Global employee engagement on the rebound (Supplied Content)

Employee engagement plays a major role in organisations around the globe; it has an impact on its reputation, growth, sustainability and success. Global employee engagement has been inconsistent over the past years. However, according to Aon’s latest 2018 Trends in Global Employee Engagement Report, employee engagement on the African continent climbed from 61% of the employees to 66%. “It’s a remarkable jump when you consider the trends over the past five years. Only (51%) of all employees were engaged in 2012, whereas now nearly two-thirds of employees are engaged. It is by far a biggest increase in the five regions in this study” Says Gavin Griffin, of Aon Employee Benefits in South Africa.

Aon’s analysis of more than five million employees at more than 1,000 organisations around the world found that global employee engagement levels rebounded back to 65 percent in 2017, up from 63 percent in 2016. The percentage of employees who were highly engaged increased from 24 percent in 2016 to 27 percent in 2017.

Organisations need to be wary when it comes to their leadership teams which may lack ambition or who do not have the organisation’s interests at heart such as not being involved on the day today activities of their employees; Having employees who are not passionate about the work there are doing for the organisation  may affect the employee performance and the organisation’s efficiency. Shutting down the input of the junior staff based on who has more experience in the field can also affect employee engagement. It is therefore of great importance that organisations set a platform for every employee whether in a junior position or executive position to take part in the company day to day running in this way different opinions are being valued and employees engage with each other and come up with the best possible decision that best benefits the organisation. Thus ensuring that global employee engagement increases or gets stabilised.

Background screening significant to an organisation’s success (Supplied Content)

  

                                            

Background screening now this term has been frequently used in the past five years it refers to a thorough background check of an individual which includes criminal, commercial and financial records.  Although some may ask, why background screening whereas candidates have stated and attached all the background information needed on their curriculum vitae? Truth is organisations have been victims over the past years of employees with qualifications that are not registered with SAQA thus demolishing the reputation of the organisation.

Companies like the Managed Integrity Evaluation(MIE) which is the largest background screening and vetting company in Southern Africa have managed to come up with ways  in which companies can add value to their hiring processes and also assist them through increased productivity as most suitable candidates were hired thus reducing the risks and potential reputational harm of bad hires.

The uptake of background screening has increased to 6.77% over the past five years.

This is according MIE’s seventh annual Background Screening Index (BSI) report released on 14 March 2018, the increased rate shows that organisations are starting to be aware of the excellent screening services done by the MIE across the continent.  There are other findings highlighted in the BSI report:

·          2017 saw a growing demand for criminal background checks within the public sectors and SOEs with 724 507 criminal checks, 9.91% were found to have a criminal or pending criminal record. The mining and manufacturing sectors were found to have the highest associated risks.

·         Misrepresentation and fraud of qualifications remain high. MIE conducted 552 871 qualification checks in 2017 where 14.3% of these checks were found to misrepresented, fraudulent or the transaction was cancelled.

·         An associated risk with confirmed credit checks has increased. Overall the potential risk associated with confirmed credit checks has increased to 18.08% 

With the findings listed above, organisations will be able to see the importance of background screening for greater hiring processes.  Background screening enable organisations to identify individual which may be a threat to the success and growth of the organisation . 

By so doing they are also ensuring the safety and security of their employees from a new employee who might have a history of a harmful or negligent behavior.  Back door hiring should also be avcoided at all costs by organisations as they may not know what they are getting themselves into hence the services of companies such as MIE are to be considered for the prevention of such obstacles.

Sound ethics for the greater good of the company! (Supplied Content)

“Sound ethics” now this is a phrase that is commonly used in a business environment, it refers to the codes of conduct or principles that the organisation’s employees should uphold in the work place and that also contributes to the success and growth of the organisation. Therefore failure to uphold these principles can be bad for the organisation’s reputation, relationship with the clients and or investors and corruption often result in such instances.

However, there are ways that organisations can use to ensure sound ethics in the workplace. For a start executives or those in leadership roles should lead by example so that fellow employees can also be ethical and productive in holding the company’s morale.  Management of ethical behavior in the workplace is of key importance as it depicts the organisation’s positive public image. It helps them also with regards to their competitors in the industry. If they practice sound ethical behavior it is most likely that even in hardships their clients or investors are able to remain loyal to them because they are aware of the principles they hold.

According to Thapelo Petje the Executive Director: Group Strategic Sales, Jasco Group maintaining ethical business policies can also be driven from the bottom up. Employees should be comfortable enough to be able to question possible unethical business decisions, and to bring these to the attention of the right people. However, it is often the case that employees simply stick to their own work and don’t speak out against managers. Whether due to fear or simply being employees who are not interested in the greater good of the company, instances where employees ignore questionable dealings should be investigated. Usually, their silence can be traced back to a work culture that does not encourage an “open door policy”, which can stunt business growth altogether.

Cyber security alerts of great importance ! (Supplied Content)

Organisations tend to turn a blind eye when it comes to cyber security alerts which in most circumstances might help them prevent an incident from taking place. This is becoming a norm in the corporate world where many organisations suffer great loss from cyber attacks instead of being wary when receiving cyber security alerts. It is however, important that companies become active participants in the case of cyber security alerts because time is key in such incidents. The quicker you respond to such alerts may save the organisation from having to deal with cyber attacks.

“Failure to respond quickly can cost businesses millions of Rand, not only in lost business, but in lawsuits and loss of reputation,” says Simon Campbell-Young, MD of Credence Security. 

He says one basic mistake businesses make is assuming that shutting down the power will solve the problem and lessen the risk of further damage or data loss. “It won’t. It might stop the cyber criminal’s activity at that moment, but it could endanger the business far more, as it could lose valuable business data, as well as forensic data that could be used to trace the attack.”

Other than being quickly responsive to cyber security alerts , organisations may decide to come up with cyber response plans which enhance decision-making within the organisation and how to implement those plans in a manner that is not time consuming and can instantly detect any cyber threats and dismiss them.  It would be great if organisations do consider installing hacker software which will disclose the hackers details such as name, location , reason for hacking , what data have they acquired.

Mobile-first solutions driven by the growth of IoT (Edited Content)

Mobile-first solutions are starting to dominate the enterprise sector. This is according to Cassie Lessing, CEO, Strato IT Group, developers of mobile business applications. Lessing says that more businesses are realising that a mobile-first business – in which employees rely on their mobile devices to conduct business - is better set for long-term success. Globally, enterprise mobility strategies, which focus on mobile device use for business purposes, are already a top priority as most seek to better engage with customers and create a more efficient workforce.

It is of significance that companies adopt this platform of mobile first solutions as it helps them to interact with their clients providing a better way for communication, improvement and productivity. However, in order companies to use this platform they have to reach a certain stage of business maturity. According to Yankee Group there are levels of maturity which includes:

Ø  Opportunistic: Companies that are still deploying mobility solutions to meet specific use limited architecture extendibility, supporting those deployments.

Ø  Strategic: These are more forward-looking companies deploying mobile applications to address larger subsets of workers, featuring more sophisticated functionality. They use a definite roadmap along with a more policy-driven approach for delivering their pre-defined business outcomes.

Ø  Mobile-First: There are just a few companies that have reached this stage of enterprise mobile maturity. Mobility, at this stage, is integrated into the whole organization in order to re-envision business processes and transform business processes, driving innovation in a unified way.

Sitting behind this innovation and growth is the rise of the Internet of Things (IoT). The total number of IoT devices is predicted to surpass mobile phones worldwide by the end of 2018, making it the largest group of connected devices. Exacerbating this phenomenon is that by 2021, there will be 7.7 billion mobile broadband subscriptions, 9 billion mobile subscriptions, and 6.3 billion Smartphone subscriptions. “This makes mobile-first an inevitable enterprise strategy within the next five years,” says Lessing.

Fighting the Legacy of gender inequality and the wage gap (Edited Content)

21 March 2018 marks exactly 70 years since the creation of the Universal Declaration of human rights.  Gender equality is one of the human rights that has been enacted in the South African Constitution but what is the significance of celebrating human rights day when our fellow women are still treated unfairly  especially in the work. Women are called Imbokodo which means “The Rock” because they are able to overcome many challenges but unfortunately when it comes to the work place they remain defeated. Gender imbalances continue to take place whether there is a human right that is being violated or not, fairness is far to come within the working environments.

South Africa is not the only country facing gender inequalities this was highlighted recently with the release of the World Economic Forum’s (WEF’s) Global Gender Gap Report in 2017, which benchmarked the efforts of 144 countries to close the gender wage gap. The findings were a disgrace. The report referred to a “continued stalling of progress at global level” and, in fact, a reversal of ‘wins’ already made. Such is the depth of the wage gap that, noted the report, it would take 217 years to be defeated with the global gender gap taking close to 100 years to close.

For example, on 22 January 2018, at the ripe old age of 90 Minnie Mouse received her star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. This was after her male counterpart, Mickey, received his star.  A stark reminder that, even in the world of make believe, women continue to get a raw deal. Issues such as the ‘wage gap’ and more serious concerns around the predatory behavior towards women in the workplace-as we are seeing highlighted in the likes of Hollywood and British theatre currently- are real world issues that many countries are fighting against.

The wage gap will flourish as long as the world keeps serving up a diet of stereotypes which continues to bill women as the weaker sex. Only a unified global army of strong, enlightened, bold, innovative and brave men and women, boys and girls can hope to exterminate this scourge. This is a battle to be fought on all fronts, in the real world, on the big screen, in boardrooms, in classrooms and, yes, even on the animator’s easel.

                                             

Economic crime a threat to South Africa’s organisations (Supplied Content)

According to the press release issued by PwC on 27 February 2018, economic crime in South Africa is now at the highest level over the past decade. It is also alarming to note that 6% of executives in South Africa (Africa 5% and global 7%) simply did not know whether they were being affected by economic crime or not. Although other South African organisations continue to report high levels of economic crime others are still not paying attention of the effect this type of crime can have on their finances until it happens to them.

Economic crime is often mistaken for corruption but these are two different terms.  Corruption is a criminal act by those in power, typically involving bribery while economic crime is not limited to both the public and private space. It can refer to acts such as money laundering, tax evasions, illicit capital heavens and banks etc. It is of significance that companies start to look for alternative solutions on they can avoid such malpractises within their organisations. Not only does economic crime result in the financial loss in an organisation, it can have dire effects on the staff morale, commercial relations and most importantly its reputation.

Trevor White PwC Partner, Forensic services and South Africa Survey Leader, says: “Economic crime continues to disrupt business with this year’s results showing a steep incline in reported instances of economic crime. At 77% South Africa’s rate of reported economic crime remains significantly higher than the average rate of 49%. However, this year saw an unprecedented growth in the global trend, with a 36% period-on-period increase since 2016.”

The reason why some companies are being attacked by economic crimes is due to the traditional way of doing things. The use of technology in companies to protect their interest is growing at a quicker rate therefore it is important that they ascend to the digital world. They can start by installing anti-corruption software such that will be able to detect any malpractices in their financial accounts, abuse of resources etc within the organisation. Over the years, the C-suite has been the one to be held accountable of these criminal activities but if organisations turn to technology, they can have better chances of preventing any fraudulent behavior within and have executives that are adamant to the progress of these organizations rather than milking them of every cent.