Many people entering the workplace for the first time after school or college, or returning to work after a break, are finding it difficult to master buying and wearing a work wardrobe. It’s particularly tough when you have a limited budget, if, say you’re in your first job and juggling student debt and the need to pay for food, rent and other unavoidable bills.

Larger firms are giving advice and even seminars to new staff to help them through the first few difficult months but if you don’t work for a company that’s going to train you to buy the right gear, here are some tips to help.

•    Try to develop a sense of your new workplace before making an investment in workwear.  You can do this by wandering past the building at lunchtime and seeing what people are wearing as they come out, or by Googling a big firm on the internet to see what the people in news stories and on the company website pages are wearing. That stops you buying garments that are too casual, like vests for the office, or too formal, like shirts for the building site, and that are therefore never worn.
•    Get a friend to come and help you sort your current clothing out before you buy, often a fresh pair of eyes can show you how to use items you’ve barely or never worn, or shows you could sell barely worn and unwanted garments to help fund your new purchases.
•    When buying casual, check the washing labels as it can be annoying to have to use special washing machine programmes or even hand-wash work clothing.
•    Set and budget and buy online. Online retailers often provide discounts for multiple purchases so, for example, you can buy six polo-shirts and get one free, or get free delivery which allows you to buy another shirt! They don’t do that on the high street.

The Institute of Fundraising’s chair, Mark Astarita, has made a forthright challenge to the value of Payroll Giving. He told the media some weeks ago that he thought, ‘the only people who really love [payroll giving] are those who make loads of money from managing the transactions.’ It’s a controversial viewpoint and one that many major charities would be wary of supporting, but for smaller firms it’s true that the cost of payroll giving can make it a burden.

The alternatives to payroll giving have different kinds of costs: the time taken to organise fundraising events like ‘dress down Fridays’ or corporate events, the cost of persuading people to pay up for sponsored activities and the difficulties of balancing the demands of the workplace with the desire to give back to society.

There can be simple ways to reduce the costs of workplace giving. One idea is to have team based activities with the winning team (either the one that raises most money or the one that donates the most time) being given a special printed T-shirt to wear for the day and rewarded with certificates and employee recognition in newsletters and on websites. This can seem a little too much like being given gold stars at school, particularly for undemonstrative British firms, so an alternative is to offer a volunteer bank where people can ‘bank’ the hours they spend working for a particular charity of their choice. When they reach an agreed level they receive back a dividend of Time Off In Lieu to give to the charity – in other words, their employer pays for them to have a day off, as long as they spend that day doing voluntary work.

IFF Research claims that British business will struggle to embed volunteering as part of the workplace, following the discovery that while 38% of those who replied said their employer encouraged or allow volunteering during work hours, only 7% of employees undertook such volunteering. 13% of responders said that their employer forbade or discouraged volunteering on work time. It suggests, according to the research company, that while a significant minority across the UK (27% of workers interviewed) had undertaken volunteering while in their current employment, only one in 14 of them had done so on paid time.

IFF suggests that motivating employees to volunteer on company time will give companies a reputation for good corporate social responsibility, provide for a more rounded workforce, and help create the volunteering culture the government feels essential to the Big Society.

An example might be the development of the Pet Society shop in Paddington. A coincidence led to an elderly woman visiting the shop asking for help because her recently deceased dead husband’s dog was pining, at the time an elderly man whose dog had died was browsing the shelves. It seemed only logical for them to arrange for the man to exercise the dog and that led to a volunteer run shop selling pet food, clothing and accessories plus hosting a fortnightly clinic with an advisor from the Dogs Trust to do health checks on pets.

Entirely volunteer staffed, the shop provides more than dog support – volunteers have been able to develop new skills that will help them get jobs. Wearing a uniform, using the till, developing relationships and offering advice are all key factors that allow individuals to ease back into working life after a period of unemployment, looking after children or relatives at home, or illness.

News from Scotland suggests that charities may experience up to a 25% drop in income as a result of a massive decline in clothing collection and it’s happening because firms that sell on donated clothing to make money are cutting into the charities’ income!

The British Heart Foundation says that it could be losing around £3 million annually. Firms are distributing leaflets that meet the law by saying that the bag with which the leaflet is given away is from a limited company, not a charity, but the print is very small and the large print, includes words like ‘kindly donate’ and that the items will ‘reach those who do not have possibility to purchase new footwear and clothing’ along with logos very similar to those of major charities. Some companies are even asking for ‘donations’ of old mobile phones and laptops which they simply trade in or resell.

Charities are asking for householders to be given clearer information from collectors about where the proceeds of their goods are going so they can make an informed choice about where to donate their unwanted clothing and other items.

In happier news, the armed forces charity Help for Heroes is close to achieving £100 million in public donations. The charity builds recovery centres for soldiers injured in recent conflicts and offers a range of opportunities such as retraining in independent living, providing resources for ex-service people to find work, undertake sport and other healthy activities, helping them to live an integrated life with their families and wear stylish clothing. Recently £8 million was spent on building a pool and gym at the Defence Medical Rehabilitation Centre at Headley Court in Headley, Surrey.

It’s actually called Team Green Britain Bike Week, and in 2011 it runs from 18th – 26th June. It’s the UK’s largest cycling event with nearly half a million people taking part in 2010 and the idea is to get more people cycling, more often. Cyclists are fitter and generally happier than the average commuter – and they have less days off work!

If your company or organisation wants to take part in Team Green Britain Bike Week Here are a few tips:

1.    Give your employees or team a chance to check their bike is in good working order, if not, have details of local bike repair firms handy.
2.    Think about providing space for bikes at the workplace – and maybe offering locks for sale along with other accessories such as helmets, gloves, lights, puncture kits and so on.
3.    Set up a commute club, offering people a free energy drink if they cycle to work.
4.    Have a fashion show with a local store or fitness centre, showing all the fantastic clothing that can be cycled in and still look good, such as sleeveless fleeces and poly-cotton mix polo-shirts.
5.    Set up a bike slalom in the car park and post You Tube videos of cyclists trying for the fastest run!

Usually we’re encouraged to think about ourselves when we’re driving, especially in bad weather or when travelling abroad where traffic rules and behaviours may take us by surprise, but this summer, with massive improvement plans being worked on across the UK in advance of the Olympic Games, it’s important to think about those working on roads and generally in the ‘outdoors’.

Most road crews have somebody watching out for traffic and they work with care, wearing suitable high-visibility clothing and with ‘men working’ or ‘roadworks’ signs prominently displayed in advance of the actual location.  But most people who work on the roads, either improving the roads themselves or caring for roadside verges, trees and other amenities, have had at least one car collision. Usually this happens because the driver speeds up when they see the end of the roadworks and ‘clip’ the last person in the crew, but people get hit or clipped at any point in a roadworking location.

Advice for drivers is:
1.    Stick to the speed limit posted on the temporary signs, which overrides the permament speed limit which may be much higher
2.    Wear sunglasses or a hat with a brim to stop glare which can prevent you seeing people working on the road
3.    Ensure your brakes are good and your tyres aren’t bald as these can both contribute to poor braking
4.    Don’t drive up to the bumper of the car ahead of you – leave a car’s length gap at a minimum to ensure that if people brake ahead of you, you can stop safely.