• The HR Specialist - Print Newsletter
  • HR Specialist: Employment Law
  • The HR Weekly

Policies / Handbooks

Where there’s smoke, there’s fire … or, in some cases, no hire

12/22/2010
Many employers are deciding not to hire smokers, and still more are trying to limit employees’ use of tobacco. Companies are screening new hires for nicotine as a condition for employment, imposing higher health-benefit premiums for smokers and trying to help smokers quit. Policies run the gamut:

Lessons learned from the big WikiLeaks breach

12/21/2010
“If the recent WikiLeaks release of more than a quarter-million sensitive government files is not a wake-up call to companies about the need to proactively protect confidential information, nothing is,” says Michael Greco, a partner at Fisher & Phillips LLP.

The pain truth: Prescription drug abuse on the rise at work

12/17/2010

Employee drug abuse continues to be the trend that just won’t go away. And it’s not just illegal drugs causing problems these days. Quest Diagnostics estimates that the use of prescription painkillers by American workers and job applicants has increased by 40% since 2005. More than 70% of prescription drug abusers hold jobs, upping the risk of work-related injuries.

Is a policy still a policy if it’s not in writing?

12/15/2010

Will a court acknowledge a company “policy” that doesn’t exist on paper? One court recently did—even though the policy wasn’t written anywhere—because the policy was being followed by all managers. Still, when in doubt, it’s best to write it out.

Catch 22: The records-retention steps you must always be ready to take

12/14/2010

Employers and HR professionals hear it all the time: You must be prepared to preserve relevant documents and produce them if you are sued. You can take some preparatory steps to ensure that you can comply with inevitable litigation holds and are proficiently primed to assist your attorneys should litigation occur. This list of 22 to-do’s can guide your document and data preservation and retention procedures:

Can we prohibit texting at work based on the Supreme Court’s recent Quon decision?

12/09/2010
Q. What lessons should employers take from the Supreme Court’s decision in City of Ontario v. Quon? That’s the case about the texting police officer. We want to ban personal texting at work.

Can arbitration agreements include clause waiving employees’ statutory claims?

12/09/2010
Q. I am wondering if we can contract with employees to resolve employment-related disputes, including statutory claims, with binding arbitration. Are there any problems with this?

Porn at work is misconduct, even without a rule against it

12/09/2010

Give some employees an inch and they’ll take a mile. They stubbornly insist on pushing the rules and argue that if the handbook doesn’t say something is prohibited, then it must be OK. Fortunately, courts don’t often agree.

Leave disciplinary wiggle room in handbook

12/09/2010

Here’s a tip if you are revising your employee handbook: When it comes to discipline, make sure you give yourself some flexibility to deal with unusual circumstances. For example, if you want to use progressive discipline, be sure to account for the rare situations that may warrant immediate suspension or discharge.

GINA’s effect on wellness programs

12/09/2010
To help you better understand your obligations under the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act of 2008 (GINA), we’ve assembled these resources: