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HR Management

Wellness program: Can you require employees to join?

01/01/2008

A “perfect storm” of an aging work force, escalating health care costs, more obese and sedentary employees and a looming shortage of skilled workers could drive organizations to make their wellness programs mandatory within a few years …

GPS to track employees

01/01/2008

Q. I would like to install GPS tracking devices in company-owned vehicles to track my employees’ whereabouts and determine whether they are making effective use of company time. I would prefer not to notify my employees that I will be installing these devices. Would I subject my company to any liability for violating our employees’ right to privacy if I take this step? …

Different grooming rules for different employees are legal

01/01/2008

Tattoos, body piercings, wildly colored hair—these days it seems as if just about anything goes in the workplace. Employers that want some sense of decorum at work may feel as though insisting on a dress code marks them as dinosaurs. Rest assured, however, that you can insist on a reasonable dress and grooming code …

How to comply with Florida’s Drug-Free Workplace program

01/01/2008

Employers participating in Florida’s Drug-Free Workplace (DFW) program must be careful to follow its strict guidelines or risk incurring workers’ compensation benefit liability. In exchange for lower workers’ compensation premiums, Florida employers can agree to adopt the DFW program …

Set harassment policies employees can understand and follow

01/01/2008

The best—quite possibly the only—protection employers have against losing a sexual harassment lawsuit is an effective sexual harassment policy. But a policy isn’t worth the paper it’s written on if employees don’t know about it or find it hard to use …

FBI says Atlanta police failed to pursue child pornographer

01/01/2008

The FBI has charged Terrill Crane, the husband of Atlanta police sergeant Tanya Crane, with paying more than a dozen underage girls to have sex with him. Worse, the FBI says it has evidence that the Atlanta Police Department first learned about the alleged crimes seven years ago …

Valdosta Tech president swept up in card abuse audit

01/01/2008

Robert Abene, president of Valdosta Technical College, resigned days after his son was arrested on charges of misusing a state-issued credit card. Abene said he was resigning to focus on his family …

Don’t discount cost of harassment lawsuit—Even if you win

01/01/2008

Lots of employers win sexual harassment lawsuits, but not until they have had to air their dirty laundry in public—and pay for the privilege, too. That’s one reason to insist on a professional workplace free of sexual innuendo and harassing behavior. HR performs one of its most valuable services when it impresses on management the high cost of winning a sexual harassment lawsuit …

Can disclaimers keep handbooks from becoming employment contracts?

01/01/2008

Q. Are disclaimers in employee handbooks valid in North Carolina? …

Can we search employees’ work areas while investigating a string of thefts?

01/01/2008

Q. I work for an Internet company with about 50 other employees. Recently, there have been several complaints around the office about theft of personal property. The problem has become a distraction in the workplace and I was asked to investigate the incidents.

Our employee manual does not have any policies prohibiting theft of personal property, and there are no notices that warn employees that their work areas may be searched. What right does my company have to search a suspected employee’s work space and personal items to try to locate property not owned or related to my company? …