Every employee handbook should include the company’s overtime policy. When creating this policy, you’ll want to clearly outline which employees are eligible for overtime pay. It’s also important to communicate how overtime pay is calculated, as well as any necessary steps required prior to working overtime. In addition to explaining the policy and how it works, it’s essential that you tell employees why you have the policy in the first place.
When creating your company’s policy related to attendance and punctuality, you’ll want to consider several things. With the increased opportunity to work from home in recent years, it’s important to define how the policies apply to all employees — whether in the office or remote. In addition to outlining the policy and how it will be enforced, it’s essential that you tell employees why you have the policy in the first place.
Your phone chimes, alerting you to a new email. You quickly discover it’s from a former coworker and read the first few lines: “I am participating in a fundraiser for [insert cause]. Will you donate?” Though you don’t delete the email immediately, you close the message because you know its exact purpose: to get you to donate. You’ll think about it, or, more likely, you’ll start thinking of rational-sounding reasons not to contribute.
Imagine, instead, if you open the email and you’re greeted with the following introduction: “June 5th started off like any other day, but it ended with a life-changing diagnosis.” ‘Whoa, where is this going?’ you think. As you continue reading, you learn that your former coworker is fighting a serious illness and is raising money for the cause. You reach for your wallet, inspired to support an old colleague.
What exactly was the difference between the two messages?
Whether or not this is your first rodeo, creating or overhauling an employee handbook is a big project. If you know the traps you might encounter along the way, you can devise a plan to avoid them. These five pieces of advice will help you steer clear of common pitfalls during your next handbook project.
Want to pick the brains of other HR professionals? We’ve done it for you by compiling a list of the top six resources to help you write handbook policies and procedures. Click away!
Feeling hesitant about taking the handbook updating plunge? We know it’s hard. Before diving head-first into our complete How to Write Policies and Procedures guide, test the waters with these top tips for writing policies and procedures.
Although we saved this topic for last, it’s arguably one of the most important handbook decisions you’ll make. Before you’re buried in policies and procedures, be sure you’ve nailed down your handbook delivery method. Your chosen distribution channel will change the way you present content to your audience, so it’s important to know before you start writing.
How many online employee handbooks have you created? Chances are the answer is zero, zip, zilch, or nada. We, on the other hand, have become quite familiar with the steps it takes to launch your new or updated company policies. As a result, we created a checklist to keep a project like this organized and on track. This project management is baked right in to Blissbook, but since not everyone gets to experience the joy of this in-app functionality, we thought we’d share it with you here as well.
Listed below are the common milestones you will achieve from the day you decide you want to redo your policies/handbook through your launch and follow-ups. Want these milestones to-go?
Click here to download the project milestones checklist or just go ham and download the entire How to Write Policies workbook.
After pouring your heart and soul into your policies and procedures, your handbook deserves the best launch in the history of launches. As indicated in Part 2, your marketing / communications team can help devise a strategy for unveiling your handbook – and we’ve created a worksheet to make it easier.
Now that you’ve identified your project scope and goals, who should you involve? It’s best to start with a small team, but multiple viewpoints can create the best end result. It’s imperative that you involve the right people at the right time. If you’re too early or too late, you might run into avoidable issues, such as eleventh-hour budget concerns or the need to reengage leadership when your attorney tells you a policy needs to be modified.
Save everyone, especially yourself, the hassle by thinking proactively. Want to make that simple?
Click here to download our “who to involve” checklist or go all-in and download the entire How to Write Policies workbook.
Adulthood: When worksheets became fun again.