We know how hard it is to stay up to date with latest developments in HR when you’re busy doing the day job and time is tight. Bring yourself up to speed with a 90 second summary of the HR stories you need to know about from the last month! We’ve selected and summarised some learning points from the best of the last month’s HR-related articles to help get you up to speed and ensure that you don’t miss anything each month.

Gender Diversity

Gender Diversity was definitely the hot topic for March…here is a summary along with some suggested ways of promoting gender diversity and equality in the workplace!

With International Women’s Day in March and the deadline now past for gender pay gap disclosures in GB, the spotlight has definitely been shining this month on the wider issue of gender diversity in the workplace and boardroom - for companies of all sizes.

Clarendon Executive’s Joanne McAuley looks at the obstacles facing women as they climb the corporate ladder and what can be done to help create a face of lasting change for NI boardrooms.

The Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) has launched a campaign seeking to raise the visibility of role models for women entrepreneurs with a digital campaign called ‘100 FSB Women’ - the focus of the campaign is to use digital platforms to raise the visibility of some really exceptional women. More from Helen Walbey, Chair of the FSB Women in Enterprise Taskforce.

Not all workplaces provide equal opportunities for women and indeed men. So with this gender inequality in the spotlight, what can you do in the workplace to provide equal opportunities for both men and women? Although this article from The World Economic Forum is a few years old and focuses on women, they suggest six ways of promoting gender equality throughout the employee life cycle from recruitment to promotion is still relevant today and can be applied to women and men. Some of their suggestions include make gender equality part of training and education, make flexibility and work-life balance a part of the wider company culture and don’t limit your talent pool. For the full six suggestions and more detail visit The World Economic Forum.

With all this in mind and the fact that Rt Hon Amber Rudd MP, Minister for Women and Equalities, reported in March 2018 that there are currently 2.1 million people out of the labour market caring for their home or family members, 89% of whom are women. Despite many of them having a wealth of skills, experience and talent they often struggle to get back into jobs at the right level. The Government has recently supported two toolkits on supporting women returners to work through ‘Returner programmes’ targeted at people returning to work after a long break (typically two years or more). They offer real benefits to employers and employees alike. As well as helping people who have taken a career break to return to work, they can also deliver a real competitive advantage for employers, these toolkits can be found at the above links.

Our other HR articles this month looked at…

Are happy employees engaged employees?

In her monthly article series HR expert Olga Pollock asks are happy employees engaged employees? We agree with Olga that some people are happy to come to work, get the day in and look forward to a pay cheque every month. On the other hand, engaged employees come to work because they want to, not because they have to. Engaged employees want to make a difference and they strive towards meeting a shared purpose and vision of the organisation.

Dismissal and its complexities

As HR practitioners the complex subject of dismissals is never too far from our desks…if you are anything like us here at Legal-Island we always have a stream of questions around the complexities of dismissals and are often confused by the subject. With this in mind, Shoshana Bracewell from Think People Consulting summarises Dismissal in her first article for Legal-Island - ‘Decoding the complexities of dismissal’. Shoshana breaks down dismissal, unfair dismissal and gives us 6 things to take away that employers need to demonstrate in a potential dismissal case.

Dismissal During Probationary Periods

And finally, if you’ve more than 90 seconds to spare and to finish this month’s HR summary, we stay with the subject of dismissal and more specifically during probation periods. Probation, and all things related, is one of the most read subjects on our website. Chris Fullerton from Arthur Cox answers the common question ‘Can employment be terminated during the probationary period? If so, what are the risks to employers?’