Monday December 23, 2024

What can HR expect in 2014? Regs, rulings, reform and more

This year was no walk in the park for HR pros — and there looks to be plenty to keep everyone busy in the coming year. Here’s what should be on HR’s radar in 2014, courtesy of Fisher & Phillips’ Jim Holland and Much Shelist’s Sheryl Jaffee Halpern. Criminal background checks The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission […]

Clearing the ‘hardship’ hurdle when FMLA and ADA collide

The overlap of the FMLA and ADA has become a huge concern for employers. Reason: More employees are turning to the ADA to milk more job-protected leave out of their employers once their FMLA leave expires.   Once employees exhaust their FMLA leave, they can still request an accommodation of more leave under the ADA, […]

HR metrics: The numbers you should be looking at

How can HR show upper management that it contributes just as much — or more — as any other department in your organization?   Two words: HR metrics. Yes, HR keeps records and documentation like any other department. But those records alone belie very little of HR’s true worth to an organization. Put simply, HR […]

The 3 Key Elements to Employee Engagement

What makes up the trifecta of employee engagement? It takes your senior leaders, the manager and the employee all collectively working together to drive engagement within an organization. The Human Capital Institute (HCI) and Achievers recently wrote a research report exploring how these three key elements work together to increase performance, dedication and productivity in […]

Maybe managers don’t matter after all (INFOGRAPHIC)

A new study has found that employee happiness depends less on managers than on their co-workers. It’s been said a million times before: Employees don’t leave companies — they leave managers. But a new study says that employee happiness may be more dependent on closeness to co-workers than with direct supervisors. That’s according to new […]

Conquering employee fears about health risk assessments

Most company wellness programs lean heavily on biometric screenings/health risk assessments to be successful at driving down health spending. Problem is, many workers aren’t willing to participate in these evaluations, making it hard to get wellness initiatives off the ground.   So what do you do when workers are standoffish about your screenings? Confront their […]

He wanted to donate his kidney to his sister — but was fired instead

This employee wasn’t disabled, but he was fired right before he donated a kidney to his sister. Could he really sue for disability bias?  When Scott Rope was hired by Auto-Chlor as a branch manager, he told a company official he’d be donating a kidney to his sister in a few months. Over the next […]

Are you taking the right steps to ease workforce stress levels?

Both workers and employers agree: Stress is the No. 1 workforce risk issue. Where they don’t agree: The causes of stress and burnout. Even worse, employers seem to be missing the boat on helping their people deal with these issues.   Those are some of the take-aways from recent research from the 2013/2014 Towers Watson Staying@Work Survey. […]

These pregnancy bias cases didn’t turn out well for these employers

Two new cases show that courts are coming down hard on the unfair treatment of pregnant applicants and employees.  She was told not to bother applying In the first case, Wendy Lamond-Broughton was a lifetime member with Weight Watchers, which meant she was able to apply for jobs with the company so long as she […]

Updating your employee handbook: The essentials

It’s easy to overlook the importance of keeping the employee handbook current. Here’s a checklist you can use to make sure you’ve got all your bases covered. A clearly-written, well organized handbook lays out the company’s  expectations for employees. It also makes clear what the employee can expect from you. And when done correctly, it […]