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The Courier Mail on the weekend talked about the results of a blitz of workplaces employing restaurant and cafe staff in central and north Queensland. More than 50% of the 151 small businesses were not complying with workplace laws.

The sort of mistakes that were found were incorrect details on payslips; inadequate time and wages records (e.g: timesheets); incorrect wages rates, loadings and penalty rates.They face penalties of up to $33,000 as well as back-pay to the workers.

The thing that amazes me is that the Industrial Inspectors were surprised at the result!  From my experience small businesses have been really struggling getting their heads around Workchoices and the implications for their business.  It is not made any easier by the government announcing it had made sweeping reforms to Workchoices (which in real terms meant two bits of bugger all to the vast majority of small businesses).

No big changes have been made!  We are still stuck with the crappiest piece of legislation ever drafted in Workchoices, and small businesses trying to work out which bits of the State legislation (if any) should they be following and which bits of the thousands of pages in the federal.

That’s why we put together our Instant HR Policies and Procedures Manual to try and simplify what is an absolute nightmare through the state and federal jurisdictions.  We keep watching Federal Parliament hoping that real reform to the legislation and clarity will come back to small businesses in the very near future.

We look forward to sharing our next edition of the Manual with all current owners when that day finally arrives. Until then - keep your Manual handy and avoid being one of the statistics!

Until next time

Ingrid Cliff

We put your business into words

Heart Harmony - HR Copywriter

I was reading the New York Times and came across a lead story discussing all the downsizing happening in the USA at present.

The section that really hit me was Radio Shack in 2006 that sent “an e-mail message to 400 employees in its Fort Worth headquarters that read: “The work-force reduction notification is currently in progress. Unfortunately your position is one that has been eliminated.”

If ever you are the person who has to deliver the bad news, there are ways to sack someone due to downsizing.

1. Do it in person - no emails, texts, faxes or notes in the mail
2. Have all your paperwork sorted - this includes eligible termination payments, forms for Centrelink and details of a person to contact if the person has questions
3. Do it in private - do not make the person walk through the office in front of everyone. Treat them with respect and dignity.
4. Do it early in the week, ideally a Monday as this gives the person maximum time to start looking for another job during the week and get support as needed. Never terminate on a Friday or last thing of a day as this will leave the person with limited emotional support or capacity to take action.
5. Treat the person with total respect - No marching the person out of the building. Allow the person time to gather their things, remove private material from their computer, and have some form of appropriate celebration of their time within the company. Remember there was nothing “wrong” with the person - it was the position who was downsized and not the person.
6. Give support - wherever possible assistance with outplacement services to brush up a resume and to help the person get back into the job market is a great idea.
7. Do it quickly - this is not the time for long winded fluffy speeches trying to put it nicely. Get to the point and be 100% crystal clear on what is happening now and what happens next.

If you keep the motto “treat them with respect” firmly in the front of your mind and put yourself mentally in their place, you will generally make the best of a bad situation.

Until next time

Ingrid Cliff

Heart Harmony

Putting your business into words

Some people are predicting by Xmas petrol will be $2 per litre in Australia. This has significant impact on small businesses.

With your employees - some of them will begin to question if they can afford to continue to travel to your business if petrol costs continue to rise.

If you want to retain your team you need to look at options such as working from home a few days per week, petrol card bonuses once a month or organising car pooling within your office. Start NOW before you get the first resignation letter and tell everyone what you are doing - communicate clearly and repeatedly and you will head off some potential problems.

You also need to rethink all those meetings at different locations - you know the ones where people drive to your location for a meeting. People are going to start to ask - what is the return on investment for my petrol expense for attending this meeting?

This is a brilliant time to explore options such as Skype group chat or other virtual meeting technology.

Also look at the costs of your fleet on the road - maybe smaller cars are going to become your new company fleet standard rather than the big Commodores.

Petrol is a great opportunity for you to look at ways to improve your business bottom line and boost efficiency - if you just look at it that way!

Ingrid Cliff
Heart Harmony

Putting your business into words

When you are hiring a new employee you want to find out if the person will be a great match for your role. You want to discover a bit more about them as a person and how they generally operate under both normal and stressful situations.

Let’s be honest - you would dearly love to find out if they are stalkers, likely to rob your company or create a lawsuit by their bizarre behaviour towards clients … but you can’t generally ask those sort of questions.

That’s why I loved this article in the Indianapolos star. It talked about weird interview questions and here are some of my favourites:

• which character on Seinfeld are you most like and why
• if you were a fruit what kind would you be and why
• what movie star would be the best kind of employee and why
• what colour describes your personality

These are all great questions to reflect on your personality - but not in a job interview! Particularly the one about “are you a placid pool or a running horse”?

If you are going to ask questions, ask ones that are based on experience that transfers to your job. “Tell me about the best team you worked for and what made them a great team”, “describe the qualities of your favourite boss you have worked for”, “how would we know you are under stress” are more likely to get sensible answers than the fruit question.

Have a great weekend!

From running horse Ingrid

Heart Harmony

Putting your business into words

Recently I was asked how a company that had never had an employee in manual in place should go about implementing it with their team. It is a very common question and here are my thoughts…

With your team if they have had nothing to this level of detail in place it will be a cultural shift for them. I suggest starting with training your managers first on their roles and responsibilities. Talk them through the manual in some depth – make sure each manager has access to a copy. For the first time they do anything with the new rules – such as recruitment or performance review, sit with them while they go through the process to help them learn as they go.

Your managers will also want input into how the procedures work in their area. They may want to edit the words to better match their understanding or the internal operating processes of your company. Allow that editing process if you can, but you retain final approval of the changes.

Once your managers are aware of the content and have started on the editing, then inform the employees of the manual and its broad contents. Once you have a final version for your workplace I would run a training session where you talk through all of the most important policies with your employees – almost like a new induction.

Make sure each person can access the manual – either electronically or through a printed copy in each work team. Set a realistic timeframe for them to read it and ask any questions – two weeks to a month is time I would give. If you leave it longer they won’t read it. If you leave it too short, you disadvantage some people.

Hold another meeting to answer any questions that may have come up, make any final edits and then a week later the manual comes into effect.

Until next time

Ingrid Cliff
Heart Harmony

Putting your business into words

Part of the joy of running a small business is the chance to create a life not just a living for both yourself and your employees. Sometimes knowing what else you can do to create a fulfilling workplace (and not run the business into bankruptcy in the process) can be a challenge.

This week the Alfred P Sloan Institute released their report on When Work Works - a report of the winners of a major US competition for Business Excellence in workplace flexibility. This 90 page report is worth a read by any one who has employees.

Some of the points they have found is the best businesses all have a few things in common:

• These employers don’t see looking over employees’ shoulders as the way to ensure good work. They trust employees, but hold them accountable and focus on results.
• They don’t see the individual employee in potentially heroic terms. It is the team that must deliver performance.
• They don’t think that automatically putting “customers first” above employee concerns is the best way to succeed. They have learned that a workplace that addresses staff issues has a staff that is more responsive to customers.
• They don’t think that killer hours are the only route to profit. They try to ensure that their employees have the time and space for renewal to do their best work.
• They don’t say that “only work-centric employees need apply.” They find that dual-centric employees – who contribute to their communities and are involved with their families – are among their most committed and productive employees.

While many of the businesses profiled are medium to large businesses - the concepts of allowing flexibility for life, volunteering and study are applicable no matter the size of your business.

The other applicable concepts are listening and acting on employees comments and holding employees accountable for results not “face time” in the office.

You can download a free full copy of the report from www.whenworkworks.org.

Until next time

Ingrid Cliff
Heart Harmony

The challenge of employees using email in a business setting for private use is an area most businesses struggle with. The article linked to this post covers the issue in some depth from a US perspective - looking at recent US case law. While the Australian courts would not be likely to take these cases as precedent, they would still be informed by the content.

So what is the bottom line for company email policy?

* Companies need a stated email policy that clearly states all emails are the property of the company
* The policy needs to state all emails will be monitored
* The policy needs to extend to blogging, message board and forum posting
* It also needs to state all emails are stored on the companies server and can be searched
* Companies need to regularly remind employees of the policy
* Companies need to consistently enforce their policy

If you do that you will be half of the way there in any disputed case over who owns or can access emails.

Until next time

Ingrid Cliff
Heart Harmony

What is the strangest interview question you have been asked?

I think mine was many years ago when I was applying for job in a tribunal that meted out the law on things like workplace fairness - I was asked by the male head of the tribunal (in total seriousness) - “What will happen when you fall pregnant and want to leave and have babies.” Scared me right off having kids for another 10 years!

Today I was checking out a blog post by my favourite internet teacher - Ed Dale when I came upon this ad

We have a couple of openings in Melbourne and Manchester for Interns to assist in running our Internet business.

You will be paid!

You will not be paid much…;

We are looking for people who have a lot of enthusiasm and really want to make it marketing online.

It might surprise you to know that I have been an intern! It might surprise you more that I was a multi-millionaire at the time!

I really wanted to know the information marketing business from the ground up - so I took a commission only position with an organization so I could learn the ropes from the inside. I did it for a year and it was invaluable.

I also went and lived with Gary Halbert in Miami for a month. That was one hell of an experience!

Lets be clear - you won’t be doing glamourous work BUT you will see how everything hangs together and be on the inside working with Dan, I and the rest of the team. There will be a lot of admin type work and you will need to know your way around a Mac (notice that I said Mac) if your applying for the position and want to work remotely - a mac with leopard is a must - we live on iChat!

Dan, Rob and I spent about six hours yesterday working on forward plans for our business and we did it all on iChat

The way I see it you will be with us for about a year - I would of hoped by then you would be raring to go out and start making info-products of your own.

While I’m happy to consider “virtual intern” arrangements - in truth, we are both going to get a lot more out of it if you are living near-by, if i need you to help me with a location shoot holding the camera - it’s going to be a bit hard doing that from Boston.

For the Melbourne position, there is an option for us to provide accommodation, internet, computer etc as part of the deal. In Manchester you’ll need to talk to Dan!

For the right person this is a golden opportunity. You will need to be a go-getter (duh!) and if you have seen/read “the devil wears prada” - you’ll have a great idea about the level of direction you will get (I’m kidding - mostly…;)

Interviews will be conducted via iChat and in person at Melbourne and Manchester

You can send your application to eddale@mac.com

(now here’s a tip - think about your application, I barely passed high school, attended two classes at collage and as evidenced by the seven deliberate spelling mistakes above can hardly string two words together. CV’s make me sleepy - who you are, and what your prepared to do, what you love and what get’s you up in the morning (apart from the alarm clock!!) is far more interesting. In Fact, what you HATE doing and can’t stand is even more useful - a great job application is just like a good sales letter (or video…;.))

One final thing - In your application answer at least this one question

Think back to when you were little and you wanted to be a ballerina, fireman, six million dollar man, eric estrada on CHiPs (careful, we all have dreams…;.) what did your parent of the opposite sex say to you about your dream??

Have at it - Quick Movers get bonus points

Don’t you love that last question (and the ad)! It truly reflects the company, the people you will be working with and doesn’t pull any punches. A great example of an employment ad.

So what did you want to be when you were little. Apparently I wanted to be a teacher when I was very very little (and have 6 kids. Done that one, 2 of my own and 4 I raised for a few years with a previous partner).

What did my father say about that dream? “Hey the holidays are good, you are paid well and you always have a job.” As he was a uni lecturer at the time I think the answer was more of a reflection of where his mind was at in the middle of yet another school year!

So - over to you. What did you want to be when you were little and what did your parent of the opposite sex say to you about your dream?

Oh - and the job’s still open with Ed - just get in quick!

Until next time

Ingrid Cliff
Heart Harmony

Who ever heard of a company’s employee handbook being discussed around the world? Well that is precisely what has happened this past week.

Billionaire property Tycoon Sam Zell has just taken over the Tribune - a major newspaper in the USA. One of the first things he did to shift the organisation culture was to throw away the old company manual and rewrite it in his own unique way.

So why is it making headlines in newspapers and magazines? Why is it being talked about in blog posts around the world? Well - it could be the way that it is written.

Rule # 1: Use your best judgment

Rule #2: See Rule 1.

That’s it. That is the one hard and fast rule. Unless a serious mistake was made when you were hired, you have pretty good judgment.

One of the clauses causing the most debate includes “working at Tribune means accepting that sometimes you might hear a word that you, personally, might not use. You might experience an attitude that you don’t share. You might hear a joke that you might not consider funny. That is because a loose, fun, non-linear atmosphere is important to the creative process. This should be understood, should not be a surprise and not considered harassment”

Great idea – but it won’t stand up in court! Employee handbooks are seen as a company declaring how it intends to deal with a situation. While the manual does go on to say how they will handle any allegations of harassment - the damage is done by the first paragraph. The reason it is damaging as it declares the company believes that poor language, racial vilification or sexual harassment in its widest sense should be tolerated within a company. This will mean that the company will have a very hard time arguing they took reasonable steps to prevent such harassment occuring.

I did say it was quirky - and quite funny in places - “Making the building too hot, banging on trash can lids or loud bagpipe music are annoyances you can complain about …”

That said – there are a lot of great features you may want to consider incorporating into your manual – particularly the core values of keep your word, collaborate, no surprises, compete, play fair, take intelligent risk, reward successful performance, question authority, serve our local communities.

There is no doubt that the quirkiness has certainly raised the awareness of the manual to all staff and potential employees in a way few companies have been able to do. The test will be when someone (and they will) tries to defeat the manual in court - what will the court think about the quirkiness and humour.

Personally I love humour, but given all of the cases I have seen I would say leave the humour out of critical business documents such as employee handbooks. It only comes back to haunt you.

If you would like to check out their manual in full I have uploaded a copy of the Tribune Employee Manual here in PDF for your thoughts and opinions.

Is the Tribune manual great or a problem that could have been avoided?

Until next time

Ingrid Cliff

Heart Harmony<

As a business owner you can waste hours each week setting up rosters - only to have team members come back with changes they want to make (particulary during school holiday periods). This can set you into a spiral of chasing people to swap shifts to cover your roster.

A well considered HR policy should include some basic admin processes

Have a shift request book - that way if someone can’t work they should write it in the book before you do up the rosters (and remember to check and rule off the book when you do up the rosters for that week).

Get people into the habit of trying to find their own replacement from other staff if they can’t work a shift.That way they come and tell you that they are not available but Mary Joe will cover for them.

Have people initial their rosters to say that they have seen them.

Firmly and equally apply your “no show - not sick - no pay” policy.

By being clear on your rostering rules and procedures you will save hours of your precious time each week as well as reduce your overtime bill.

Until next time

Ingrid Cliff
Heart Harmony

www.heartharmony.com.au