Perry Work Report for the week of April 12, 2010

April 12, 2010

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Perry Work Report – two week hiatus

The Perry Work Report will not be published for the next two weeks -- the weeks of April 19th and April 26th. Your editor will be on research leave as she prepares for the TRY 2010 6th Annual Library Staff Conference (Toronto, Ryerson and York are participants). The theme this year is The Academic Library as an Agent of Change and my joint presentation with Kimberly Silk of the Martin Prosperity Institute is titled: Successful e-publication seeks warm web 2.0 technology to build a future together.

Perry Work Report will return for the week of May 3, 2010.

 

 

LabourStart Conference to be held at McMaster University

LabourStart will be holding its global solidarity conference this summer in Canada. The conference will be held on 9-11 July 2010 at McMaster University School of Labour Studies, in Hamilton, Ontario.

2010 Conference Registration

 

Great places to work -- trust is what counts

There are many permutations on these “best workplace” surveys. The most recently reported results are from the Great Place to Work Institute, which is US based with offices worldwide, including Canada.

“Today, the Great Place to Work Trust Index survey instrument is the primary selection criterion used annually to compile the “Best Workplaces in Canada” list. The index is also used in compiling similar lists for leading business publications around the world, including Fortune’s “100 Best Companies to Work For” list in the U.S.” [as reported in the Globe and Mail, April13, 2010]

Globe and Mail, April 13, 2010: Canada’s Best Workplaces (12 pages, PDF)

“Unionized organizations make their mark” – see pages 1&9 for this article in the above Special Report

For a complete listing with links to all of the Best of surveys … see BIC (Business Information Centre) Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto -- Career Resources—Targeting companies by industry – Canada’s best (list on the right with links)

 

Management Quality in Ontario’s the Retail Sector

The Martin Prosperity Institute has released Working Paper 13 on management quality in the retail sector and its impact on regional and national prosperity. The previous research in this series, Working Paper 12, looked at Canada and Ontario’s manufacturing sector.

Working Paper 13, April 8, 2010: Management matters in retail Presentation by Roger Martin (44 pages, PDF)

Presentations by Dene Rogers, President & CEO of Sears Canada Inc. and David Soberman, Marketing Professor at the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management are also available.

Working Paper 12, March 11, 2010 (scroll down to link)

 

Addressing Workplace Change

A recent Conference Board of Canada paper titled Navigating Through the Storm analyzes how three powerful mega-trends—globalization, population aging and diversity, and technological innovation—are affecting the nature of work, the ways in which workplaces are transforming as a result of those trends, the role of leaders in addressing workplace change, the skills they require to respond successfully today, and the skills they must seek out as they develop or recruit the next generation of leaders for 2020 and beyond. Fulfilling the project’s goal, the report serves as a comprehensive guide to help organization leaders understand the challenges and navigate successfully within this new environment.

Conference Board of Canada, April 2010: Navigating Through the Storm: Leaders and the World of Work in 2020 (67 pages, PDF) available to the University of Toronto community by signing up for a Conference Board of Canada e-library account

 

US Board of Director Compensation

The Conference Board New York has released the 2009 Directors' Compensation and Board Practices Report. This report analyzes director compensation and board structures in U.S.-based public companies based on proxy data through May 2009 from 2,436 companies and the results of a 2009 survey of corporate secretaries by The Conference Board. In the last decade, boards of directors of U.S. public corporations have responded to new regulatory requirements and market pressures by strengthening their independence and expanding the scope of their fiduciary duties to oversee management.

The Conference Board, Inc., March 2010: The 2009 Directors' Compensation and Board Practices Report (203 pages, PDF) available to the University of Toronto community by signing up for a Conference Board of Canada e-library account

 

Pension problems

Globe and Mail, April 12, 2010: Can Canada own the pension podium? A number of thoughtful policy decisions are needed when the finance ministers meet next month to discuss the future of the country’s pension system by Keith Ambachtsheer

Toronto Star, April 12, 2010: Tories in denial about pension woes, critics say: Overall, system works well, Jim Flaherty has said, as talks on reform begin

 

Are we seeing Employment Growth through Rose Coloured Glasses?

In their recently released commentary, the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives discusses how despite the latest Labour Force Survey which states that employment growth continues to increase, these numbers are driven upwards by part-time jobs. This commentary also discusses the effect this new trend in temporary employment will have on the labour force.

Labour Force Survey, April 9, 2010 (6 pages, PDF)

Report: The Temporary Recovery, April 12, 2010

Globe and Mail, April 10, 2010: Modest employment gains fail to drop jobless rate: New jobs created, but more people back looking for work. 'It could be the last statistic to turn around in the recovery,' economist says

 

New Reports on Aboriginal Peoples in Canada

The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives and the Centre for the Study of Living Standards (CSLS) have both released reports discussing various issues surrounding education and Aboriginal peoples in Canada.

The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives’ report states that income inequality between Aboriginal people and the rest of Canadians persists, noting that for every dollar non-Aboriginals makes, Aboriginal people earn only 70 cents – without a new approach to this problem , this income gap will not disappear for another 63 years. Labour and gender trends are also discussed in detail within this study.

Report: The Income Gap between Aboriginal Peoples and the Rest of Canada, April 2010 (34 pages, PDF)

The Centre for the Study of Living Standards’ report discusses the economic impacts of improving the levels of Aboriginal education and how they could play a key role in “mitigating the looming long-term labour shortage caused by Canada’s aging population and low birth rate.”

Report: Investing in Aboriginal Education in Canada: An Economic Perspective, April 2010 (37 pages, PDF)

 

Work-Sharing program extended and enhanced

Recognizing the uncertainty facing many businesses, Canada’s Federal Budget 2010 provided an extension to the enhanced Work-Sharing measure introduced in the first year of Canada's Economic Action Plan. Budget 2010 also put in place an extension of up to 26 weeks (to a maximum of 78 weeks) for employers with active, or recently terminated, Work-Sharing agreements. Both of these enhancements will be in place until April 2, 2011.

Canada News Centre, April 9, 2010: Government of Canada protects jobs through Work-Sharing: Canada's Economic Action Plan extends and enhances program to minimize impact of recession on workers

Work Sharing – statistics from Human Resources and Skills Development Canada : EI Monitoring and Assessment Report 2008

 

Health Care Workforce Internal Migration

The study, Internal Migration of Canada's Health Care Workforce: Summary Report—Update to 2006, illustrates the migration patterns of 25 health care occupational groups within the same province or territory (intraprovincial migration), from one province or territory to another (interprovincial migration) and to and from rural and urban areas of the country. The study found that despite the declining migration rate, Canada's health care workforce was still more mobile than the general population between 2001 and 2006. The majority of movement was intraprovincial, with 14.2% of workers moving from one community to another within the same province or territory. In comparison, 3.2% of the health care workforce moved between provinces and territories from 2001 to 2006.

Canadian Institute for Health Information, April 7, 2010: Internal Migration of Canada's Health Care Workforce: Summary Report - Update to 2006 (34 pages, PDF)

Media release

 

Forest, Paper, and Packaging Sector

A new report from Deloitte has recently been released entitled Compass 2010: Global forest, paper, and packaging sector outlook. The report discusses the strengthened global forest, paper, and packaging (FP&P) sector, discussing trends and forecasts for this industry. According to the report, consolidation and restructuring through bankruptcy is expected to continue within North American and European companies.

Press Release, April 6, 2010

Report, April 2010 (6 pages, PDF)

 

World Health Day 2010

The past April 7th marked the occasion of Worth Health Day 2010, which focused on urbanization and health. To commemorate this day, both Eurofound and the World Health Organization have put together a selection of recent publications and reports that discuss physical and psychological health, including several specifically looking at wellbeing in the workplace.

WHO’s World Health Day Information

Eurofound’s Selections of Publications

 

Book of the Week

Identity Economics: How Our Identities Shape Our Work, Wages, and Well-being, by George A. Akerlof and Rachel E. Kranton. Princeton : Princeton University Press, 2010. 185 p. ISBN 9780691146485 (hbk.)

In 1995, economist Rachel Kranton wrote future Nobel Prize-winner George Akerlof a letter insisting that his most recent paper was wrong. Identity, she argued, was the missing element that would help to explain why people--facing the same economic circumstances--would make different choices. This was the beginning of a fourteen-year collaboration--and of Identity Economics.

Identity economics is a new way to understand people's decisions--at work, at school, and at home. With it, we can better appreciate why incentives like stock options work or don't; why some schools succeed and others don't; why some cities and towns don't invest in their futures--and much, much more.

Identity Economics bridges a critical gap in the social sciences. It brings identity and norms to economics. People's notions of what is proper, and what is forbidden, and for whom, are fundamental to how hard they work, and how they learn, spend, and save. Thus people's identity--their conception of who they are, and of who they choose to be--may be the most important factor affecting their economic lives. And the limits placed by society on people's identity can also be crucial determinants of their economic well-being.

About the Authors:

George A. Akerlof is the Koshland Professor of Economics at the University of California, Berkeley, and 2001 Nobel Laureate in Economics. Rachel E. Kranton is Professor of Economics at Duke University. Akerlof is the coauthor, with Robert Shiller, of Animal Spirits: How Human Psychology Drives the Economy, and Why It Matters for Global Capitalism.

 

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Editor: Vicki Skelton
Designer: Nick Strupat

Copyright © 2008 Centre for Industrial Relations and Human Resources, University of Toronto. All rights reserved.

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