The start of the New Year is a good time to review your Employee Handbook to make sure it’s up- to- date and consistent with your current business practices.
Don’t have an Employee Handbook? BCN Services can help you create one. Employee Handbooks communicate the rules and performance standards to employees, encourage employees to behave in a certain way, help ensure that employees are treated in a consistent fashion, make known the benefits you offer and help you to win unemployment claims and lawsuits.
A handbook is a good way to communicate to employees that the company intends to comply with all federal, state and local law. It also allows you to address a wide variety of policies without restricting your ability to respond on a case-by-case basis. A handbook provides a framework for dealing with various circumstances, but should not act as a step-by-step guide for how to deal with every situation that may arise.
Generally policies should be written and shared on a companywide basis to avoid any types of miscommunication or claims of discrimination.
Having different policies for different departments can get you into trouble if you don’t have a legitimate business reason for doing so. Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits not only intentional discrimination but also neutral job policies that affect people of a certain race or color and that are not related to the job and needs of the business.
BCN Services can help you examine your workforce as a whole and in specific departments to ensure that there is no unintended discrimination and develop policies and an Employee Handbook that will best serve your business and workplace. Contact us for assistance anytime.
Amanda Cline, HR Generalist