What to look out for in 2012

2011 was a bad year for the majority of business and individuals as public sector job cuts, austerity measures and poor economic growth impacted organisations across all sectors, but let's put that behind us and think about what you can do to make the most of the next 12 months.

Will it be the year of social networking?

Social media has been growing at an exponential rate across all areas of society and has started to make its way into business, with some making better use of it than others.

But 2012 is expected to be the year that the business world takes hold of sites such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn in a big way, so make sure you are positioned to take advantage. Using the platforms allows you to reach a huge number of customers and enable you to expand your candidate base when you are looking to recruit new talent.

If you are going to use social media in the office, you must be aware that staff could be sidetracked onto their own personal pages, so it is important to think about how you will deal with this, as there is very little sense in imposing an organisation-wide ban.

Dealing with older workers

With the end of the default retirement age in the UK, it is likely that you will be dealing with older employees in 2012 and in the future, so think about how your strategy accounts for older members of staff.

It is important to use fair performance management, recruitment and reward processes that do not discriminate against older workers. Another issue will be managing headcount as the new rules also make it more difficult to predict when someone will retire.