution deployment.

Linda Ding, senior director of strategic marketing at Laserfiche said: “Laserfiche is committed to supporting organisations across industries in their quick response to recovery from the pandemic. We worked with innovative customers, industry leaders and technology partners to develop this package’s low-code workflow templates that can be deployed quickly, with the goal of increasing accessibility of services and visibility into safety procedures when employees, customers, students and constituents need them most; and reclaiming time for organisational leaders to focus on the well-being of their communities, and the future of their enterprise.”

The package includes three categories of process automation users can utilise for a variety of contexts: short-term emergency response, medium-term workflow modernisation, and long-term digital transformation. The first of these new solutions are available now, with additional releases planned for August and October 2021. The initial release includes the following solutions:

  • Daily employee symptom report enables faster pre-screening for employees and supports continued safety at work. The solution allows employees to submit a daily symptom report online before starting work for the day. A human resources representative is notified by email if an employee has an elevated temperature, reports any symptoms or has come in contact with anyone diagnosed with COVID-19. These employees are then notified via automated email to stay home and rest or are recommended to work remotely.
  • Work from home experience survey supports employers’ ongoing effort to monitor employee well-being while working remotely. Employers can use this survey solution to assess how well their employees are adjusting to working from home, what works well, and what could be improved. Survey questions can be easily tailored to organisational needs.
  • Inventory tracking and equipment request enables IT teams to track hardware provided to remote employees and manage equipment inventory. To track hardware originally used in-office, employees provide information associated with their hardware, like device ID number, via an electronic form. The form can also be used to request additional equipment. When a request is submitted for additional hardware, an IT representative is automatically designated to assign equipment to the employee.
  • Return to work questionnaire allows employers to collect needed information such as employee symptoms and intended return to work schedule to inform and support organisation’s reopening strategy. Based on employee answers, they can be assigned to a specific cohort or phase that aligns with guidance from local health officials, corresponds to your reopening strategy and enables your organisation to manage in-office capacity.
  • COVID-19 time-off request helps support compliance with the Families First Coronavirus Response Act to provide employees with paid sick leave or expanded medical and family leave for reasons related to COVID-19. An employee can submit a time-off request via an online form; it is then automatically assigned to a human resources representative for review and approval. An automated email notifies the employee whether the request is approved or denied.

In addition to enabling the rapid deployment of automated solutions, the Digital Reopening package gives organisations the tools to track requests and process data, allowing for continuous optimisation. Organisations around the world have leveraged Laserfiche throughout the pandemic, developing robust IT infrastructure and business continuity plans, and transforming the digital experience for employees and customers during major disruptions. To learn more about how organisations have used Laserfiche throughout the pandemic and in planning for the future, visit Laserfiche’s Digital Reopening Resource Page.

Hospitality, News

Hospitality sector set to reopen on a larger scale, but cautiously

Written by Kunal Sawhney, CEO Kalkine Group

With the relaxations provided by the government of the United Kingdom, the hospitality sector seems one of the major beneficiaries as the enterprises operating within the industry will be allowed to restart their respective operations after an extended stretch of 16 months.

There is a large section of businesses that have already been permitted to reopen, but the removal of social distancing guidelines and the upper limit on the number of large gatherings is likely to provide a substantial stimulus to the commerce.

The indoor, as well as outdoor settings that used to flourish with business at some point before the onset of pandemic are now desperately looking forward to a meaningful run on the commercial scale as minimised curbs on gatherings and social distancing will certainly allow them to accommodate more people.

Higher footfalls have a direct impact on the volume of sales. The healthcare authorities, the test and trace drive by the National Health Service (NHS), the genome sequencing conducted by the Public Health England (PHE), the expanding scale of immunisation programme and other preventive measures have collectively helped in facilitating a normal trading window for the enterprises after a long break of more than 16 months.

The renewal of cross-functional activities, including supply chains, logistics, delivery, transportation and uptick in volume of food and beverages at the venues, are likely to provide a boost for the hospitality sector, effectively contributing to the national economic growth.

With more than 700 enterprises operating within the industry, all the businesses are expected to remain on a continuous lookout for more and more customers in order to resurrect the ‘going concern’ factor as soon as possible. The people who have been entirely dependent on the functioning of the hospitality industry will finally get partially relieved with the massive restart of the sector.

The operators are seeking to capitalise on all the possible monetary opportunities that can regenerate a steady stream of cash flows. The UK hospitality industry employs more than 3.2 million individuals across the widespread geography of four nations combined, potentially representing nearly 10% of the total workforce of the UK.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson has recently reinstated to proceed with caution even with the Downing Street administration allowing the large-scale reopening, scrapping the social distancing guidelines to facilitate more consumers on the board.

As the coronavirus pandemic continues to evolve with the emergence of variants of concerns and a spiralling number of Delta variant cases, the Prime Minister has said that it is absolutely vital to proceed with caution now. “We cannot simply revert instantly from Monday 19 July to life as it was before Covid,” the PM said at the coronavirus press meet on 12 July.

The government has recommended wearing a face-covering in crowded and enclosed spaces, a move intended to avert any possible outbreak of cases in the country. At a time when the nation is about to witness mass gatherings at various hospitality venues, a positive impact will be there on the national economic growth. All the hospitality businesses account for approximately 6% of the business settings, contributing nearly 5% to the national GDP.

All the hospitality businesses will now be able to move towards profitability for the first time in the last 16 months, in an attempt to overcome the Covid-related debts, said Kate Nicholls, CEO of UKHospitality.

Healthcare News, Home Working, Physiotherapy

Explosion in home-working leaving half the workforce in pain

Half of home workers are experiencing physical pain due to a poor home office set-up, a new report reveals.

Major culprits include being forced to use sofas, beds and beanbags instead of desks, less movement due to not having to walk to see colleagues and a lack of ergonomic advice from employers, according to research of 2,000 people.

The ‘Are Home-Workers Sitting Comfortably?’ report by Ascenti, the UK’s leading physiotherapy group, reveals that back, neck, shoulder and hand pain are common among the half (49%) of home workers already experiencing discomfort since they stopped being office-based.

Workplace-induced musculoskeletal pain affected half-a-million UK workers last year, costing businesses £15bn. With the report suggesting a 10-fold rise in home working since the coronavirus outbreak, it is feared this could increase dramatically due to non-ergonomic set-ups.

The sofa is the new ‘seat of choice’ for office workers, the research found, with seven out of 10 (72%) having worked from the couch since the outbreak, while more than half (56%) have used their bed, making them both more popular than the traditional desk (47%).

Younger employees are particularly likely to use alternative work set-ups, with nine out 10 (91%) 16-24 year olds having based their office out of bed, two thirds (65%) on the floor and half (52%) from a beanbag.

The improvised set-ups are the result of half of home workers being unable to access a desk, adjustable chair or separate monitor and keyboard, and many others having to share. Women are particularly likely to miss out and are experiencing more signs of injury as a result.

The good news for employers that are investing into supporting staff with their home-working set-up is that eight out of 10 (85%) would be more likely to want to work for a company like this. The research found that recognising employees’ responsibilities at home (28%), providing a work computer/laptop (25%), inviting questions about setting up a workspace (19%) and the promise of work-from-home options in the future (26%) would all improve an employer’s reputation.

To help businesses who would like to provide their employees with an engaging way to test their home-working set-up, Ascenti has created The Ergonometer quiz. This fun 10 question quiz provides a great way for employers to open the conversation with their staff and invite them to contact the business for further advice.

In addition, the ‘Are Home-Workers Sitting Comfortably?’ report contains evidence-based expert advice for employers to help them answer questions.

Stephanie Dobrikova, CEO of Ascenti, which works with more than 400 businesses to provide physiotherapy support to staff and which recently added a home-working health assessment to its list of services, commented: “Organisations have had a really tough time having to quickly adapt their systems, services and communications to meet the unique needs of the current situation and we all know how incredibly hard people have been working to make that happen.

“However, the results of this report suggest that a majority of home-workers are carrying out their daily duties in a way that increases their chances of physical injury, which could add extra pressure to individuals, businesses and the health service at what is already an exceptionally challenging time – and that is a worry.

“Having a good ergonomic workspace can reduce pain, prevent injury and increase productivity, so it’s well worth supporting home workers with setting one up, especially as it looks likely that this situation could be with us for a while yet.

“Creating an ergonomic home office doesn’t have to be expensive and advising employees of simple tricks like using a rolled up towel to provide lumbar spine support and adjusting their seat height with a cushion can really help to protect the health of those who don’t have access to an adjustable chair. Movement and stretches are also important and home-workers should be advised to try to stand up every 20 minutes and move for 20 seconds – our data shows that nearly one in four are now moving less than they used to.

“Many home-workers told us that they’re feeling distant from their colleagues and struggling to switch off at the end of the day. Video conferencing can be a good way to stay connected to others, while rounding off the workday with a 30-60 minute walk can help them to stay fit and provides a great way to unwind and transition from worklife to homelife.

“From a company culture and employer brand point of view, it’s clear from this research that demonstrating an understanding of the pressures your employees are facing at this time and taking steps to make things easier for them – whether through providing equipment, advice or the offer of flexibility – will go a long way to supporting their health and wellbeing, and in turn improve both their productivity and your reputation as an employer.”

Ascenti, which is providing free virtual physiotherapy appointments to NHS workers and over 65s during the lockdown, invites businesses and organisations to get in touch for further advice. Home-workers who complete The Ergonometer test and share their results to social media can win one of 20 free online appointments where they can have a home-working health check.