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Absence Policies and Leave Administration Lacking Rigor and Framework, Study Says

The widespread use of manual and improvised procedures to measure, mitigate and administer employee absence suggests that many employers are taking substantial compliance risks with regard to the Family and Medical Leave Act, according to the ADP Research Institute study, Total Absence Management: Two Decades After the Passage of FMLA. Even though lost productivity due […]

Best Practices for Holidays? Let’s Find Out

By Compensation.BLR.com Editor Robert Brady For years, BLR® has surveyed HR and compensation/benefits professionals to find trends in policy and practice. We appreciate your participation in our series of brief, targeted surveys. Today’s survey topic: Holiday Practices. We’ll publish the results in a future issue, and we’ll also send you a PDF report. (Be sure […]

Corporate Pensions’ Funded Status Continued to Improve in September

Corporate pensions’ September funding levels continued to recover, gaining ground on rising interest rates that reduced the funds’ liabilities. Three benchmark measures of the funded status of typical corporate retirement plans all showed improvement from August and record-low levels recorded earlier this year. Pension liabilities, or benefit obligations, of the 100 largest corporate defined benefit […]

Employers Must Consider Transferring Employees Who Require Specialized Medical Care

Employers must consider transferring employees with disabilities so they can be close to medical care, the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in Sanchez v. Vilsack (No. 11-2118 (10th Cir. Sept. 19, 2012)). Clarice Sanchez worked as a secretarial employee for the U.S. Forest Service. When she fell at work, she sustained brain damage […]

Romney: Dodd-Frank Act a ‘Boon’ to Big Banks

Retirement plans’ fortunes are tied to the financial markets — and how the federal government regulates them — and there has been no bigger development in that arena than the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform Act of 2010. The law made news Oct. 3, when presidential candidate Mitt Romney criticized Dodd-Frank’s “too big to fail” provision, […]

Retirement Plan Access More Widespread Than Many Believe

Concerns about whether enough Americans have access to retirement savings plans regularly drive alarmist headlines and heated Capitol Hill hearings, but two recent studies indicate that workers’ access to such plans is, in fact, widespread. For U.S. workers most likely to be able to save and to be focused on preparing financially for retirement, coverage […]

Creating wellness programs that work: 6 essential components

Creating a wellness program that works can seem like a daunting task. How do you get employees to participate? How do you keep costs in check and ensure it creates cost savings? You may be surprised to learn that there are only 6 essential components to creating a wellness program that really works.

leadership lessons learned the hard way

Leadership lessons learned the hard way

The other day, I had the opportunity to reflect on some of the biggest lessons I’ve learned as a manager. Most of them were learned the hard way, and I have the scars to prove it. I’ve made more than my fair share of mistakes over the course of my career, but I’ve also learned […]

Canadian citizenship applications under closer scrutiny

by Gilda Villaran Fraud in Canadian citizenship applications has been a concern. Following an investigation by police and the Canadian border agency, the Immigration Minister announced on September 10 that Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC) is proceeding to revoke the citizenship of 3,100 people who obtained it by fraud. The discovery of this amount of […]

I’m Worried They’re Doing the Laundry Instead of the Work

Flexible scheduling and telework invariably raise the question in managers’ minds, How do I know they’re working? Consultant Dayna Fellows says, If they’re getting the job done, maybe you shouldn’t care about the laundry. One of the advantages to telecommuting that many organizations find is that it forces managers to manage by results rather than […]