Pay is a complex business. Pay is not the only reason why folk leave one firm and move to another but often it is high in prominence in the overall decision. This blog sets out the primary criteria in deciding how much to pay an employee for doing a job and then describes a pay model that allows these criteria to be met.

The Web is full of articles about what went wrong with Thomas Cook. It had debt and no cash. Ignoring the fact that Thomas Cook experienced changing markets, just how should managers work to avoid becoming an insolvency casualty? Many firms run with low reserves and high debt. This is a dangerous operating point. Here we discuss options and give examples of business strategy for safer operation.

Your staff are going to have a whole series of questions which you will need to address as you go through the redundancy process. We've pulled together some of the more important questions that you are going to be asked, and presented them for you here. They range from questions about contractors to simple things like whether companions can attend meetings.

The business of predicting how, from their personality profile, humans will behave has both fascinated and annoyed managers. Northwestern University published results of research suggesting four personality types. Data from145,000 respondents was analysed using ‘big-data’ computer analysis methods using clustering algorithms. This research is easily misinterpreted and does not offer a robust or useful simplification.

Around 80% of UK managers are untrained in people-management. Just think about the improvement in your organisation's lot if it were the other way. We offer a nine-month programme covering hiring, managing and developing people in 18 webinars and 3 workshops. It's for managers who want the Level 7 knowledge and skills without the assessment from formal courses. And it's completely free of charge. Can you think of managers in your own firm who don’t have the skills and knowledge to effectively manage people?

Leadership is where one person, the leader, persuades another person, the follower, to accept the leader’s point of view. There are three elements. Leaders must have a point of view that they’d like their followers to accept. For leadership, that point of view should tap intrinsic or extrinsic employee needs. There must be an existing relationship between leader and follower that also has future meaning. And the leader must focus on practical action that he or she can take that will do that persuading.