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Four legal ways to cut pay costs in tough times

Surviving the downturn often means cutting hours and pay to keep the company afloat. That’s understandable and legal, unless you make one of the common cutback mistakes and run afoul of the Fair Labor Standards Act.

The four ways to steer clear of legal trouble:
1. Work cutbacks in full-week increments. It’s a practice common during holidays or other slow or down-season periods. The FLSA permits full-week cuts from exempts’ pay if there is no work available during that whole week. Note: During a full-week shutdown, make sure exempts don’t do “a little work” from home. That would mean they worked part of the week, making them eligible for a full week’s pay.
2. A formal short-week schedule. That is, it’s OK to announce that for the four weeks in January, the company will be closed on Fridays, and pay will be cut commensurately. Make sure to: Announce the revised schedule as far in advance as possible so as not to make it look like you’re haphazardly cutting and have no real salary standards for exempts. Even if you cut days, you can’t increase nonexempts’ workday hours to the point that they exceed 40 hours in a week — unless you want to pay them overtime. And remember you can’t cut exempts’ salary below the magic $455-a-week figure — that would put them in the nonexempt category and make them eligible for overtime pay at a later date.
What to avoid: In a short-term pinch, some companies decide to suddenly clip a day or two off the current workweek, and lower paychecks commensurately. But the FLSA states that if exempt employees are ready and available to work in any scheduled full week in which they’ve already worked, they have to be paid for the full week.
3. Require employees to use vacation time or PTO. The U.S. Department of Labor has ruled it’s OK to mandate that employees use available vacation time or PTO during a shutdown, especially when the shutdown is for “budgetary concerns.”
4. Across-the-board pay cuts, with no reduction in the workweek. Granted, this won’t get you on the “Best Places to Work” list, but it’s a cost-cutting maneuver that’s generally legal. And to pull it off usually requires some heavy lifting in the area of maintaining morale and employee relations. So, for instance, you could announce a 5% pay cut for all employees. Just be sure no one drops below the legal minimum wage or that exempts stay above the $455-a-week mark.

Caution: Some state laws are tougher than federal laws when it comes to allowable cutbacks. Check with your state department of labor to make sure cuts don’t violate state labor laws.

Most Workers Say Their Job's Stagnant

More than half of workers say their jobs are stagnant, and nearly two-thirds of workers say they have no desire to take on a leadership role, according to a survey by Development Dimensions International, a firm that specializes in talent management.
Respondents who said they felt that their job was stagnant were twice as likely to say they had no room to advance (32% of those who said their jobs are stagnant vs. 18% who said they aren't), were less likely to say they are asked to do more (14% vs. 27%), and say they are given fewer exciting challenges (3% vs. 26%).
The survey found that 46% percent of workers who said their jobs are stagnant said they "just do their job and go home," compared with 20% of those who don't feel stagnant.
The survey found that 44 percent of workers said they'll look for another job when the economy improves. Among workers who felt their jobs were stagnant, 77 percent said they'd leave for another company if given the opportunity.
"The economy has forced organizations to focus on generating revenue and delivering bottom-line results, but this data tells us they've forgotten about the importance of also focusing on their people--putting their organizations at risk for high turnover, poor performance and low engagement," said Jim Davis, vice president of workforce development for DDI.

Deloitte rolls out career customisation - Pilot scheme allows staff to ‘dial up or down’

Deloitte has introduced a form of flexible career management that allows staff to “dial up” or “dial down” their professional life to suit their needs, according to Sarah Jepson, talent adviser, human capital consulting, at the firm.
The “mass career customisation” initiative has been piloted in the US by the professional services firm for a year, and will be particularly important for retaining and engaging staff as the economy recovers, said Jepson, speaking at the StepStone Summit in London.
“It’s based on an idea that an individual has times when they can dial up or dial down and take time out depending on their individual priorities. It’s an approach to career management that allows you to have that flexibility,” said Jepson.
Dialling down could take the form of career breaks or adopting more flexible hours, whereas dialling up could mean taking on an additional workload or moving to a different location, explained Jepson. About 10 per cent of eligible employees in the US had chosen to do one or the other, she added.
The pilot has resulted in increased employee satisfaction and has attracted new people into Deloitte, said Jepson. The firm is planning to roll out career customisation to all of its 42,000 US employees by May 2010 and is now starting to pilot the programme in Europe, she said.
Both dialling up and dialling down are monitored against specific criteria, explained Jepson. “These are whether people want to be fixed in a location, whether they want to work part time, and whether they are happy to stay at a certain grade or stretch themselves,” she said.
Jepson added that Deloitte wanted to engage employees through the initiative. “It’s about recognising that people have different values and expectations and alternative talent pools. It’s about attracting mothers and flexible workers. We customise products so why not customise careers and how organisations respond to individuals?” she asked.

What your boss expects HR to know about business

If you don’t know what “free cash flow” means, maybe you should – if you want to get ahead in your organization.
What if someone told you he had a key piece of knowledge that would give you an edge on most of the other managers in your company? You’d probably jump at it, right?
Well, consider that business owners and CEOs routinely expect their managers and supervisors to have an understanding of the basics of business, especially money and finances. A survey by the Harvard Business Review shows that owners’ expectation might be too high.
Asked to take a basic financial-literacy exam, a representative sample of 300 managers — from all company sectors, including HR — scored an average of only 38%. Get this: Over half didn’t know the difference between “profit” and “cash.” Many didn’t know the difference between an income statement and a balance sheet. Nearly two-thirds thought that discounts offered by sales reps had no effect on gross margin.
Does it matter? When delivering the results of the test, Harvard presented scenarios in which that lack of knowledge could cripple a business. For instance, imagine you’re hiring an inventory manager who doesn’t understand the relationship between inventory on hand and cash flow. Worse, imagine you don’t know what the applicant doesn’t know.

Cash for Employee Clunkers?

The Cash for Clunkers program ended a few weeks ago with nearly 700,000 cars taken off the road, replaced by far more efficient vehicles. While the benefits gained verses the $3 Billion spent by the government is still being debated, I couldn’t help but wonder if Cash for Clunkers might not work in the workplace, too.
Imagine how businesses might respond if the government offered a financial incentive to replace under-performing employees with more talented, efficient ones.

Which employees qualify as Clunkers? I’m referring to the employee whom you hired several years ago – the high potential candidate who arrived to work on day one filled with promise, a positive attitude, lots of motivation, even though he was a little wet behind the ears when it came to experience. After a few months, this employee became a keeper, a top performer, a cherished employee. But just like the car clunker, the shine eventually faded and the ride got rough.
The employee’s performance is inconsistent at best and you constantly seem to be fixing this and repairing that. You’ve found yourself avoiding new projects and postponing strategic initiatives because you were afraid this old clunker couldn’t make the journey. Once considered state of the art, his skill sets have become outdated and the cost of retrofitting him with new skills keeps increasing with little improvement.
You’ve tried different working arrangements, shifting team assignments, and changing managers. You’ve offered promotion, demotion, probation, counseling, and warnings. You’ve invested in trainers, coaches, workshops, seminars, and even a psychologist. With each passing day, his reliability becomes more questionable and his attitude is polluting office morale, releasing productivity-killing emissions into the work environment. But for some crazy reason, you keep him employed, just like “good ole Bessie” in the driveway. You have fond memories of good times together and you treat him like a member of your family.

Then finally the government offers an “Employee Cash for Clunkers” program, ponying up the opportunity and money to exchange tired, burned-out, and attitude-killing workers for a new more efficient, more productive, and more positive employee.
The program has a short window and it’s being offered on a first-come, first-serve basis. Inventories are also limited in the talent pool because many of the most talented people are already employed. Only unemployed and new graduates can be hired. Poaching proven employees from competitors is not covered under the Employee Cash for Clunkers program. There are a few great candidates waiting to be hired but they won’t last long. You’ve got little time to act and only one opportunity to make the right choice. And you certainly want to avoid exchanging one clunker for another regardless of the incentive program.

Which employee would you consider to be your “clunker?” Think – what’s his or her name? If any one of your employees handed in his or her resignation today, which one would offer you all relief and little angst?
What type of employee would you replace him with? What expectations would you have? What skills would he need? What new projects or responsibilities could you give him? What could you do differently if you could replace your Clunker Employee with a Cash Cow?
Now I hate to burst your bubble but it’s unlikely there will ever be an Employee Cash for Clunker program. Nonetheless, the long term rewards for upgrading your talent right now far exceed any incentive government could offer. Many high potentials as well as proven performers are just sitting on the proverbial job parking lot waiting to be picked up. Humbled by the Great Recession, many talented people are offering their services at significantly discounted salaries in exchange for an opportunity. The talent inventories are at their highest levels in years and as the economy reboots, the best deals will disappear as quickly as inventories. Like the stock market, if you’re waiting to time the bottom and the top, you’re likely miss both and regret your decision for years to come.
Start your own Employee Clunker Exchange today. Don’t wait. Identify your clunkers right now. Which employees are costing you more than you gain? If you don’t know, find out. While the right metric will be company, industry, and/or company culture specific, one measure that I found helpful in nearly all situations is Profit per Employee. While all employees do not sell, every employee is responsible to contribute to the bottom line. Develop outcomes and metrics for each employee. Don’t go crazy with this. It’s a simple exercise. Just ask this question: by the end of the next 12 months, what do I expect him or her to accomplish? (If you don’t know, you can’t expect the employee to know either. In which case, you might have a classic, not a clunker, right under your nose and you didn’t even know it.) Then hold every employee accountable for expected outcomes.
Identify your requirements for a replacement. Before you go employee-hunting, determine how much experience, education, and skills you need for an employee to succeed. Do a job analysis. Again – don’t go crazy. For most positions, this shouldn’t take more than a few hours, even less sometimes, to identify the goals, responsibilities, and core competencies.

Get the word out. It’s now time to set the recruitment wheels in motion to recruit candidates who fit your requirements. Upload your opportunity to job boards. Announce your opening on social networks like LinkedIn and Facebook. Place an ad in Craigslist. Many of the strategies I just recommended are free or low-cost. If you’re concerned about being overwhelmed with resumes, use an online applicant processing system (APS) to rapidly screen out unqualified candidates. In this market, now is not the time to compromise. Cast as wide as net as possible. There are a few needles in the current haystack but there is also a lot of hay! An APS will automatically handle the “resu-mess” caused by high unemployment and online job boards and allow you to focus your time and attention on only qualified candidates. Spend some time on LinkedIn, posting the job to groups and asking for referrals.
Time is running out. The talent market is as good as it will get for years to come. Talent inventories won’t last forever. Act now. Exchange your clunkers today.

Employers Expected to Face Additional Pressure From Department of Labor

It seems like everywhere you look there is some mention of the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) cracking down in one way or another on businesses. Statistics indicate that there is much increased activity in DOL audits over the last few years, which should come as no surprise. In the DOL 2011 Strategic Plan Fiscal Years 2006 - 2011 the department listed four major goals, which are:

*A Prepared Workforce

*A Competitive Workforce

*Safe and Secure Workplaces

*Strengthened Economic Protections

According to the Strategic Plan, the third goal, Safe and Secure Workplaces "focuses on ensuring that workplaces are safe, healthful, and fair; providing workers with the wages due to them; providing equal opportunity; and protecting veterans' employee and reemployment rights." It is this area that prompts the majority of DOL audits of employers.
The newly appointed Secretary of Labor, Hilda Solis, issued a statement on March 24, 2009 that the DOL is renewing its efforts to enforce labor laws across the country. With the addition of 250 field investigators provided to the DOL under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, businesses can be assured of increased audits.
In is important to understand that the DOL is quite a large organization with far reaching regulatory authority. The DOL has 27 divisions that each has their own function. A few of the divisions that are most familiar to private employees are:
Employment Standards Administration (ESA), which includes: *Wage & Hour Division (WHD) *Employee & Benefits Security Administration (EBSA) *Occupational Safety & Health Administration (OSHA)
In 2008 the WHD recovered more than $185 million in back wages for 228,000 employees. In addition, the agency assessed $9.9 million in civil monetary penalties and concluded 28,242 compliance actions. Including the 2008 figures, the 8 year cumulative total of back wages collected by the agency was $1.4 billion dollars.

Audits are generally triggered either when a current or former employee files a complaint with the DOL or when the DOL targets a specific industry for investigation. It is a common practice of the DOL to target a variety of low-wage industries including day care, agriculture, janitorial services, the garment industry, healthcare, the hotel and motel industries, restaurants, and temporary help. These industries generally have vulnerable and often immigrant workforces, and a history of chronic violations.
Keeping in mind the many arms of the DOL and its numerous divisions, there are many areas that may be audited and some of the main areas of employee complaints (that result in an audit) are listed below:
*Misclassifying employees as exempt (Exempt vs. Non-Exempt status)

*Independent Contractor Status

*Minimum Wage Violations

*Child Labor Violations

*Overtime Issues

*Family & Medical Leave Act (FMLA) Violations

*Improper deduction(s) from wages

*Other Wage Issues such as: Bonus, Incentive, On-Call, Paid Time Off issues

*Timely remittance of retirement plan deferrals withheld through payroll deduction

*Fair Pay Issues

In addition, many states have a state agency equivalent to the DOL. For example, in California there is the Division of Labor Standards Enforcement, which can also audit CA employers for the same items as the DOL. It is imperative to know your specific state's requirements in addition to federal regulations. In California, employers should also ensure they are complying with meal and rest break requirements, properly recording meal breaks and the employees' time worked, properly paying overtime, and reimbursing employees for all business related expenses.
Liability for violation of the wage and hour laws does not require evidence of bad intent or unlawful motive by an employer. The performance of the employee is also rarely an issue, making the employer's exposure fairly straightforward in most cases.

If the DOL audits your company, a representative will visit your facility to conduct interviews, make sure the required posters are hung, and possibly examine the time clocks to determine whether your company is in compliance with the Fair Labor Standards Act. DOL will then review up to 3 years' worth of your wage-and-hour records and investigate your wage-and-hour practices to determine whether you have paid your employees the proper amount of overtime. This will include a review of your pay records, so you must make sure the records are accurate and organized.
Employers need to be proactive about complying with these complex wage and hour laws. If cost is a concern, complete an in-house audit and then have an attorney double check the policies and practices. It will cost a lot more to contact an attorney after the DOL or state agency is in your workplace or the lawsuit has already been filed.

Employee Performance: Don't Forget to Measure, Measure, Measure

Employee performance seems to be one of those "assumed things". We assume that if the work is getting done satisfactorily that an employee is performing well. But how well is the employee really performing, and even more importantly, is this employee really performing up to the full potential of the job?

How does one measure the value a team member is adding or destroying? It is sometimes quite easy and at the same time very difficult to measure. In sales-driven situations, employee performance is quite easy to observe and measure. In Customer Service situations, the evidence often lies hidden in dissatisfied Customers that leave silently and never return.

As one can imagine, data can be difficult to come by, but it is often available if one asks the right questions. Sales teams often have the best data sets for obvious reasons. Sales people are the "tip of the spear" and can cost a lot due to their compensation structure. Plus... Many sales organizations motivate performance through variable compensation. Therefore, the data is usually somewhere.

Other positions can pose challenges to measuring employee value added, however if the position was important enough to create in the first place, you will be able to find the value it adds to your organization. Regardless of how easy or how difficult it is to measure an employee's performance, it is absolutely critical that a manager be able to quantify and verify the value an employee brings to the organization.

The sad truth is that companies and managers often think they know who their high performers are, but fail to adequately measure what their performance really is. Instead they rely on anecdotal evidence, organizational politics, and biased perceptions to judge performance.

Key employee performance point - Always know the value your employee team members are adding. Regardless of the position, or how difficult it might seem to measure and analyze results, this must be done. No exceptions. Period.

Create score cards in order to track the value added in order to identify trends and problems before they become big issues. Employee score cards should reflect the 3-5 key accountabilities necessary to do the job well. A good way to identify key accountabilities is to Benchmark the Job. If you'd like, feel free to contact me and I'd be happy to share some best practices on Job Benchmarking.

Something to consider about employee performance... Over the years, I have discovered some interesting performance trends with regard to high and low sales performers.

Low performers (bottom 20 percent) typically produce between 10 and 50 percent of the high performers (top 20 percent). The typical performance gap between the top and bottom 20 percent is way too high.

Companies hang on to their low performers way too long. It amazes me. Companies often love their low performers way too much. The result is companies leave opportunity on the table - the bottom line is reduced as a result.

Final thoughts: measuring employee performance is far too important to ignore - regardless of how difficult or inconvenient it may seem. I challenge you to take a good look at the way you measure your team members' performance and carefully consider what you need to do to better understand the true value an employee brings to your organization.

What should every company do as part of their Talent Management Strategy?

Benchmark the Job
Match the Talent to the Job
Set Employee Expectations
Hold Employee Team Members Accountable
Continuously Review the Talent by asking, "Would I re-hire this person?"

Now go Maximize Possibility!

E-Verify extended for three years

E-Verify is currently a voluntary program run by the United States government to help certify that employees hired by companies are legally authorized to work in the United States. Formerly known as the Basic Pilot/Employment Eligibility Verification Program, the program is operated by the Department of Homeland Security in partnership with the Social Security Administration.
A system that lets employers check whether newly hired workers are in the country legally has won a three-year extension from Congress. But the debate over the E-Verify program is far from over. In addition to renewing the controversial voluntary program, Congress voted Tuesday to approve $137 million for it over three years as part of a $43 billion spending bill for the Homeland Security Department. The bill now heads to the White House, where President Barack Obama is expected to sign it into law soon. South Carolina is one of 12 states that have passed legislation in recent years requiring employers to use the E-Verify program as a way to combat illegal immigration. "The reauthorization of the E-Verify system is a huge step in assisting employers and the government," said state Sen. Larry Martin, the Pickens Republican who wrote the state's E-Verify law. "It provides the employers the certainty that they are following the law and it provides the government -- state and federal -- a better way to enforce the law." The Obama administration supports E-Verify, but there's deep skepticism in Congress. Lawmakers rejected an attempt by Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., to make the program permanent. House and Senate negotiators on the final version of the Homeland Security spending bill added language requiring the Government Accountability Office to once again analyze the system and its implementation.

Source: http://www.greenvilleonline.com/article/20091021/NEWS01/91021004/E-Verify-extended-for-three-years

US Department of Labor announces $6 million grant to provide Kentucky workers with health insurance payments

The U.S. Department of Labor today announced a $6 million grant to provide an estimated 1,550 jobless workers in Kentucky with partial premium payments for health insurance coverage.
"The challenges associated with a job search are enough without worrying about a lack of health insurance if you or a family member fall ill or need medical attention," said Secretary of Labor Hilda L. Solis. "This funding will help eligible Kentuckians pay for health insurance while they seek out new careers that pay family-supporting wages and provide benefits for the long term."
The grant, awarded to the Kentucky Education and Workforce Development Cabinet, Department for Workforce Investment, will be used to make "gap filler" payments for unemployed individuals who are receiving Trade Adjustment Assistance benefits and are eligible for the Health Coverage Tax Credit (HCTC) program. Under the program, eligible individuals can receive 80 percent of premium costs for qualified health insurance programs. These payments cover the months it may take a worker to complete Internal Revenue Service enrollment, processing and first payments under the HCTC program.
Of the $6 million announced today, $3.6 million will be released initially. Additional funding up to the amount approved will be made available as the commonwealth of Kentucky demonstrates a continued need for assistance.
The amount released today will be funded by resources made available for health coverage National Emergency Grants under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.
National Emergency Grants are part of the secretary of labor's discretionary fund and are awarded based on a state's ability to meet specific guidelines. For more information, visit http://www.doleta.gov/NEG/.

Disaster Preparedness Standards Proposed for Businesses

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) will adopt standards to help the private sector be better prepared for disasters and emergencies. DHS is accepting comments on the proposed standards through Nov. 15, 2009.
DHS published a notice in the Oct. 16, 2009, Federal Register seeking comment on the three new standards that would be adopted under the Voluntary Private Sector Preparedness Accreditation and Certification Program (known as PS-Prep). PS-Prep was mandated by Congress with the passage of the Implementing Recommendations of the 9/11 Commission Act of 2007. Businesses will receive emergency preparedness certification from a DHS accreditation system that would help businesses enhance operational resilience, business continuity management, and disaster and emergency management.
The proposed standards were developed by the National Fire Protection Association, the British Standards Institution and the American Society for Industrial Security and were selected from a field of 25 proposed standards for their scalability, balance of interest and relevance to PS-Prep, according to a DHS news release.
“Preparedness is a shared responsibility, and everyone—including businesses, universities and non-profit organizations—has a role to play,” said DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano in the news release. “Ensuring our private sector partners have the information and training they need to respond to disasters will strengthen our efforts to build a culture of preparedness nationwide.”
DHS also is working on classifications and certifications for small businesses, according to the release.
More information about the three proposed standards:
• Language from the National Fire Protection Association establishes a common set of criteria for preparedness, disaster management, emergency management and business continuity. This standard was chosen because of its focus on planning and preparation in anticipation of a disaster and does not prescribe a program development process, according to the Federal Register notice.
• Language from the British Standards Institution defines requirements for a management systems approach to business continuity and integrates risk management disciplines and processes. It was chosen because it provides a management systems approach to business continuity and integrates risk management disciplines and processes. In addition, it addresses business-to-business and business-to-customer dealings to strengthen business resilience.
• Language from the American Society for Industrial Security defines requirements for a management systems approach to organizational resilience. It encompasses risk management mechanisms and follows a plan-do-check-act approach associated with other International Standard organization management system-based standards, the notice stated.
After DHS considers comments on the proposed standards, it will publish another notice in the Federal Register on the ones it will adopt. To comment, visit the Federal eRulemaking Portal at http://www.regulations.gov.

Despite recovery, employers aren't ready to hire

Job hunters will face long odds well into next year. As the unemployment rate inches closer to 10 percent, most businesses are nowhere close to hiring again. Uncertain about prospects for recovery - the economy's and their own - employers cut 263,000 jobs in September, the government said Friday. Unemployment crept up to 9.8 percent.
As the economy slowly turns around, sales are slowly growing and many companies are starting to make money again. But they're doing it by cutting costs, squeezing more work out of fewer employees and relying on part-timers and cheap overseas labor. Until companies are confident the recovery is here to stay, they will probably keep laying off workers. The economy lost 62,000 more jobs in September than in August, and the unemployment rate notched up from 9.7 percent to a new 26-year high.
Most economists say the recession is probably over. But the recovery isn't robust enough to embolden businesses to hire again.
"Fear is a large factor for many companies," said Michael Williams, dean of the graduate school of business at Touro College in New York. "What happens after the government's stimuli end? Does the recovery morph into something durable, or is there an abyss on the other side?"
President Barack Obama called the jobless figures a sobering reminder that progress to reverse the recession will come in fits and starts. Employers are expected to continue cutting payrolls for six to nine more months. Economists think the jobless rate will go as high as 10.5 percent around the middle of next year before declining gradually. It could take three or four more years for unemployment to fall to normal levels. The worst recession since the Great Depression has already claimed 7.2 million jobs, and analysts figure 750,000 more jobs could disappear over the next six months. The drumbeat of job losses is creating fear that Americans won't start spending again and the recovery may fizzle. Some worry the economy might succumb to a "double dip" recession - meaning it would stop growing and start shrinking again.
After the recession of 1981 and 1982, the economy added 1.2 million jobs in the first six months of recovery. By contrast, after the 2001 recession, the economy lost 1.1 million jobs before unemployment peaked two years later. It was dubbed a jobless recovery.
Economic historian John Steel Gordon says this could be a jobless recovery, too, with businesses wringing more work out of the employees they still have and relying on part-time and overseas help. "It's actually worse now," he said. "Companies aren't going to hire until it becomes obvious we're back in a lasting growth cycle." Until then, economists think, the few industries creating jobs will probably include health care, education, legal services, data processing and transportation. And early next year, the federal government will be hiring for the 2010 census. In the last economic recovery, the financial industry drove job growth, but that probably won't happen this time. Job growth should also be slow in construction, manufacturing and retail. All told, 15.1 million Americans are out of work - twice as many as at the start of the recession. Counting laid-off workers who have settled for part-time work or just given up, the unemployment rate is 17 percent, the highest on record since 1994.
People are also staying out of work longer. The number of people jobless for six months or longer jumped to a record 5.4 million. That's more than one-third of the unemployed, a record.
A key Obama adviser noted that while the job losses in September were the most since July, layoffs are way down from a recession high of 741,000 in January. A House bill to add 13 weeks of unemployment benefits for people in states where the jobless rate is 8.5 percent of higher has stalled in the Senate. Hundreds of thousands of people already have exhausted their benefits or are about to. The September unemployment rate would have been higher - perhaps over 10 percent - if not for the exodus of 571,000 people from the work force, economists said. Many of them were so frustrated over a lack of work that they simply abandoned the search. Older workers who are laid off are also dropping out and filing for Social Security benefits at a faster-than-expected pace, the government says. Applications for retirement benefits are 23 percent higher than last year. Disability claims are up about 20 percent. Bernard Baumohl, chief global economist at the Economic Outlook Group, says he's optimistic the recovery won't fizzle. But he says it will "jagged and uneven," with more pain ahead for jobseekers.
Source: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/2009985985_apuseconomy.html

Public option still alive as health care reform advances

A little over a week after the Senate Finance Committee passed a health care reform bill without a public insurance plan, that option appears to be back on the table. “At the end of the day we will have a public option,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told reporters in response to questions about the health care legislation making its way through the House of Representatives. Details of the public plan were still being worked out, Pelosi said.
The idea of a government-run health insurance plan appears to be gaining ground in the Senate as well, although the versions being discussed at press time fall short of nationwide, Medicare-like coverage. One idea is to make the public plan a fallback option, implemented only if other health care reforms in the legislation fail to expand insurance coverage.
Another proposal would create a government plan but let states opt out, while a third would allow states to participate in the federal government’s plan or try out plans of their own.
Congress remains divided on the issue. President Obama contends that a public option would be the best way to ensure that there is competition in the health insurance market.
Many Democrats agree, and they feel their case has been strengthened by a preliminary Congressional Budget Office (CBO) report indicating that a public insurance option with provider payment rates pegged at 5% above Medicare reimbursement rates (known as Medicare Plus 5) would provide greater cost savings than other public option plans and allow the total cost of the health care system overhaul to come in below the president’s target of $900 billion over 10 years.
House Democrats recently expressed confidence that they had enough votes to pass a health care overhaul bill that includes a robust public health insurance option. And some public opinion polls have showed support for a government-run insurance plan.
Yet most Republicans (and some Democrats) are opposed to any public option, arguing that a government-backed plan would have unfair advantages over plans offered by private insurers and would come to dominate the market. Some contend that a public option will also drive up the deficit, without slowing the rise in overall health care costs.
In addition, they cite a recent report that seems to support their position. Conducted for the Office of the Actuary, which handles long-range cost estimates for Medicare, the report said the nation’s health care spending will rise faster with the proposed reform legislation than it would without it.
America currently spends about $2.5 trillion a year on health care. The report says that figure will approach $4.7 trillion a year by 2019 if the legislation does not pass and nearly $4.8 trillion if it does.
The Obama administration called the report out of date, maintaining that it does not reflect the most recent versions of health care legislation that are under consideration.
Meanwhile, the return of the public option to the table caught some by surprise, since the issue had seemed all but dead just a week earlier. The health overhaul measure passed by the Senate Finance Committee on October 13 did not include a public option.
That version of the legislation, backed by Senate Finance Committee chairman Max Baucus, was a 10-year, $829 billion plan that would require nearly all Americans to have health insurance coverage. To make that possible, the plan would expand eligibility for Medicaid and create new tax subsidies for those purchasing coverage on their own.
Though that plan did not include a government-run health insurance option, it would create a network of nonprofit health cooperatives that would compete with private insurers. The CBO estimated that the bill would ensure that 94% of nonelderly Americans are covered by health insurance in 2019, up from 83% in 2010.
The Senate Finance Committee bill was significant in that it attracted one Republican vote, from Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine. The other nine Republicans on the panel voted against the bill.
Although hardly a model of bipartisanship, the bill’s one Republican vote contrasted with the health legislation that passed every other House and Senate committee, none of which were backed by a single Republican.
The Senate Finance Committee bill won some praise from the Retail Industry Leaders Association (RILA), which counts Walgreen Co. as a member.
“RILA applauds the committee’s inclusion of prevention and wellness incentives in the bill,” said John Emling, senior vice president for government affairs. “These incentives are critical to shifting America’s health care delivery system from the simple treatment of disease toward the prevention of disease.”
The association added that the retail industry’s support for reform was contingent on the reduction of systematic costs, the preservation of the employer-based system, and changes to the proposed enrollment requirements that address the needs of high-turnover industries like retail.
Source: http://www.chaindrugreview.com/inside-this-issue/news/10-26-2009/public-option-still-alive-as-health-care-reform-advances

Military FMLA Leave: Qualifying Exigency Leave

Employees already eligible for leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) with family in the military are entitled to two new forms of FMLA leave benefits -- qualifying exigency (QE) leave and military caregiver leave (MCL). The rules for employer coverage (employing 50 employees within a 75-mile radius) and employee eligibility (they've worked 12 months and 1,250 hours) are the same as for traditional FMLA leave. Of help to employers, the U.S. Department of Labor's (DOL) November 2008 rules also created a required notice and certification process similar to what applies to traditional FMLA leave.
On the other hand, the military FMLA leave provisions expanded the reasons employees may take leave, which family members are eligible for leave, and for some employees, the length of time they may be absent. For example, to give meaning to the new military provisions, the DOL lifted the age and disability limitations for "son" and "daughter" as they apply to military leave. As with traditional FMLA leave, however, employers may ask an employee for reasonable documentation or, when proof is unavailable, a statement of the family relationship.

U.S. District Court Upholds E-Verify System

U.S. District Court ruled in favor of the U.S. government in a lawsuit challenging the legality of the E-Verify system (Chamber of Commerce of the United States v. Napolitano). This means that beginning September 8, 2009, federal contractors and subcontractors will be required to use the E-Verify system to ensure their employees are legally authorized to work in the United States. The requirement is designed to stop federal contractors and subcontractors from hiring illegal immigrants.
The E-Verify system is a federal government online database program that allows employers to verify employment eligibility by electronically comparing employee information taken from the Employment Eligibility Verification Form (Form I-9) against the records in the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Social Security Administration (SSA) databases. The system, which facilitates compliance with federal immigration laws and is currently voluntary for employers, is jointly operated by the DHS and the SSA and is overseen by the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS).
The E-Verify program has continued to face opposition from immigrant advocacy groups and business groups that assert the databases used by the E-Verify system are full of errors. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, one of the business groups strongly opposed to the E-Verify system, initiated the lawsuit against the government in an effort to prevent the program from becoming mandatory for federal contractors and subcontractors.
The U.S. District Court in Maryland held that requiring federal contractors and subcontractors to use E-Verify doesn’t violate federal immigration law. Specifically, the court noted that the rule doesn’t require any person or entity to use the system since organizations and individuals voluntarily decide whether to become government contractors and subcontractors. The court also noted that the President and the U.S. government had the authority to enact the requirement.
Although the Bush administration attempted to make E-Verify mandatory for federal contractors and subcontractors during its final months, the start date for them to begin using E-Verify has been delayed multiple times. When President Barack Obama took office, he ordered additional review of the system. After six months, the Obama administration and the DHS decided to push ahead with the expansion of E-Verify.
After the E-Verify rule takes effect on September 8, employers that are awarded federal contracts that include the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) E-Verify clause will have to verify the employment eligibility of all their employees (including current workers) through E-Verify. However, federal contractors may not use E-Verify to verify current employees until the rule becomes effective and they are awarded a contract that includes the FAR E-Verify clause.

Women take over job market

Women are on the verge of outnumbering men in the workforce for the first time, a historic reversal caused by long-term changes in women's roles and massive job losses for men during this recession.
Women held 49.83% of the nation's 132 million jobs in June and they're gaining the vast majority of jobs in the few sectors of the economy that are growing, according to the most recent numbers available from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The gender transformation is especially remarkable in local government's 14.6 million-person workforce. Cities, schools, water authorities and other local jurisdictions have cut 86,000 men from payrolls during the recession — while adding 167,000 women, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
"Unemployment among men isn't going to last forever," says University of Chicago economist Casey Mulligan. "People will move from construction and manufacturing to industries that are creating new jobs." Mulligan expects the portion of jobs held by women to peak slightly above 50% this year, then drop below half when the economy recovers and more men find work.

Google testing HR algorithm

Google thinks it will be able to tell which of its employees are going to quit, maybe even before they know.
The company revealed Tuesday that it is using its fabled data-collection and analysis powers for more than just search results. The Wall Street Journal reported that Google has developed an algorithm for assessing the number of employees likely to turn their back on the free lunches and multicolored walls of Google's Mountain View, Calif., campus in hopes of convincing the best of those folks to stay.
A few years ago, Silicon Valley workers were flocking to Google, and the company was hiring like mad. The world has changed, however, and Google is no longer automatically seen as the best place for a budding young coder or entrepreneur to hone their talents--especially as the stock price has declined since its late 2007 heights.
As a result, Google has seen recent defections to companies du jour such as Twitter and Facebook, and is determined to retain its best people, according to a company representative quoted by the Journal. The algorithm is still in testing (insert joke about Google's beta culture here), but the idea seems to be to identify disengaged employees before they lose interest in staying with Google.
It's almost like a kinder, gentler version of the "forced ranking" Six Sigma program that encouraged companies to regularly fire the bottom 10 percent of their employees to get rid of the malcontents. Google's not going down that road, but nor is it shy about using quantitative analysis to categorize its workforce.
The algorithm works by taking data from staff pay history, promotion history and employee reviews and appraisals of its 20,000 staff worldwide.The programme is still in the test phases, so the company is not ready to share information about the technical workings of the system, but a spokesman told HR magazine: "As anyone who has observed Google over the years knows, we are serious about keeping our employees happy.
"The work we do in predictive attrition helps us find situations that may increase the likelihood of some ‘Googlers' leaving the company so that managers and HR staff can work on avoiding those very situations. "These efforts don't identify specific people at risk of leaving but instead focus on the less obvious factors that may contribute to the decision to leave the company."Google does not intend to use the algorithm to prevent employees who wish to leave the company from doing so, but hopes to find out which employees are feeling demotivated so training and recognition can be used more strategically.

HAPPY ACT

I recently ran across a news tidbit about a bill called the Humanity and Pets Partnered Through the Years (HAPPY) Act. H.R. 3501 would amend the Internal Revenue Code to allow an individual to deduct up to $3,500 for “qualified pet care expenses.”

A “qualified pet” is defined as “a legally owned, domesticated, live animal.” It does not include animals used for research or owned or utilized in conjunction with a trade or business.

And “qualified pet care expenses” are defined as “amounts paid in connection with providing care (including veterinary care) for a qualified pet other than any expense in connection with the acquisition of the qualified pet.”

Needless to say, the Humane Society of the United States is in favor of this and so are the folks at PetWellBeing.com and CatChannel.com while the Pet Industry Joint Advisory Council (PIJAC) issued an alert Aug. 5 supporting the proposal.

“Providing pet owners the opportunity to deduct pet care expenses is an important step toward ensuring that pet owners provide adequate veterinary and other necessary pet care,” PIJAC stated in the alert. “It encourages responsible pet ownership and will hopefully reduce the abandonment of pets by people struggling as a result of the economic downturn.”

Wage and Hour compliance

Legal compliance is essential at any time. However, it becomes even more critical in today’s litigious environment for organizations to minimize risks by taking steps, such as the following:

1. Develop an understanding of how the FLSA and applicable state laws impact your organization. This federal law’s primary focus is on regulating overtime, recordkeeping and posting requirements, minimum wages and child labor. The Department of Labor, the agency charged with enforcement, has information available on its Web site, http://www.wagehour.dol.gov/.

2. Avoid assumptions that employees are exempt from overtime and minimum wage provisions based on criteria such as job titles or whether they are paid on a salaried rather than hourly basis. Instead, take responsibility for analyzing relevant facts prior to making exemptions. For example, when considering potential white-collar exemptions, examine information related to salary and duties to determine whether employees meet standards for executive, professional, computer, outside sales, or administrative designations.

3. Generally pay overtime at a rate not less than 1 1/2 times a non-exempt employee’s “regular” rate of pay for all hours worked in excess of the standard 40-hour workweek. Regular pay normally includes all remuneration (e.g. on-call pay, shift and weekend differentials, non-discretionary bonuses), unless specifically excluded by the Act.

4. Compensate non-exempt employees for any work performed in excess of a 40-hour workweek, even if overtime has not been authorized by the employer. There is a common misperception that employees do not have to be paid for overtime if the employer’s policies require the employee to obtain authorization prior to working any overtime. While employees must be paid for those hours worked, employers are not prevented from applying discipline for such policy violations.

5. Pay attention to activities that may be compensable for non-exempt employees, including attendance at training programs and meetings, waiting and on-call time, rest and meal periods, travel and clothes changing time. Review the Act and related information to determine whether compensation is required.

6. Maintain and preserve required records for non-exempt and exempt employees in an accurate and consistent manner. Examine organizational recordkeeping procedures periodically to ensure FLSA compliance.

7. Establish a compliance plan that includes implementing appropriate policies and procedures, researching issues and documenting decisions reached, and conducting periodic reviews of organizational practices. Throughout the process, seek legal or human resource expertise, as needed, to provide assistance in interpreting this complex Act.

How to Recession Proof Your Workforce

If you’re interested in keeping employee motivation, morale, and engagement high despite the impending downturn in our economy, it’s important for you to “Recession Proof” your workforce. By Recession Proof, I mean do the things that help employees remain motivated, determined, and inspired during difficult times.

1.If Employees Are Overwhelmed, They’re Not Engaged
2.Employee Engagement is Most Important—And Most Challenging to Achieve—In Difficult Times
3.Give Employees As Much Control As Possible Over Their Work

4.Help your employees build self-efficacy and feel the “thrill of victory.”

5.Keep the dream alive and celebrate your wins

6.Communicate, communicate, communicate

7.Strengthen relationships

8.Remove Unnecessary Sources of Stress

If You Recession Proof Your Workforce…
You’ll have a group of employees who are able to:
· Respond to challenges with a “can do” attitude.
· Remain upbeat and determined, despite the difficulties you face.
· Focus their attention on making a difference, rather than on complaining about
things they can do nothing about.
· Handle greater challenge, pressure, and demands without becoming stressed.
Recommended Readings:
· To identify, and communicate to decision makers, the true cost of workplace
stress, go to: http://humannatureatwork.com/Workplace-Stress-1.htm

· To identify and removes unnecessary sources of workplace stress, go to:
http://humannatureatwork.com/Workplace_Stress_ManagingStress.html

· To communicate to key decision-makers why its important to have a workforce
that’s effective at managing stress in the workplace (i.e. having a resilient
workforce), go to: http://humannatureatwork.com/resilientworkforce.htm

HR Policy Association's recommendations they put forth to the President

Healthcare reform is on everyone’s minds these days. The HR Policy Association recently sent a letter to President Obama offering there recommendations on healthcare reform. The HR Policy Association is a representation of large U.S. employers.
“Our members very much want health care reform, but they are concerned that the proposals as presently written could create a strong disincentive for expanding employment opportunities in the United States," said Jeffrey C. McGuiness, CEO of the HR Policy Association, in a statement.
Here are the recommendations they put forth to the President:
• Preserve ERISA pre-emption. Congress should preserve full Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) pre-emption, which the group says has been an effective policy allowing multistate employers to develop and administer benefit plans under uniform rules. This includes continuing to prohibit legal action against ERISA plans in state courts.
• Avoid new federal benefit mandates. The federal government should not impose specific benefit mandates on employers that would undermine their ability to manage their health plans, pursue innovative approaches to control costs, improve quality and offer benefits that meet the needs of their employee populations and companies. Congress should avoid imposing expensive minimum benefit requirements on employers that force them to offer generous benefit plans with costs that neither employers nor beneficiaries can afford.
• Preserve incentives for healthy behaviors, prevention and wellness. Continue to permit benefit designs that drive healthy behavior and create strong personal and financial incentives for adopting healthy behaviors, such as allowing meaningful premium discounts for beneficiaries who enroll in health risk assessments and other programs to improve their health.
• Preserve the ability of employers to promote wise consumer decision-making. Employers should be allowed to continue to design affordable, consumer-directed health care plans for their employees that encourage them to be smart consumers about the relative cost and effectiveness of varying treatments and providers. This includes preserving tax-advantaged health financing vehicles such as flexible spending accounts, health savings accounts, and health reimbursement arrangements.
• Preserve flexibility and innovation in benefit design. Provisions restricting the use of sustainable plan design (such as co-insurance, co-payments, updates to fixed-dollar features) could drive cost escalation in existing or “grandfathered” employer-sponsored health care plans.
• Avoid "maintenance of effort" provisions. So-called "maintenance of effort" provisions that inhibit a company’s ability to adjust to changing financial and market conditions should be avoided. An example is the prohibition against post-retirement reductions in retiree health benefits.
• Ensure that large employers can maintain sustainable risk pools. Policies to expand coverage through new health insurance exchanges should be done in a way that does not lead to significant adverse selection for large employer plans, which would drive up the cost of employer coverage significantly. Permitting people with access to comprehensive employer-based insurance to opt out of that coverage and enter an exchange should be avoided or restricted.
Included among a list of general health care reform recommendations are:
• Promote malpractice reform. Reform tort laws to create a reasonable safe harbor that limits malpractice claims against providers who follow approved medical protocol in delivering care. This will help to reduce costs linked to the practice of defensive medicine and create incentives for providers to report errors, disclose quality data and follow best-practice guidelines in the delivery of care.
• Create a pathway for approval of generic biologic drugs. Establish a regulatory pathway to allow the Food and Drug Administration to approve generic forms of brand name biologic drugs.

Did you know that an estimated two-thirds of employee hiring decisions may be mistakes? This article will provide you with information that can help you improve your hiring process so that you can cut costs and maximize productivity in your organization. Whether you're an owner, an executive or a manager, the following information will be beneficial to you.
Make the most of your existing hiring process and find the right talent. Improving your existing hiring process with pre-hire assessments.
From your experience you know you have hired some excellent employees and some who failed. Now take a moment and think back. Did you use the same employee screening method to hire both? Typically we find that employers do employ the same methods for each position. This suggests that your existing employee selection process may produce inconsistent hiring results.
Pre-hire assessments provide the easiest and most effective way to eliminate uncertainties in the hiring process. Pre-hire assessments are invaluable tools for increasing consistency and improving the success of your existing hiring process. Organizations who utilize poor hiring practices in their hiring process continually lose money due to increased turnover, decreased productivity, and in extreme cases, negligent hiring lawsuits. These hiring decisions become costly mistakes because they are made with inadequate information about the candidate.
Take a moment and ask yourself these quick questions: - Would you like to know in advance if a candidate has issues with substance abuse or employee theft? - Would you like the ability to predict whether or not they have the work ethic and reliability required to be successful in their position? - Would you like to know if the candidate is going to be a good fit for the job and your company? - Would you like to hire more top performers?
If your answer is yes to any one of these questions, pre-hire assessments can help.
Pre-hire assessments are a natural extension to your existing hiring process. They can be seamlessly integrated into most applicant tracking systems. And, with pre-hire assessments, you will be able to identify and hire candidates who are reliable, ethical and hardworking by checking criminal records, education credentials and other background information. Knowing this information about candidates before they are hired is absolutely essential, because businesses large and small can be held liable for accidents and crimes committed by its employees.
To protect your company and minimize risk, you can use a pre-hire survey to ensure you minimize the risk of making a bad hire.
A pre-hire survey is a scientifically designed assessment tool that evaluates job applicants' attitudes for integrity, substance abuse, reliability, and work ethic. This can empower you with a structured system to objectively obtain better information, identify the best candidates, and conduct better interviews.
Pre-hire surveys address the 21st century challenges that are increasingly eroding companies' productivity and profitability: - Unauthorized use of the Internet - Using company email for personal use - Disclosing private and restricted computer data - Theft of office supplies and other company property - Clocking in or out for other employees - Revealing confidential information and/or trade secrets to outsiders - Shoplifing, also know as inventory shrinkage - Carelessness - Unexcused absences - Tardiness - Drug use - Sub-par job performance - Fraud - Job-hopping
They are also fast and easy to use and promote positive behaviors in your company including: - An honest day's work for a full day's pay - Promptness - Conscientious use of company time and resources - Confidentiality of proprietary data and other information - Dependability - Employee loyalty - Increased productivity
Pre-hire employment assessments will also help your organization develop a strategic hiring process that will minimize the costs associated with hiring and recruiting employees.

Character counts: How to create your own crystal ball for effective hiring

Many human resource professionals wish for a crystal ball to foretell the fate of a prospective employee. Without the ability to gaze into the future, they ask themselves “does this candidate have the essential proficiencies - the right combination of education, skills and experience?” If the answer is yes, the candidate must be a perfect fit.

Stopping there, however, leaves out an important part of the equation: the character of the candidate. “Character is what a team does when no one is looking,” explains Joseph Krivickas, a technology industry President and COO for FAST. And character is what often leads to the end of employment. As the HR saying goes, we hire for skills, but fire for character.

So how do you avoid hiring someone whose character is not consistent with the position, the values of the team or your company? Consider adding some character-based questions to the interview process. You’ll not only prevent potentially costly hiring mistakes, but you will be more likely to hire someone with whom you and your team enjoy working.

Before you begin interviewing job applicants, list specific actions you require from the employee in the position and think of fundamental character traits of the perfect candidate. Then, create questions and scenarios to see if the candidate has the required traits and practices the desired actions.

Here are some effective suggestions for interviewing for character traits:
· At your last job, how did you fill down time?
· Which situations kept you from coming to work on time at your last job? How often did that occur?
· Describe a recent problem you had with one of your manager’s decisions. How did you handle it?
· Priorities often change suddenly throughout the day. If you are asked to quickly do another task, how does that affect your mood?
· What do you think is an acceptable number of days to be absent in a calendar year?
· How do you handle situations that could cause you to be tardy or absent?
· What are some examples of stealing from your employer?
· How have you responded in the past when you found another employee stealing?
· How have you responded in the past when your substitute or coworker called in sick and you had to take over their responsibilities as well as your own?
· Think about the last time your manager critiqued your work. How did you respond?
· Give me an example of a time you did something without being asked. Can you give me another example?
· Tell me about your most frustrating experience as a ____________(job title). How did you handle the situation?
· Two hours before you are scheduled to arrive at work, you learn weather is going to be bad and traffic will be worse. How do you respond?
· It’s lunchtime and a customer or co-worker needs five minutes of your time. What do you do?
· If you had a problem and no supervisor was available at the time, how would you handle it?
· It is 10 minutes before you are to leave. You like to complete each day with a routine you have set up to help you prepare for the next day. Your manager asks you to complete one last task, a task that a coworker should complete, but your manager has never trained the coworker to complete. How would you handle this situation?

HR professionals have been entrusted with the responsibility of hiring the best person for the position. Not only does the person need the skills and background, but he/she also needs the right character to be truly successful in the position. So until we are given that “crystal ball” to guide us on our selections, consider adding a few of the questions above to help make the best selection.

Three Concerns When Inquiring About Applicants' Past Criminal Convictions

One extremely useful facet of using employment applications in hiring is the ability of the employer to directly ask an applicant if he or she has a criminal history that would show up if a thorough background check was conducted. Yet, to their detriment, many employers use language that is either too narrow, too broad, or too ambiguous to successfully accomplish this - each of these mistakes can lead to legal quagmires or bad hires continuing to slip through the cracks and potentially endanger businesses. To make this reality perfectly clear, let us go over each of these scenarios in greater detail:

Too Narrow
An example of a question that is too narrow is to only ask about felonies. Many standard employment applications only ask if an applicant was convicted of a felony. That allows the application form to be used in all states. However, misdemeanors can be very serious. Under California law, for example, most employers would want to know if an applicant had a conviction for offenses such as fighting with a police officer, illegal possession of weapons, spousal abuse or child abuse, commercial burglary, assault and many other offenses. Yet in California and other states, these can all be misdemeanors. Many serious offenses are plea-bargained down to misdemeanor offenses as well. Without the proper language, an applicant can honestly answer that he or she has not been convicted of a felony even though there may be serious misdemeanor convictions an employer needs to know about. A best practice would be to utilize an application form that asks about past criminal conduct in the broadest language allowed by law in your state

Too Broad
On the other hand, some employers ask questions that are so broad that it improperly covers matters that are protected. An example may be, "Have you ever committed a crime?" Or "Have You Ever Been Convicted of Any Crime?" There are a number of limitations under state and federal law concerning what an employer may legally ask about or "discover" concerning an applicant's or employee's criminal record. In fact, it can be a misdemeanor in California for an employer to knowingly violate some of these rules. Furthermore, if an applicant is placed in a position where he is forced to reveal information about himself that he is legally entitled not to disclose, an employer can actually be sued in some states for "defamation by compelled self-publication." In other words, if forced to say something defamatory about himself, an applicant may be able to file a lawsuit against the employer for defamation.

Too Ambiguous
The third mistake is to ask an applicant, "Have you ever been convicted of a felony or serious misdemeanor?" or "Have you ever been convicted of a crime of violence?" or a similar question that calls for an opinion. The problem occurs when an applicant is called upon to make a judgment about his own offense. To determine if a crime can be labeled as "serious" can call for a very complex legal and factual determination on which lawyers and even judges could disagree. At times an applicant may be simply confused by court proceedings and may not understand the results or what they mean. By asking a question that is ambiguous and leaves waffle room, an applicant can argue that in his or her mind the offense was not serious and a "no" answer was truthful. That is why a question cannot contain any ambiguity.

Mistakes Managers Commonly Make in an Uncertain Economy

Companies trying to survive in times of flux tend to make similar mistakes, regardless of the type of business or industry.

These mistakes fall into four broad categories:

Morale/retention,

Productivity,

Innovation/risk taking and

Business development.

Here’s how to avoid some of the most common management pitfalls as you navigate the economy’s rocky road.

Morale/Retention
1.Staff reduction by a dozen cuts.

2.Closing off communication channels.

3.Eliminating incentives.

Productivity
1.Reducing professional development and training.

2.Making their jobs harder.

3.Postponing recruitment.

Innovation/Risk Taking
1.Stifling critical thinking.

2.Waiting for a turnaround.

Business Development
1.Sacrificing quality.

2.Losing sight of the customer.

3.Cutting the wrong things.

No Raises (or Worse) for Nearly 40% of Employees in 2009

Over 1 in 3 (39 percent) U.S. employees reports that, due to economic downturn, they either have not received a raise or that their compensation actually has decreased in 2009, according to a new poll.



The ComPsych Corporation poll asked employees “Has the economic downturn impacted your work? If so, in which area have you experienced the greatest impact?” The most frequent response—cited by 39 percent of employees—was that they’d either not received a raise or that their compensation had decreased this year. Another 20 percent replied that the economic downturn had created more stress and/or conflict among coworkers. Meanwhile, 11 percent indicated that they were doing more work due to layoffs in their organization, while another 10 percent said they were working more hours and unable to take as much vacation as usual. Only 1 in 5 respondents (20 percent) said that the economic downturn had not impacted their work.



“We continue to see increased call volume from employees who need help managing their finances in this challenging environment,” said Dr. Richard A. Chaifetz, Chairman and CEO of ComPsych, a provider of employee assistance programs.


“Our customers, realizing the need for supporting and educating employees with financial information, have been promoting the EAP-Employee Assistance Program as a place to turn for help as well as scheduling personal finance seminars for their workforce.”

The Perks of Self-Service HRIS

An effective HRIS provides information on just about anything the company needs to track and analyze about employees, former employees, and applicants.

Considering that up to 80 percent of an HR department’s time is spent on administration and paperwork, it’s no wonder an increasing number of vendors are making self-service an integral part of their HRIS offerings. By granting employees direct online access to their own HR information via an intranet or portal, the burden on HR is reduced, thereby cutting costs and improving employee morale.

Here are just a few of self-service’s perks:

• Satisfy employees: Boost employee morale by empowering workers with instant access to information ranging from benefits plans to training opportunities.


• Maintain accurate data: When employees are encouraged to update their own personnel information, the result is not only a reduction in data-entry errors but more relevant and up-to-date information.


• Recruit easily: Eager to fill a new position? Let candidates come to you by providing employees with online access to job opportunities. In turn, HR managers can easily search for suitable candidates rather than sift through stacks of resumes.


• Reduce inquiries: Put an end to time-consuming employee inquiries and let your HR staff get back to business. Thanks to self-service, an employee can find that missing pay stub or retrieve details on the latest benefit plan with the click of a mouse. Some self-service tools even allow users to communicate directly with a benefits administrator regarding benefit elections and confirmation.


• Cut costs: Offer self-service and save money. Forrester Research reports that a self-service approach can slash the cost of a customer interaction from as much as $35 on the phone to 75 cents online — a potential savings of 98 percent on just one transaction.


• Aid HR managers: Employees aren’t the only ones who stand to benefit from self-service. Provide HR managers with instant access to the information they need in order to perform budget and staffing tasks efficiently.


• Change priorities: By empowering employees, self-service relieves HR professionals of administrative overhead and frees them to focus on strategic initiatives such as recruitment.
  

Will Obama make paid sick days mandatory?

Earlier this month, the House of Representatives held a hearing on a bill that would make offering paid sick leave mandatory for employers.

If passed, the Healthy Families Act (HFA) would require any company with 15 or more employees to offer full-time workers seven paid sick days a year. Part-time employees would get a prorated amount based on how much they work.

Like the FMLA, the HFA would let employees take time to care for themselves or a family member. The leave would be legally protected — meaning employees could sue if they feel they’ve been retaliated against for using it.

The HFA is less strict than the FMLA, however. “Family member” includes any blood relative and anyone whose relationship with the employee is “the equivalent of a family relationship.” Any physical or mental illness, injury, or medical condition could result in a protected absence.

What about current paid leave policies?
The bill says employers won’t need to change anything if they already give employees sick leave that’s at least equivalent to what’s required by HFA. But employers would be prohibited from eliminating leave they already offer in an attempt to offset the mandatory sick days.
That means companies won’t be able to reduce vacation time to offset the costs of additional sick time. And some experts interpet the provision to mean companies offering a general PTO bank would need to add seven sick days in addition to what’s already available.

What to expect
Attorney Mike Aitken, speaking at a recent Society for Human Resources Management conference in Washington, D.C., said he expects Congress to take a vote on the bill this spring.
The HFA was introduced in the Senate a few years ago and failed to move. But that was before President Obama — a vocal supporter of the bill — and an increased Congressional Democrat majority arrived in Washington.

So far, no states have made sick leave mandatory — measures have failed in California, Ohio, New Jersey and Washington. Three cities — San Francisco, Milwaukee and Washington, D.C. — have passed mandatory sick leave laws.

H.R. 3010, the Arbitration Fairness Act

Before the House Education and Labor’s Health, Employment, Labor and Pensions Subcommittee, the issue of mandatory pre-dispute arbitration clauses in employment contracts was front and center during its hearing on “Protecting American Employees from Workplace Discrimination.”

Jamie Leigh Jones, a former Halliburton contractor working in Iraq who had previously revealed that she was drugged and gang-raped by fellow Halliburton employees, testified about how she is fighting to obtain access to the justice system because she unknowingly signed an arbitration clause as part of her 18-page employment contract.

When asked by Congressman Tierney if she was aware at that time that she could be signing away her rights by agreeing to arbitration, Jones responded, “At age 20, I had no idea what arbitration was…,” and further explained in her testimony that, “I had no idea what an arbitration was other than a tiny paragraph included in the lengthy document that mandated that I could not get justice from the civil court system.”

Ms. Jones asked the Committee in her testimony: “How can this Country not protect us contractors, who have left our families to help our country in an effort to build democracy overseas, when we are victimized criminally?”

To date, no criminal prosecutions have occurred in her case. When she turned to the civil courts for justice, she found that her employment contract contained an arbitration clause, which if upheld, could result in preventing her from seeking justice through the civil court system.
Congresswoman Sanchez pointed out that H.R. 3010, the Arbitration Fairness Act, would prevent the use of pre-dispute binding mandatory arbitration clauses in certain employment agreements, as well as in consumer and franchise agreements. This legislation will ensure that the decision to arbitrate is truly voluntary and that the rights and remedies provided for by our judicial system are not unknowingly waived.

H.R. 3010 currently has a bipartisan group of 70 cosponsors, and has been referred to the House Judiciary’s Subcommittee on Commercial and Administrative Law, chaired by Congresswoman Sanchez.

As the world's largest trial bar, the American Association for Justice (formerly known as the Association of Trial Lawyers of America) works to make sure people have a fair chance to receive justice through the legal system when they are injured by the negligence or misconduct of others—even when it means taking on the most powerful corporations

How to Recession Proof Your Workforce

If you’re interested in keeping employee motivation, morale, and engagement high despite the impending downturn in our economy, it’s important for you to “Recession Proof” your workforce. By Recession Proof, I mean do the things that help employees remain motivated, determined, and inspired during difficult times.

Actions That Lead to High Levels of Employee Engagement and Motivation During Challenging Times
>Give Employees As Much Control As Possible Over Their Work
>Help your employees build self-efficacy and feel the “thrill of victory.”
>Keep the dream alive and celebrate your wins
>Communicate, communicate, communicate.
>Strengthen relationships
>Remove Unnecessary Sources of Stress

If You Recession Proof Your Workforce…
You’ll have a group of employees who are able to:
• Respond to challenges with a “can do” attitude.
• Remain upbeat and determined, despite the difficulties you face.
• Focus their attention on making a difference, rather than on complaining
about things they can do nothing about.
• Handle greater challenge, pressure, and demands without becoming stressed.


David Lee is the founder and principal of HumanNature@Work and an internationally recognized authority on organizational and managerial practices that optimize employee performance, morale, and engagement. He has presented at conferences throughout North America and overseas, and is the author of Managing Employee Stress and Safety, as well as several dozen articles on organizational and individual performance that have been published in a number of trade journals and books in North America, Europe, Australia, and Asia. He is also the creator of the CDs Stress Less to Be Your Best and Whatever Life Brings: Finding Serenity and Vitality Through Resilience have discussed more about Recession Proof your workforce in detail in our HRthehumanresource magazine.

Improve Your Hiring Process to Cut Cost and increase productivity

Did you know that an estimated two-thirds of employee hiring decisions may be lead to mistakes? You improve your hiring process so that you can cut costs and maximize productivity in your organization. Whether you're an owner, an executive or a manager, the following information will be beneficial to you.

Pre-hire employment assessments will also help your organization develop a strategic hiring process that will minimize the costs associated with hiring and recruiting employees.

Jim Sirbasku is co-founder and CEO of Profiles International, a leading provider of human resource management solutions and employment assessments for businesses worldwide is discussing more about this topic. Look at HRthehumanresource magazine's next issue for full article.