Regus, the virtual office people, have conducted some international research that shows we are still highly national when it comes to packing for our business travel.

Nearly half the Australian business travellers who responded packed bathing trunks, a swimsuit or a set of sports clothing, compared to just 27% of the rest of the world.

On the other hand, only 6% of Australians packed hygiene supplies like hand sanitising gel, while, in the rest of the world, 15% of business travellers packed some kind of disinfecting toiletry.

7% of business travellers from the Indian sub-continent packed a musical instrument. A quarter of Chinese travellers tucked a lucky charm into their case but 39% of them packed a computer game. 24% of those Indian travellers took a suit when they travelled, but less than 5% of Australians packed a shirt, let alone a suit. One did take along his snake-catching kit though!

Just about every workplace research project and survey has proved that motivated employees not only get their motivation from being in a happy workplace, they motivate others to become more highly motivated, productive and energetic – and that businesses that are classed as ‘pleasant environments’ by employees are also those that have the lowest levels of absenteeism and sick leave.

So it’s in any employer’s interest to provide a creative and fun working environment to improve efficiency and performance. Here are a few tips to help turn your business into a great place to work:

•    Flexibility – allowing variety in working hours and working systems means that early birds and night owls can each schedule work time to suit their own natural energy systems. Occasional work from home also gives staff a break and a boost.
•    Exercise – getting a trainer or fitness guru into your workplace to give your team a workout can be a brilliant resource. Endorphins rush through their individual systems and collectively the idea of working out as a team builds confidence in each other. Get them to bring in their favourite T-shirt and shorts or joggers so they can get into a quick zumba routine or play a game of rounders in the car park at lunchtime.
•    Make fun a priority – have little games and contests – guess the number of bulldog clips in a jar or racing to answer the phone first are silly little bits of fun that can get everybody in the mood for excellence. Surprise a team with smoothies for breakfast or hire in a burger van for a day and let the whole organisation take a break for a burger and a cup of builder’s tea together.
•    Take ten-minute time-outs – buy a dvd and put ten minute yoga exercises on the company intranet: get each team, division or group to take little breaks. Work out ten minute walks that start from the office or factory and post them up around the building with jackets and umbrellas for people to borrow so they can get fresh air even if the weather turns nasty: get staff to take photos of fun things they see on these walks and post them on the intranet or on noticeboards.
•    Look for the fun side. If there’s a deadline looming, tell jokes about deadlines and reprieves. Get the funniest people in the organisation to share their hilarious experiences of dealing with difficult customers during coffee breaks. Put up a cartoon board near the coffee machine or water cooler and get people to caricature each other during times of great stress. When the tough times are over, make a wall of fame detailing those who really made a difference during the crisis, with thank-you notes from inside the organisation and out.

Oceanair International’s staff came up with a brilliant way to help the British Red Cross, and the people who travel on their flights.  They’ve agreed to store, sort and send on to the charity the unwanted possessions of emigrants. Many of Oceanair’s clients have piles of household goods and clothing that they don’t want or need and yet don’t want to throw away when moving abroad.

The unwanted items, ranging from clothes to children’s toys to kitchen equipment are often in very good condition and the charity is able to sell them to raise funds for projects. So far more than £4,000 has been produced by selling the items in the charity’s shops, allowing vulnerable people in crisis in the UK and overseas to be helped in their most difficult experiences.

The ten lorry loads of material that have been transferred from Oceanair’s terminal to the charity’s shops have been pretty varied – including three pianos!

Over 100 runners recently high-tailed along the course of the Mayfair Park and Tower Race. It’s a tough urban experience, starting with a 4 km sprint around the Serpentine Lake in Hyde Park, then a run up the entire 56 flights of stairs from the ground floor of the Park Lane London Hilton to the Michelin starred Galvin at Windows bar and restaurant.

It’s not all arduous endeavour – the runners are then able to enjoy a restorative champagne breakfast at Galvins.  The Hilton in the Community Foundation organises the annual event to provide funding for young Londoners through an apprenticeship programme called Galvin’s Chance. The runners are a mixture of staff at the hotel, famous faces and keen amateur athletes and this year they have raised more than £20,000.

The young people helped by the charity don’t just get funds, as ex-offenders have the chance of training and mentoring, including apprenticeships in London hotels and eating houses. In association with the Springboard Charity these young people are found jobs, housing, and given basic life skill such as learning to budget and cook, how to look after their clothing and appearance when working in public, and skills such as handling and making complaints, negotiating with others and team-building skills. Many will undertake NVQs in hospitality at college while they are working as waiting or kitchen staff.

It might not be what you expect of largely Mormon Salt Lake City but for one PR agency there, it’s become a habit to forget to wear trousers.

For a five week period from mid July to mid August, Richter7 employees are encouraged to wear anything but trousers to work in a ‘no pants’ policy. Garments often seen around the water cooler include: shorts, skirts, capris, sarongs, breeches, lederhosen kilts, and saris. Lungis and dhotis have been seen and even a leopard skin modesty pouch a la Tarzan! And such unusual work clothing is even worn to meetings with clients. Those who forget and turn up in trousers are fined by the knickerbocker police.

There’s a serious side to this silliness though. Utah reaches 100 degrees regularly throughout the summer and the no-trousers policy allows people to dress to meet the weather, while encouraging them to donate good clothing to a national charity that gives garments to needy individuals by ‘popping pants’ into the donation bin placed in the centre of the building’s parking area. It’s also a way of encouraging staff to remember that charitable giving is important all year round, by offering a ‘Christmas in July’ approach to getting employees to give money, goods or even time to good causes.

Events being held to celebrate the ‘no pants’ approach include a “Cool Down” party, providing frozen treats for the 36-person agency every day that the temperature exceeds 100 degrees, and buying a new pair of shorts for each employee.

Health and safety has been much in the news recently and employers and employees both have to find a balance between madness and negligence. For example, in a Hampshire village, the posties are no longer allowed to cross a particular road during their deliveries. Yes, the post has to be delivered by one postal worker on one side of the road and another on the other. It’s the result of a health and safety audit that clearly believes post people are less able to manage traffic than local residents even though they have high-vis clothing and other safety garments to protect them.

In another case, a major holiday camp has decided people aren’t allowed to bump each other in bumper cars. Instead they are to be restricted to ‘careful overtaking’.

And in a Sussex school, children were banned from spending their breaks outside because it was too hot in the sun. The head teacher said she’d taken the ‘rare step’ for the safety of the children who would run around around in the sun and could become overheated. Instead they’ve stayed in the classroom and played board games.

Parents are divided over the issue, some say that children don’t get enough exercise and shouldn’t be restricted and that as the school rules include children having to bring hats and suncream to school in summer, it’s a silly decision. Others point out that the sun is hottest between midday and 3pm and children should be in the shade at those times.

Health and safety requires judgement and these cases might all seem that judgement went out of the window. For organisations and businesses, communicating the reason behind the decisions is important and allows individuals to understand the reason they are being asked to abide by rules that might seem a little nannying.

It may seem like summer is over already, but there will be plenty of sunny days ahead and it’s a good idea to think about workplace fundraising in the summer for three reasons:
1.    Staff who get the chance to take a break from work are generally more motivated on their return
2.    Investing in your local area and its community activities can bring increased awareness of your firm and ‘brand loyalty’ from local people
3.    The public relations that results from community work is positive and lasts longer than advertising for the same spend.

So why not try some of these?

Car Wash

It’s a classic American fundraiser and you can make it even more fun by having the company Chief Executive dress up in a silly costume (but it’s best not to pick a sexist girly outfit as that can backfire on you) and/or other sidelines such as apron-wearing volunteers cooking barbecue or offering soft drinks and home-made cakes for those queuing to have their cars washed. You get three chances to fundraise this way: once for the car wash, once for those who sponsored the CE to dress up and once on the sale of refreshments.

Travel-a-thon

These are catching on in city centres across the world. On a given day, everybody who takes part is sponsored to travel to work in a whacky, non-car-using fashion. Skateboards, inline skates, kayaks and skipping have all been used in the USA, and this can serve a second purpose of giving your less exhibitionistic employees a chance to try out public transport while still raising money for a good cause. Invest in printed T-shirts for participants so everybody knows they are raising money for their chosen charity and ensure they have good safety clothing such as gloves and knee-pads if they are using an extreme travel option.

Community Clean-up

This can be the simplest and most effective of all. Pick a local park or other public area, clear your activity with the council and the police and get gathering litter! People can be sponsored by the square metre cleared or the bin-bags filled. It raises money and improves the local area and if you wear printed T-shirts or overalls, gets you fantastic local publicity. Once again, ensure your teams are properly clothed and have good gloves and eye protectors.

The two biggest issues that cause problems for employees and employers over the summer: heat and holidays!

The problem with heat is often an intermittent one, especially in the UK, which can make it difficult for employers to manage soaring temperatures for just a few days, such as in the recent heatwave. However when temperatures become uncomfortably high, and there is no set maximum, employers should consider improving conditions by:

•    Insulating heated areas such as pipes
•    Providing portable air-cooling systems
•    Ensuring window shading is effective
•    Offering fans and other air circulation
•    Relaxing clothing rules to ensure people can dress sensibly to take account of heat while still remaining safe
•    Moving work-stations and benches further from heat sources or rotating work roles so nobody spends all day subject to radiant heat.
In addition, those working outside should be offered hats and water breaks to ensure they don’t develop heat- or sun-stroke.
Holidays are often a bone of contention too. In 2010 ACAS took more than 100,000 calls about holidays and the working time arrangements. The most common questions include:

Can flexible working requests be made just to cover just the school holidays?

The answer is no, any request for flexible working, if agreed, creates a new work pattern with the employee who has made the request and that is a permanent change to their employment contract. However, many employers make other, informal, arrangements temporary or interim changes to work patterns to ensure that they can cover the businesses needs in the summer holidays and to allow them to treat all employees fairly.

Can employee legally take time off if their childminding arrangements break down during the summer?

Yes, employees have a legal right to ‘reasonable time off for dependants’- this means giving them time off to resolve family emergencies – usually this is unpaid and generally lasts around one or two days (or whatever you consider reasonable in the individual’s circumstances) giving time to put alternative arrangements in place. It is acceptable for the employer to suggest that the employee uses annual or special leave for this purpose and an employer can consider, but is not bound, to offer special leave with pay.