Category: HR Management & Compliance

There are dozens of details to take care of in the day-to-day operation of your department and your company. We give you case studies, news updates, best practices and training tips that keep your organization fully in compliance with ever-changing employment law, and you fully aware of emerging HR trends.

Supreme Court ruling bolsters use of mandatory arbitration

by Charles S. Plumb Employers requiring employees to submit disputes to mandatory arbitration rather than filing a lawsuit got a boost from a November 26 U.S. Supreme Court ruling in an Oklahoma case. In the case, two employees of Nitro-Lift, a provider of services to oil and gas well operators, left their jobs to work […]

How to Help Line Managers Do Their (and Your) Job

Yesterday’s Advisor addressed the challenge of managers who won’t manage. Today, what to do about it, plus an introduction to an easy-to-use checklist-based HR audit system. Here are three steps you may take to help your managers manage: 1. Make Responsibilities Clear To start with, of course, you need good, clear policies and procedures. Then […]

New year brings changes to New Hampshire employer safety programs

by Jeanine Poole New Hampshire’s requirements for employer safety programs are changing. Passed in June, House Bill 1587 goes into effect on January 1, 2013. The new law provides: Employers with 15 or more employees (formerly 10 or more employees) must have a written safety program filed with the New Hampshire Department of Labor (NHDOL). […]

Making Managers Manage

Surely one of the most frustrating things about HR is managers who won’t manage. HR sets up its policies, practices, and systems and then managers don’t follow through. Some don’t care, some can’t, and some just don’t have the backbone to make tough calls. One thing’s sure—when things go South, HR’s going to catch the […]

Train Managers to Resist Retaliation

How can you keep your managers out of the retaliation danger zone? First of all, they have to recognize the danger zone (go here for yesterday’s danger zone list), and then they need to know to contact HR before taking action. Keeping Managers Out of the Danger Zone Are you in the danger zone? If […]

Ignoring the Basics Can Lead to HR Failures

In yesterday’s CED, we offered tips for managing the basics of HR legal issues. Today, the rest of the tips and an introduction to a California-specific resource for your employee handbook policies. Once again, a tip of the CED hat to attorneys John K. Skousen and Christopher J. Boman, partners at the Irvine office of employment law […]

Do Your Managers Know How to Resist Retaliation?

Gauge your managers’ current knowledge about retaliation with these quick cases: Peter worried that a dangerous chemical was being used without proper protection, and he reported it to the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). His boss, Sheila, was not happy. “Peter’s wrong,” she said. “There’s nothing unsafe about our process. And I’m miffed […]

IRS sets 2013 standard mileage rate

The IRS has announced the 2013 standard mileage rate to use in computing the deductible costs of operating an automobile for business use. Employers often use the rate to determine how much they will pay employees for using their personal vehicles for work-related purposes. The 2013 rate for transportation or travel expenses is 56.5 cents […]