Why Do We Have to Make Things Hard?

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It seems HR, like many professions, has to make relatively straightforward concepts as difficult as possible to prove we're professionals.

In my mind, it's our job to make things as simple as possible. People are complicated enough without us HR pros making things worse.

I'm not talking about all of the compliance things that our lawmakers and regulators have worked hard to make as convoluted and nit-picky as possible, I'm talking about the people part. The true important piece we are responsible for.

What got me going today is the whole generations discussion. I really think this is one of those areas that got blown out of proportion to justify some HR professor's research budget and the income of many, many consultants. (Okay, that was a little sarcastic...)

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I am not saying people who grew up in different times with different political, social, and economic realities don't think differently. They do. Just as people who are the same age in the same community think differently, depending upon their circumstances (race, religion, culture, socioeconomic status, etc.). Over time, most get pushed into the same workplace mold the rest of us got stuffed into. If there is one thing I would like to change about the workplace, that would be it. We do not need a worker cookie cutter, making sure we are all as nearly as possible like the person next to us. In fact, that is a very bad thing.

I am from the "sex, drugs, rock and roll!" generation. Can you even recognize a hippie in the stick-in-the-mud self-righteous people we see around us in the workplace talking about the lack of work ethic in our young people today? Seems I recall hearing those same words from my parents back in the day.

Does that mean I haven't done training on generational differences in the workplace? No, because I have. And I think there is some value in it, just as I think there is value in bringing all types of differences to the attention of our workers and managers, whether that difference, is sex, race, religion, disability, gender orientation, or any other difference between people. I hope there is a greater appreciation and understanding of one another as a result so we can work together more effectively.

But at the end of the day, we are all people. We all want respect. We all want to feel valued. We need to be listened to. We want to know what our bosses expect of us. We want to know how they'll evaluate our performance. We want to learn. We want to feel like the work we did for the last 8 hours was important. That's the bottom line. One size does not fit all, even with those of us who are most alike.

We're different. Good. There's nothing wrong with wanting something different than the person next to you. Celebrate those differences and the value those differences bring to the workplace in terms of creativity, innovation, and yes, fun. But let's not spend our time making those differences a cause for creating another us vs. them division. Let's get rid of the cookie cutters. After all, we're not gingerbread men.

Photo by Pietro De Grandi on Unsplash

Let's Talk Systems

I am a big proponent for setting up systems. For many reasons.

HR is an interruption-rich environment. If you have never worked in HR, it can be a madhouse. I find that if I don't have some way to keep track of what needs to be done and where I am in the process, things get forgotten. Just because I was thinking of doing a task or partially done with a task when I am interrupted, my brain translates that to "Done!"

Often, multiple hands touch an action for different purposes. If you're a one-person HR department and do all of the HR and payroll yourself, maybe not so much. But for many of us, different people do different things. Take for example a new hire. Someone has to report the person as starting to work. Someone has to ensure the I-9 gets done. Someone needs to ensure the new person is properly set up in the HRIS (and possibly payroll, if the system is not the same.) Someone has to ensure they are scheduled for all of their orientation/new hire training. Someone has to set up their personnel file. Someone has to take care of sending out the benefits paperwork,....and so on. You get the point. How do you track whether everyone with an action to take has indeed gotten the information they need and completed their tasks?

People leave. Employees leave. They quit, you fire them, they die. Sounds a little hard-nosed., but face it--people leave. All of these have happened in my department. Sometimes with little or no notice. Does anyone know how to do their job? Can anyone pick up and at least fumble through the actions that need to be done?

We forget. Some actions in HR need to be done only once a year. Do you remember to do them? Can you remember how? Do you know where to get the information you need?

For these reasons and more, you need to set up systems. That means you have to sit down the think out all of the steps you take, who does what, when they need to be done, etc. There is nothing wrong with manual systems. I used them for years and they work fine. I have to admit though, I like to automate as much as possible. Automated systems can be easier to share as well.

So what are some of the systems we need?
- Continuity "binders." You may not use binders anymore--electronic files work. The idea is to  have everything you need in one place so that if someone comes into the job knowing nothing, they can fumble through. I learned this one in the military. People turn over all the time, so this is a great way to ensure continuity when there is no time for training. These should contain a process flowchart and/or checklist, who to call, links to references, where to find the documents, forms and manuals needed, and an FAQ.
- Checklists. Yes, I mentioned them in the last paragraph. If you don't feel like you need something as complete as a continuity binder, at least make a checklist. It might be my little military mind, but checklists are our friends. But only if we use them. Did you do this? Who did it? When? It's all right there.
- Task lists. I mean a list of every important task in your department. That way, you can easily see if you have people who are lined up to do all of them and that you have continuity documents for all of them. This will also allow you to set up a task reminder system.
- Task reminder system. If you don't do a task every day, it's a good idea to have a reminder set up, with an early reminder to start gathering information in advance. The year goes by with the speed of light and annual tasks come up before you know it. Time for the annual handbook review. Check. Time to send out the Medicate Part D Notices. Check. Gee, has it already been 15 days for that FMLA certification? What's going on with that?
- Cross training. Look at that master task list. Does every task have a primary and an alternate person assigned? If it's a critical task, maybe even a back up for the back up. I'm just saying...stuff happens. The primary of course, is the person who does the job every day. The backup should at least have been trained on the task and can do it, with the assistance of the continuity book.
- Quality Control. Even if you have a process, you need a way to check it. I had one person who would be the last person to receive the checklists back on a new hire. Her job was to review the checklist to be sure every single task was signed off and to do a spot check to be sure. She also went hunting for checklists if they weren't returned to her in a couple of days of hire. None of these tools do a thing for you, if they aren't used.

If you will take the time to set up (and keep current) systematic processes in HR (and the rest of your company), your work life will be so much easier and you'll be in better shape on compliance.

Penny's Top 7 Best Practices

In the last blog post, I talked about the Top 10 employment law mistakes. That blog was focused on compliance. Compliance is not my favorite thing about HR. You do compliance because you have to. It is a cost avoidance/risk management strategy. But compliance doesn't make you money. In fact, it costs you money--you just hope it is less than you would have lost without it.

Today, I want to talk about what types of HR practices can make you money. HR isn't thought of as a revenue-generating activity. It is seen as a cost. And it is true, that by itself, HR doesn't produce any products or services your customers buy. But I can tell you for certain, that your HR practices have a huge impact upon whether your company is successful because people matter.

So here are my Top 7 HR best practices that can make a real difference in your organization's profitability (and make it a better place to work.) My personal opinion is, "Grow Your People, Grow Your Business." Hence the graphic for this blog post.

1. Pay close attention to culture. Culture is what tells people what is really important, regardless of what your policies might say. It is really more of a leadership responsibility, but have no doubt that your HR policies can support the culture you want or they can undermine it. Consider a culture audit--if you are serious about building and sustaining a culture of a certain type, you have got to pay attention all the time. The foundation of a growth culture is trust.

2. Have the right kind of HR. Most HR departments tend to be one of two types. They are either all compliance all the time or they are what I think of as "tea and sympathy" HR--we want to make the employees happy. Most of the time, I don't fault the HR person--they respond with what they think leadership wants. Many companies have additional duty HR. These people were never trained in HR and have other responsibilities. HR is just an extra piled on to an already busy workload. In my opinion, you need people with superior interpersonal skills (especially in the coaching area), strong professional knowledge, and a business mindset. They should be thinking all the time, how can I help this workcenter be more productive? How can I help the employees be better at their jobs? What would have the most impact on revenue?

3. Hire right. If we hired right in the first place, we could prevent the majority of our people problems. I am not talking just about hiring right off the street--I am including internal promotions/transfers in this. None of us have a crystal ball. We are not going to choose the right person every time. But we can improve our odds by using a solid process. The topic for another post.

4. Not all employees are created equal--they are not interchangeable. We tend to treat employees as if they are interchangeable cogs. We treat employees as disposable. Somehow we have developed the notion that we can pick up a spare part any time we need one.  That's pure B.S. There are very real differences in knowledge, skills and motivation. If you pay attention, some employees make fewer mistakes, sell more, and are valued by your customers. This is worth something. Don't be afraid to pay for that.

5. Invest in your employees--especially your supervisors. Employees should be an investment, not an expense. I hear it all the time, "I'm not going to pay for that training because Joe could go to the training and then quit. I would be flushing my money down the toilet. Why should I pay for him to find a better job?" First, I pay for it because he will be better at his job while he is working for me. Next, I plan to be the best job whenever possible, so he doesn't leave. If you have limited dollars to spend, the single place where you can have the most impact is at the first level supervisor. If you invest nowhere else, invest there.

6. Listen. We don't always have all the answers. We don't even have the best answers. The people who know the most about what our customers want are those who interact with them every day. The people who know how messed up our processes are do the job every day. Get over yourself. Listen and learn.

7. Be fair (that doesn't mean exactly the same.) Employees value fairness. Management often thinks being fair means treating everyone exactly the same. It doesn't. Treating people exactly the same can be very unfair. If Sally makes you 25% more money than the average worker, why should she make the same amount of money as the loser who makes you 10% less than the average? Fairness does mean I need to lay out my expectations and hold people accountable. I need to tell people how they are judged and what I use as my yardstick to determine how I decide what to pay, but that doesn't mean we all have to be paid the same. I find employees to be okay with different treatment for different people as long as they can make the connection between that treatment and the standard. hey don't trust smoke and mirrors.

So there are my Top 7. Obviously there are a lot of other things you can do. But if you can focus on these, the rest will be easy.

Penny's Top 10 Employment Law Mistakes

First off, Penny is not a lawyer. So why am I talking about employment law mistakes? It doesn't take a lawyer to see what types of things repeatedly get companies into trouble. All you have to do it watch the news.

The law is intended to constrain our actions. It is the box that companies have to operate within. Stay within the lines and all is well. Stray outside, and the potential for expensive problems rises the further outside of that box you go. In other words, this post is about compliance and managing risk. (Don't worry, the next post is about actually doing things that can help your company make money.)

So what do I see as the Top 10 mistakes?

1.  Assume common sense and the law are the same. Business owners tell me all the time that they are just using common sense. Stop. There is no relationship whatsoever between the two.

2. Wage and hour. Paying people is tricky. The law was passed in 1938. The workplace was nothing like it is now. Wage and hour lawsuits are the single biggest liability a company has. Make sure your supervisors and payroll people are trained. You may think that your outsourced payroll vendor will keep you from making a mistake, but that is not the case. You need to know how to pay properly and do it, even though you don't think the rule makes sense (see Mistake #1.)

3. Employee misclassification. Yes, this is related to Mistake #2, but an mistake here may not only cause you a wage and hour problem, but carry over into ERISA and tax compliance. There isn't room here to get into details, but I am talking about exempt vs. nonexempt on one hand and independent contractor vs, employee on the other. The key thing to remember is that the going is assumption is that all of your workers are nonexempt employees. If you think they should be classified differently, be prepared to prove it. The consequences for being wrong can be onerous.

4. Interfere with employee concerted activity. Employers tend to think that if they do not have a union, employees have no rights. Not true. If you have 2 or more employees who want to talk about a work issue (pay, benefits, and conditions of work) then that action is protected activity. I had a CEO once who wanted to fire an employee because she asked a question about a wage freeze in a town hall meeting. Don't go there. Be sure your handbook doesn't have policies you cannot enforce (like prohibiting employees from discussing their pay.) The National Labor Relations Board has been busy the last few years, so if you haven't looked at your handbook lately, the likelihood is you have several policies that are not OK.

5. Poor selection, training and support of supervisors. This is a soapbox issue for me, so I will try to restrain myself. Don't just pick the best worker or the most senior employee as the supervisor. Some people are just not suited to the role. The needed skill sets are different. Choose wisely. Since your company is liable for what your supervisor says and does, provide training on all of the things that tend to get your supervisors (and company) into trouble. Then give them some ongoing support--continuing education, mentoring, and coaching are critical.

6. Don't take employee complaints seriously. This was the topic of my previous post, so I am not going into detail here. Listen.

7. Don't worry about compliance. Small business owners tell me they don't have to worry about compliance because the government only worries about the big companies. There is some validity to that. However, I have had several clients in the 3 - 50 employee range who have had audits or other interactions with government agencies. Often, because of employee complaints (See Mistake #6). Some, just because they were in a target industry. A few, just because....

8. Don't know what laws apply to your business. The bigger you are, the more laws you have to worry about. If you are a federal contractor, things are even more complicated. You need to know what laws apply to you and just as importantly, which do not. If you are small, you may be trying to follow statutes that just don't apply to you. I had a company with just 3 employees contact me to look at their handbook. They had taken a sample from the internet some years before and filled in the blanks and used it. One of the policies in the handbook was Family Medical Leave, which they thought they had to provide. This is just too much money for a small organization. Nonprofits sometimes think they don't have to comply with employment laws because they are charities. You have an exemption from certain tax liabilities--everything else you have to comply with, the same as your for profit brethren.

9. Don't do/don't document safety training. No matter what services or products you provide, training is required--before the employee starts to work. Even if that employee is a temp. This doesn't have to be complicated. For many organizations, the requirements are relatively few, but you have to document the training. First, because we don't want anyone to get hurt. Then, because we really don't want to have to pay the fines (which have gone up dramatically in recent months.)

10. Poor selection/oversight of outsourcing partners. Many companies outsource parts of their HR function. That's fine. The field is complicated and getting more so every day. Most business people just don't have time to keep up. Your outsourcing partners should. That's why you are paying them. However, in the end, if things aren't done correctly, you, not them, are on the hook. Pick your partners carefully and check up on them. If they put up any resistance to your oversight or make it difficult, find someone else.

Bonus: Yes, this is a top 10, but there is one more I'll give you as a bonus.  Tolerate jerks. If you tolerate people at any level of the organization that are just jerks, you are asking for trouble. This seems so simple, but it happens in almost every organization. If they can't be coached out of their behavior, the sooner you jettison them from the organization, the better.

That's my Top 10. Someone else may have a different set, but if you start with these, you'll avoid most of the big dollar traps.

Whining or Winning?

There is a oft-cited quote about customer service that says, "Your most unhappy customers are your greatest source of learning." (Bill Gates) Most of us believe that. We dissect customer complaints; we do customer surveys. We try to figure out what our customers want, and we change processes, products and services to meet their expectations.

Given that, why do we have a totally different view toward employee complaints? When employees complain, we say they "have a bad attitude," they're "whiners,"  or "crybabies." I understand the sentiment. I even find myself falling prey to that same thought process. Then I slap myself and remember, these people can help me...if I listen. No complaints? Then you have a problem. A serious problem. This is the waving red flag that your employees either do not care enough about your organization to tell you when something seems wrong to them, or they do not trust you to do anything about it. Or worse, they may feel a complaint is a sure-fire way to get a pink slip.

Complaining employees can indeed be Debbie (or Donnie) Downers--complaining about every little thing, real or imagined. That small percentage should be encouraged to go somewhere else. But most employee complaints have some merit. Employee complaints can help me discover why my turnover is so high. Why the company can't seem to meet deadlines. Which customers are costing me more to service than they are actually adding to my revenue. Who might be doing things they shouldn't. Where there might be hidden risks and liabilities. But I have to listen. More importantly, employees have to know I listened.

Listening is not the same as hearing. I can hear the words and ignore the meaning. I can also focus on the wrong things because of the filter I am listening through. Let's say an employee complains about a company policy. I am assuming you had a decent reason for implementing the policy in the first place, although that isn't always the case (the soapbox for another day.) So why the complaint? Is the employee complaining because they feel they lost something they had before the policy? Is it because the process created by the policy is cumbersome? Is there a message they are taking from the policy that is really the cause for their concern (you don't trust me)? Or was the policy and the reason for it poorly communicated?

I can give many examples, but I am sure you can think of many on your own. I want to talk more about how to listen. Most employees want to and will generally try to, complain inside a company first. And believe me, I want to know about a possible problem before anyone outside of the company knows. Usually that complaint is going to be to the supervisor. That means I need to ensure my supervisors know how to accept complaints and take care of them. If the supervisor is the source of the complaint, there needs to be another way to complain. Some ideas are a hotline, anonymous email, suggestion boxes, town hall meetings, and other opportunities to meet and talk to someone who can take the complaint (and know what to do with it.) Your HR Department is often such a place. Many people resist setting up complaints methods (especially anonymous ones) because they don't want people jumping the chain of command or being malicious in their complaints. I get it. The first usually doesn't happen if an employee trusts their chain of command and the last one happens very rarely. The vast majority of the complaints received will have some validity.

Listening is not enough. Once you have been told something--even if you think there is little or no truth to it--you have to look into it. Too many times I have seen companies blow off a complaint about a worker or supervisor because she's a nice person or he is a good family man. They may even ignore multiple complaints. Then there's a major incident and no one told them--until the EEOC calls. You don't want to be that company. So look into every complaint. If you can't be objective, find someone who can. Get the facts. Act. Tell the employee(s) what you have done to fix the issue (or why it's really not an issue.)

Treat your employee complaints like customer complaints and you'll have a better workplace and more profitable company.