12 Nov 2012

Research
A meta-analysis conducted in the United Kingdom (Bertua, Anderson & Salgado, 2005) has found that intelligence tests and tests of  specific cognitive abilities are strong, reliable and valid predictors of both job performance  and response to training.  Operational validities are in the range of .5-.6, meaning that these  cognitive tests can account for approximately 30% of the varia...

15 Oct 2012

Survey
Recent research has found that up to 80% of staff turnover can be better controlled by organisations by improving their understanding of employee needs, employee-organisational fit and workplace culture.  The research, which included over 11,000 employees from 40 Australian organisations, was based on exit survey responses from employees who left their organisations between January 2011 ...

10 Oct 2012

Skilled Job Seekers
Australia's immigration policy had long focused largely on accepting highly-skilled migrants. Seeking workers with outstanding skills and qualifications that are lacking in Australia aims to address specific skill shortages and enhances the size and skill level of the Australian labour force. In the 2012-13 period Australia accepted approximately 190,000 migrants. 68 percent of these,...

15 Aug 2012

Woman Working
One of the most important issues in the current labour market is the ageing of Australia's workforce. There are not enough Generation X's and Yers to replace the retiring baby boomers (BBs). However, this is not necessarily cause for concern as over the last decade we have seen a big increase in the number of BBs working past traditional retirement age (60-65 years). In 2000 approxima...

20 Jul 2012

Scale
A large survey of Australian businesses conducted by the National Institute of Labour Studies at Flinders University and the National Centre for Vocational Education Research reveals some interesting findings about the significant ways in which employment patterns have changed in the last 20 years. They found that since 1992: There has been a significant shift away from full-time, ...

20 Jul 2012

Office
As seen recently in a leading Australian Human Resources magazine, the importance of 'soft skills', including creativity, flexibility, diplomacy and original thought in the modern workplace is gaining momentum.  In an increasingly complex business environment these skills can help organisation's develop new and better solutions to problems, as traditional ways of interacting with clients...

20 Jul 2012

Employee Engagement
Employee engagement (EE) refers to the extent to which your employees believe in the values and mission of the organisation, are committed to their work and will act in ways that further the organisation’s interests.  It integrates the well known constructs of job satisfaction and organisational commitment. It can also be thought of as an emotional or intellectual “attachment” (positi...

20 Jul 2012

Safety Matters
Incidents such as the leak of the cancer-causing chemical hexavalent chromium by Orica in Newcastle in August last year highlight the importance of safety procedures and proper handling of health and safety incidents by organisations. Following the leak the plant was closed for 6 months, it reportedly lost $90 million in earnings, it faced court over breaching Environmental Protection...

01 Sep 2011

Personality Assessment
Meta-analyses have revealed that the most valid predictors of job performance are ability measures (cognitive or intelligence tests) and personality assessments, particularly the "Big 5" personality traits, followed by structured job interviews. Together, ability tests and measures of conscientiousness or integrity provide an adjusted validity of 0.65 (Ones, Viswesveran, & Schmidt, 1...