Sandy Seay, CEO, Seay Management Consultants
Your employee handbook is your fundamental employment document because it describes how you will handle work issues that arise with your employees. To meet that goal, it should be comprehensive and detailed. Some of the policies you need to include are listed below and will help to ensure that you are up to date and in compliance with employment regulations enforced by state and federal agencies. Be sure you are implementing HR best practices in terms of policies, procedures, manuals and documents to hire and retain good employees and motivate them to superior performance. We consider these 24 items key HR flash points and should be included in your handbook.
EEO policy – this should include the protected category of “genetic information.” Some states have additional protected categories. Check your state regulations to make sure you have them all covered.
Dress Code – address extreme hair color, potentially offensive tattoos, scents and aromas that bother other employees and body piercings in places that could be distracting. Be sure to include a provision for accommodating employee dress code based on the religious beliefs of an employee or candidate.
Cell Phone Use Policy – talking or texting at work, even if set on vibrate, taking pictures and safety issues involved while driving on employer business.
Social Relationships at Work – a supervisor dating an employee is trouble waiting to happen.
Email/Internet Use at Work – employees should be trained on how to compose emails and what Internet sites should be avoided. Inform them that the email system is the property of the employer and that all emails are subject to being retrieved.
COVID – while we hope never to have a COVID event again, it is a good idea to have a policy covering the employer’s response to pandemic situations.
Working Remotely – More and more employees are working remotely so a remote work policy should be included in your employee handbook that covers working time, accidents at home and accountability.
Technology is racing forward at warp speed. Employers should develop a policy on the use of social networking at work, taking into consideration sites like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, etc. Here are some items to consider:
■ Employers should prohibit or restrict access to social networking sites during working time and should be aware that some material that employees post may be protected content, even if it is critical of management.
■ Supervisors and managers should be required to stay off the personal social media pages or sites of their employees.
■ On the basis of National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) regulations, employers should refrain from instructing employees about what they can and cannot post on Facebook or other social networking sites.
Conduct harassment awareness training annually for all managers and employees, to build a wall of protection around your company. This training should include all forms of unlawful harassment including harassment based on race, religion, age, ethnicity, etc.
I have often said that “the workplace mirrors society” and that whatever behavior is occurring in society will ultimately find its way into the workplace. Today, we are seeing the emergence of bullying behavior in schools and in other parts of society and this can often lead to violence at work.
Bullying can be physical, emotional or relational and often occurs in cyberspace. To prevent, eliminate or reduce bullying at work, we recommend that you develop strong anti-bullying and zero tolerance for violence policies and make absolutely sure you have a
way for employees to report abuses, in a confidential and anonymous way.
To help resolve potential drug issues at work and lower your workers’ compensation premium. Your policy should cover synthetic drugs as well.
To make sure you hire the best employees that are the best “fit” for the job and the work culture, consider administering the DISC profile, which is a measure of working style:
■ Hard Driving Type A
■ People Oriented
■ Multi-Tasker
■ Detail Oriented
The DISC profile offers an opportunity to select diverse personality types to work together.
Complete the annual update of your affirmative action plan according to the regulations if you are a covered employer. To be covered, you must have 50 employees and federal government contracts of $50,000 or more.
An AAP is a tool: a written program in which an employer details the steps it has taken and will take to ensure the right of all persons to advance on the basis of merit and ability without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability, genetic information, veteran’s status or other factors which cannot lawfully be the basis for employment actions.
Employers are required to complete this report each year if they have a workforce of 100 or more employees or if they serve as a government contractor with 50 or more employees.
This report should be filed if a business has a current federal government contract or subcontract worth $150,000 or more, regardless of the number of employees. This is due by September 30 each year.
Regularly submit your new hire reports to the state employment agency database. Effective October 1, 2021, all Florida employers (regardless of size) are required to report new hires and rehires to the State Directory of New Hires within 20 days of hire.
Ensure that you have detailed job descriptions for every job, in compliance with ADA, EEOC and generally accepted principles of human resources management. In addition to helping employers manage employee responsibilities, job descriptions are often a first line of defense in the event of an EEOC or DOL investigation. Employers who are covered by the Affirmative Action regulations are required to have job descriptions.
Consider conducting several management training sessions this year on important subjects like:
■ How to counsel and dismiss employees (when necessary)
■ How to conduct performance appraisals
■ How to handle difficult employees
■ How to motivate employees to superior performance
■ Ethics in the workplace
■ How to harness the power of a type A manager: a workshop that can help produce motivation and understanding among employees and management.
Check that you have all current required employment posters, placed in prominent locations. Federal regulations require six posters and Florida requires an additional four posters. FRSA members can access these posters by visiting the members login section of the website, www.floridaroof.com.
Review your I-9 forms for completion and keep them on file for all employees. Verification requires employers to:
■ Examine and record documents under Columns A or B and C.
■ Make copies of the verification documents and staple them to the I-9 form.
■ File the I-9 forms in a separate location, not the regular employee file.
■ The E-Verify program is required for some government contractors; however, we recommend it even if you are not a government contractor because it is an efficient and inexpensive way of checking a candidate’s eligibility for employment.
Make sure employee files are complete and that they include all the documents you need (such as an application, disciplinary notices, commendations, performance appraisals, etc.) but none of the documents that are problematic (such as polygraph records, drug test records, private and personal documents).
Some employee documents are necessary for recordkeeping and reporting and are perfectly proper, but are of a personal, private or medical nature or have an EEO component. For these documents, have an administrative or confidential file, separate from the regular employee file.
Employers should have clear and frequent employee communications programs such as:
■ Open door policy ■ Employee complaint procedure ■ Bulletin boards ■ Printed or electronic employee newsletter
It is our experience that most employee problems have poor communications at the foundation.
Make sure all of your human resource decisions and actions are fully and comprehensively documented and that you have developed and implemented a system of progressive discipline for which all of your supervisors and managers have been fully trained.
Remember that the unemployment office is giving away unemployment benefits like chiclets. Keep in mind:
■ In Florida, if you dismiss an employee within the 90 day probationary period, whatever benefits may be awarded should not be charged to your account.
■ Former employees should not be eligible for benefits if they are dismissed for misconduct or if they leave with “no good cause attributable to the employer.”
■ Employees who are dismissed for performance reasons will almost always be awarded benefits.
■ Check your unemployment claims report to make sure there are no fraudulent claims. Fraudulent claims are skyrocketing, particularly in the age of COVID.
This agency covers both union and non-union employees and enforces the “unfair labor practices” requirements. In addition, union membership is at a historic low and union organizing campaigns are increasing, so it’s critical to train your supervisors and
managers in the landscape of what they can and can’t do. Most managers and supervisors are surprised to learn that they can do more than they think they can. A one-half day supervisory training program will resolve this issue. This is an emerging flash point that we must continually monitor.
Consider conducting an employee opinion survey every 18-24 months to find out what your employees think and how they feel about their work and jobs. Many a serious employee problem has been prevented by an employee opinion survey.
The Wage and Hour Division of the Department of Labor is targeting the question of “working time,” which the regulations define as whenever an employee is “suffered or permitted to work.”
If an employee is working, the employer is responsible for paying for this time, even if you didn’t authorize it and even if you didn’t know about it. This could include travel time, meal periods, time before and after regular work hours, homework and other time.
Employers should have a clear policy on the use of smartphones and other devices at home and during other non-scheduled work hours to conduct company related business. Make sure all employees are recording all of their work time accurately and that you know when employees are working.
Verify that all of your exempt employees are properly classified and receive at least the minimum salary for exemption. The federal minimum level is $684 per week but some states and municipalities have a higher requirement. Remember, that one of the requirements for exemption is that employees must receive a guaranteed salary, not subject to deduction, in any week in which they perform any work at all.
Consider having employees complete the application form online, through your website, rather than in person. This can be a more efficient and less expensive process and may more quickly identify those applicants who might be good candidates for the positions you have open. You might also want to list your open positions on your website. Candidates should complete the application prior to the initial interview.
This will help you reduce or eliminate any potential liability or exposure, provide you with the comfort and assurance that you are in compliance with all of the employment regulations that cover you and check to see that you have the best practices you need to hire and retain good employees.
Seay Management Consultants is a nationally known Human Resources Management Consulting firm that has been in operation since 1966 and has more than 400 clients throughout the country. FRSA members have access to an employment hotline service to answer your questions about employment and human resources issues, such as compensation, wage and hour, hiring, dismissal, personnel policy and more. As an FRSA member, you are entitled to call Seay Management at 888-245-6272 and talk with our consultants whenever you have a human resources question or issue. FRSA provides this service to members at no cost.