The Friday Round-Up
Employers take note: there's an online forum for employees to rate their company anonymously, whether they work their or not. Personnel Today's podcast features a story (it's about half way through, for the impatient among you) about Work Rewired.com, a website that ranks companies according to what employees say about them.
Employees rank companies on issues such as pay, training and career progression, with the RAC and Microsoft scoring well, while Boots languishes in the lower leagues.
Far from seeing it as a negative for businesses, founder Greig Harper believes the site provides HR professionals with a balanced view of the business as seen through its employee's eyes. It's also a valuable gauge of how the company's perceived externally.
But what of the legal implications? As long as it's true -- or the employer cannot prove otherwise - the comments are non-defamatory.
A similarly controversial site targets doctors. Dotcommer and doctor Neil Bacon has launched a site for patients to rate their doctors -- to the horror of many in the profession. The traditionally cliquey medical profession is divided as to whether this will knock the God complex out of doctors or unfairly tarnish medics in specialisms where mortality is high.
The threat of an annual MOT for doctors also divided the nation this week -- the biggest question being: who will evaluate them? Something tells me a brain drain's imminent...
Is all this sunshine making you blue? You could be suffering from surely the most spurious ailment ever, Summer Seasonal Affective Disorder, or S-SAD. A survey found that 39 per cent of office workers felt depressed because they were missing out on the sun. Unlikely that we'll suffer too badly in the UK, then.
The things people say, eh?
Employers are encouraged to help employees tackle obesity, another case of the 'Nudge' theory in practice.
The clean-tech sector is showing so much promise that training and internships are being created to fill anticipated skills gaps. MBAs are starting to build green issues into coursework, too.
Intel supremo Andy Grove's also taking up the green cause, encouraging the uptake of electric cars. Great news for Britain, which is set to become the E-Car capital of Europe, if GM's plans for its Cheshire plant are successful.
Fortune's Brainstorm Event 2008 finds the internet's a life-enhancer for all but the top brass. Hear Michael Dell reveal how he's "put big ears on" by setting up a Digg-style feedback forum, dellideastorm.
A couple of new terms, courtesy of Businesspundit. First, David Zetland's "Aguanomics", all about the economics of water shortages.
And speaking of ripples, who's heard of a "mirdle"? It's a male girdle, credited with boosting men's underwear sales in the US by eight per cent since 2005. Or maybe it was David Beckham after all.