Management & Management Issues

Two completely different books. One is published and the other is invisible. A company handbook reflects policies, procedures, ethics, core values and mission statement; depending on the playbook (good or bad) it’s either followed or ignored. Bad leaders think they can disregard laws and regulations, including the company’s own handbook. Good leaders follow the rules consistently and are transparent for all to see. A portion of Bad leaders can put on a great show in meetings and through messaging, it doesn’t last. Good leaders know to be honest and upfront.

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Let’s walk through the playbooks.

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Good Leadership Playbook

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Let’s talk about it. This playbook should only be used if you want to succeed in business, in leadership, and as an employee who wants to grow in a good environment. It’s not about being perfect, some of the strongest leaders admit to mistakes made along their path to the top. Those mistakes shaped them.

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Chapter 1 - Understanding stewardship of leadership at the top. It starts with care; good leadership recognizes the necessity to maintain and protect the business for it to thrive. Sustainability must be the ongoing practice. Without maintaining and supporting the environmental, economic, and social pillars of sustainability, depletion happens. A good leader knows that depleting has an end and once that end is reached the business closes.

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• Sustainability Development – changes a formerly reactive business into long-term growth with resiliency one; this mindset doesn’t just focus on the short-term revenue and costs and disregard the future. The core focus is on attracting the best talent, mitigating operational risk, reducing resource waste, and navigating environmental impact regulations in a proactive way.

  • Companies: IKEA, Google, Constellation Energy, Schneider Energy, and Procter & Gamble – different types of businesses with commitments sustainability

• Business Models – change based on the company and leader, but what they have in common is a value-creation. It means that revenue isn’t the primary focus. Leadership places customer empathy, an employee ownership culture, execute a faster decision making over analysis paralysis, and continuous adaption and changes that make sense. A good leader knows that the revenue goals will be met automatically given the areas of focus.

  • Good Leadership – knows that solving real customer problems (not false assumptions) and giving customers real-time value. Customers will pay for it to be done right, which is how trust is built. Their focus is on their employees; which makes sense to support and give credit to the ones who perform the work. Installing a strong culture of trust, vitality, and decision-making power.

• Workforce – although covered under the first bullet points, it bares to be repeated. It’s critical that strategic HR is in place; that ensure the goal of building a strong workforce happens at every level, on every team, in each department, and under all groups. It means a full commitment to the life cycle of an employee. Targeted recruiting, specialized training, and tracking development for employees. If the goal is to hire the best talent with the skills and experience, then a plan to support them is necessary.

  • Good Leadership - understand the importance of all employees; the bottom line is without them a product or service will never be done to client or customer. A good leader understands the term human gold, and like any precious object you want to make sure it’s taken care of.

• Planning – is a foundational tool, and that tool becomes a vision with actionable steps. Sometimes referred to as road mapping; the vision has direction, but needs resources allocated to sustain the journey and have plenty leftover once the destination is reached. Like any road trip, there is tracking and those on the trip are accountable for the progress or need to adjust for an unforeseen change or discovery of innovation. This example maps a product or service line.

  • Good Leadership – maps on three (3) to five (5) on average, smaller companies two (2) to three (3) years and larger corporations for capital-intensive planning ten (10) years or more. Technology is rapidly changing, which needs to be considered based on industry.

• Organization – a company needs to have structures to operate effectively. These are guidelines for authority, resources, processes, procedures, financial, payroll, insurances, injuries/property damages, workforce, equipment purchase, strategic planning, projects, budgeting, etc.

  • Good Leadership – not only ensures these are strong, sets up regular review to ensure nothing is overlooks. The end results in better operating organization overall. It helps with making fast pivots that will come along because updated data is already available.

 

Chapter 2 – Good leadership has a tool belt of skills. Employees find it easy to trust and respect them because they operate with integrity, are predictable, ethical and consistent with their words and actions.

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• Control-less Management – this means they don’t dictate down to the punctuations on how to do the job – absolutely no micromanagement. They empower and delegate. Since they are hiring the best talent with the skills and experience to do a job, then it stands to reason to let them do it. Entry level employees are supported with training to accomplish their role in the work they were hired for.

• Clear Communication & Expectations – articulates the vision and the roadmap, keeps priorities and update transparent. Set expectations. And uses active listening skills in any interaction, to avoid any misunderstanding. Will never give a quick answer, if they don’t know something. They will get the correct answer and reply with that information.

• Resilience – strong leadership has a calm certainty, even during times of strife and setbacks. It allows them to adapt and guide the organization, while maintaining a positive outlook.

• Emotional Intelligence – the ability to be self-aware and self-regulate feelings and emotions. Developing the understanding of what you are feeling and how those emotions impact your behavior, then being able to control your response or adapt your response. Once you master your own emotions, it allows you to truly understand empathy and have social awareness. It provided the ability to develop and maintain relationships.

 

Good leadership is consistent in their approaches which provides the stability employees need. A calm composed accountability structure, that is transparent. They have integrity. Don’t manage from egos.

 

Chapter 3 – Seeking out top experts and industry leaders accelerates growth and provides access to other networks. A good leader know that these connections can help to avoid expensive mistakes and gain a critical competitive edge in an existing market or emerging market.

• Consultants & Industry Leaders – partnering with top experts and industry leaders the following advantages: objective problem solving (identify blind spots and inefficacies), strategic networking (can open doors to partnerships, mergers, and talent pools), risk mitigation (both bring proven data and vetted strategies that work), and accelerated the execution (of a new initiate or fixing issues on an existing one). It’s worth the cost to partner with the best.
   

Chapter 4 – Endless Possibilities
 

Good leadership doesn’t see an ending; it only sees possibilities. Their viewpoint is on sustainable development, making better decisions and faster decisions. Creating the business model that works with a commitment to constant improvement. Listening to your clients or customers; their needs drive your product, so their opinion counts. Employees are human gold, hire the best, have program in place to support and empower them. A healthy business can afford to pay top dollars and great benefits. Planning is a foundation tool, used and never abandoned. Create the operating structures. Chose only to work with the best…it will open doors.

 

 

Bad Leadership Playbook

 

Let’s talk about it. It’s important to only use these behaviors if you want to fail in business, in leadership, and as an employee. All are 100% guaranteed, based on the level of failure you are looking to achieve using one or more to reach that goal sooner.

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All are behaviors and interchangeable with employees at all levels in the workplace. Behaviors can be changed, when they aren’t, it’s a guaranteed rocky road to the end.

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Chapter 1 – Selecting the legacy leadership wants to leave. It’s important for bad leadership commits to the one that speaks to their philosophy of poor judgment and complete disregard for employees, clients and vendors.

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• Change Resistant – being so entrenched in a rigid belief that that doesn’t allow any flexibility to adapt to changes in technology, efficiency, R&D results, and how the world is changing outside. Leadership or employee’s activity chose to resist opportunities and make excuses in hindsight.

  • Companies: Kodak, Xerox, B&L, Toys “R” Us, Blockbuster, and Compaq – all miss stepped, elected to resist, and some bankrupted.

• Fraud Model – building a business based on the fraud model; it’s golden until the foil falls off and then it’s inevitable that the business will fail. Leadership in this behavior is a risky risk taker, trying to outrun the fraud game before the collapse.

  • Companies: Enron, Theranos, and FTX – all collapsed and defraud employees and/or investors.

• Reckless Decisions – this behavior is all about financial gains and nothing more, operating in regulation loopholes or pushing the limits to see how far profits can go with complete disregard to strategic planning to support the business when the bubble pops.

  • Lehman Brothers, Northern Rock, Washington Mutal, and Myspace – the first three all overexpanded in the financial crisis 2007-2008 without safeguards and lost. Myspace elected profits over users.

 

Chapter 2 – Skills necessary to be unsuccessful and bad leaders excel at them. It’s about control; to keep others down, always confused, and to ensure blame can be directed at someone other than the bad leader.

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• Control by Micromanagement – if you keep the leash tight, you have tighter control. Because if you delegated and allowed others capable of successfully managing or accomplishing those tasks, then the bad leader loses their control over the entire situation. It’s not about the work that needs to be done, or the quality of the results - it’s about the bad leader’s ego that requires them to be in control and always right (because they are generally wrong).

• Unclear Communication & Expectations – this one is essential, if other managers and employees don’t understand the communication from the top – exactly as intended. If communication keeps changing causing unnecessary chaos – absolutely intended. If no one knows what the expectations are, except the bad leader – as intended. Bad leaders need to be in control of the hidden narrative. How else would they place blame on other managers and employees for not accomplishing it, when directives and invisible expectations were provided (because they fail at basic communication skills and have no idea what expectations are because they can’t plan).

• No Accountability Accountability – this starts with the inability to communicate effectively in any form and in any setting. To pass on the blame on others when anything goes wrong, something isn’t done or a client is upset - a bad leader knows they need to control it. So, they pull the accountability card. They know most employees and managers understand accountability and have pride in their work – those are the ones bad leader’s target. A bad leader never holds themselves accountable, it’s all about bad mouthing and blame-shifting.

• Finest in Favoritism – every bad leader needs to have blind faith followers called favorites. These favorites aren’t selected for their skills experience or abilities; they can’t do the work necessary to move it along. Their purpose is to support the ego of the bad leader. From the leader perspective they need to have a lower IQ and moral compass than they do, because those qualities make them easy to manipulate into wrongdoing.

• Against Employee Growth – this one should be obvious given the other skills above; if you hire better talent or develop employees’ skills and aptitude – you risk losing control. It’s impossible for a bad leader to lead intelligent, smarter, and highly skilled employees who can see you are a fraud or failure in your role. So you tend to drive these workers out or stop their growth path up.
   

Chapter 3 – Every bad leader needs to refill their tank from time to time, therefore they need to associate with like minds.

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• Crony Club Memberships – this one is critical; can you even imagine what chaos would endure if these memberships weren’t paid! Bad leadership needs to keep them consulting with other businesses in the same industry, vendors, and independents who agree with the same narrative of blame-pointing.

  • It’s the economy – bad leaders will always vote for policies that are directly the cause of the cost increases to the business – their own business. It’s a stunning practice and they are committed (also, they have no idea what words mean when they form sentences and the sentences form paragraphs). ‘Frank said it’ or ‘Heard it on the radio’ is where you get the truth of the matter on the subject.

  • It’s employees nowadays – bad leaders need to blame employees – if there were good employees (like back in the day), work would get done. All they want is more money. They want breaks because they’re lazy. They just stop showing up. They don’t like it when we ride them to work harder, instead of longer. Can’t meet production because of them.

  • It’s lack of cash flow – bad leaders will never admit because of their inability to plan and run a functional business. Instead, it’s not them taking the cash off the top that’s the issue, it’s got to be a mistake or tax increases. Bad leaders + Bad accounting staff always seem to go together (strange coincidence).

• The Consultants – bad leadership always finds bad consultants. Shockingly bad consultants, because they ‘get it’ and are guaranteed to deliver no results or improvements – bad leaders consider this well spent money. Real consultants can provide the guidance; steps needed and outline the challenges and changes – a bad leader will state waste money and reject those improvements.

 

Chapter 4 – The Ending

 

Bad leadership is not always the top, some started at the bottom of the company or another, some opened the business, or some were gifted the role by family or connections. It doesn’t matter how, because it doesn’t change the current reality or the determined path under their leadership.

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Bad leaders, managers, or employees all shared the same thought processes and lack good skills that come with a combination of experience (learning what works and doesn’t work), continual learning (training, educations, and skill building), and gain the emotional intelligence along the way to inspire workers, other leaders, and build a sustainable business for the long run. Not to drive the organization to collapse.

 

 

The Boat Analogy

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Most expect an immediate fall; but that’s not generally the case. Consider this, a boat can stay afloat on its own or with people aboard. It will flow with the tide. It may hit land. It might be in deep water. It might have one person doing all the rowing and they continue in a circle pattern. It might have a power motor; it might have enough fuel to make the entire trip or maybe they run out of gas because no one planned. Could be a sailboat, but no one was trained in how to raise the sails, so they float.

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What is certain is that the business will end, someday. There is one alternative, the high-speed cruise ship that’s passed them multiple times, may ask if they need any help…but changes are the bad leader send a bird gesture as the water rises on his boat and sharks’ circle.

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Workplace Survivors

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Congratulations! You most likely survived multiple boats over your work life filled with bad leadership, poor quality managers, questionable co-workers and monsters. You made it. You held up your end flawlessly – job well done. 

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I need to address Workplace Survivor Syndrome which is an emotional, psychological, and physical toll experienced by employees who remain with a company that has done large rounds of layoffs or downsizing. While my business is named Workplace Survivor, it's not intended to be an insult for a serious health issues resulting from large scale workforce downsizing. I cannot express enough to seek care and not try to cope if you were apart of this type or any type of downsizing. The focus of Workplace Survivor is not multinational corporations, conglomerates, giants of industry.

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Who's an Employee & Who’s Not

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An employee is an individual hired by the business to perform work in exchange for a wage or salary based on the role. Sometimes referred to as W2 employees. W2 is a wage and tax statement, issued in January for the previous year and necessary for filing income tax returns. Covers all employees all the way up to just under the CEO. The following falls outside the ‘employee’ category (and are based on the size and type of the company):

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• Board of Directors – these folks are elected by shareholders to govern the organization; they do not handle day-to-day operations and are not employees. A CEO in this structure tends to serve dual roles as a board member and employee).

• Independent Contractors & Consultants – these folks are brought on for special projects; they are paid through 1099 tax form for their hours. A 1099 form doesn’t withhold taxes (income and self-employment taxes), the contactor or consultant is responsible for paying them. All the business does it report what they were paid.

• Owners & Partners – business owners that operate under a DBA, Partnership, or LLC are considered self-employed owners, not employees.

 

Individuals who are employed by employment agencies are employed by the agency and not the business they are working for. They aren’t considered independent contractors.

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This is a long-winded way to say Managers are all levels are employees. That means they need to follow the company’s handbook.

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Manager Issues & Liability 

 

Let’s talk about it. Managers are the biggest liability (next to bad ownership) to a company. Employment attorney dreams realized.​

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May want to sit down and ensure your safety belt is fastened – because I’m about to get stone-cold real here. The first thing reviewed with new managers and/or existing managers, and I am clear on this statement:

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‘If you make a choice to go rogue; disregard the handbook policies, any employment laws, behave in an inappropriate manner, and intentionally disregard my advice on an employee matter small or large– I will document it in great detail, and wash my hands of you. This includes bad ownership. You’ll be held fully accountable and possibly liable based on the infraction, which means you may be sued. Don't think to use me as the excuse or blame factor for your actions.’

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Let me explain my stance, I will invest a lot of time educating and coaching a manager. Bad managers and owners are simply that - bad. After 25+ years in the human business - I don’t like any part of the discovery process internally with bad managers because I know everything flowing from them is pure BS. It’s suspicious how the ‘documentation’ quickly becomes ‘lack of documentation’, or a section of the text or email thread ‘missing’, and it becomes endless ‘I’ justifications on what they did right and think ‘their word’ absolves their part in the equation. Or the ‘facts’ keep changing when facts can’t change. Oddly strange how the employee’s version and they can supply the full span of the correspondence.

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Managers are human. Most employee-employer conflicts are unintentional or misunderstandings. I would expect to see where the breakdown started and in the normal language the manager speaks (aka foul language adjectives) or if you want to call HR a colorful term (aka foul language descriptive). My focus is on conflict and resolution. Decades in roles from managing others to human resources – I’m a realist. I get the HR persona jokes. I get that no one likes rules. I get that I’m called just about every known descriptive, regardless of if it is actuated or not. I’m not offended by it.  

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Not all managers are bad. Not all employees are right. Not all situations are illegal. To repeat, majority of the time it is truly misunderstanding or miscommunication.

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We have employment laws for a reason. It’s to protect employees and it also provides a clean road for the company to follow. Employees and Employers can have a smooth relationship – it a beautiful thing. Let’s review the process steps when an employee files a grievance outside of the company.

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Start to End Process (Liability)

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When an employee files a lawsuit; the process steps are as follows:

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• Administrative Stage – also called pre-filing. It’s the gathering of all documented evidence, filing a claim with the agency (ex: EEOC or state equivalent), and what’s referred to as a ‘right to sue’ notice or authorization from the agency to proceed to court.

• Litigation & The Court Process – the formal filing of the complaint (submission of legal documents of the claim), defendant (employer) files a motion to dismiss or an answer to the complaint, then discovery happens (this is the exchange of documents, answering questions and conducting depositions under oath.

• Resolution or Trail – if a resolution is negotiated out of court (by mediation or settlement) that means a deal is agreed to and not continuing to court. There could be what’s called a summary judgement (the judge rules based on lack of factual disputes) or trial (could either be judge or jury) for a final verdict on the case.

 

An employment attorney is necessary. It’s a lot of steps, some with deadlines based on the type of claim.

 

IMPORTANT: there are two types of employment attorneys; ones that support employers only and ones that support employees. You can contact the Bar Association in your area, and they can provide you with attorney’s information.

 

Liability

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Companies will stand behind their HR professionals and managers, who are sued as individual defendants in employment litigations – only if the HR professional and managers handled things appropriately. If not, then they are left to retain and pay from their own attorneys and may be responsible for paying a part of any settlement, legal judgement or verdict won by the employee.

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The important takeaway is that managers are responsible for knowing employment laws; as they are the first line of contact for their employees. And need to know what not to say, because giving inaccurate or incorrect information is never a good idea. 

 

 

Everything Managers Need to Know (Quick Reference)

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Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) Classifications (Federal) – these are the two main categories employees based on their job function are under.

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• Non-Exempt Employees – are fully covered by FLSA protections.

  • Must be paid at least minimum wage (Federal or State, whichever is higher)

  • Must be paid all hours worked (If a manager calls a non-exempt employee after hours to discuss work – employee need to be paid for those hours – ALL HOURS WORKED)

  • Must be paid overtime (1.5 times regular pay) for hours worked over 40 hours in a single week (State rules would take precedence over Federal) or like CA it’s based on over 8 hours in a day.

• Exempt Employees – are workers who are not eligible for FLSA protections for minimum wage and overtime provisions.

  • Exempt have a predetermined or fixed salary amount that does not fluctuate ($90,000/annual or $3,461.54/bi-weekly)

  • Exemption criteria are as follows:

    • Job Duties – the primary responsibilities (high level) are executive, professional, administrative, sales, or computer roles.

    • Earning (Paid above a designated level set) – paid above a specific level (like above Federal and State may differ, whichever is higher is what the is precedence)

    • Salary – must be paid a set amount per pay period that does not fluctuate

• Worked Hours – these are the hours the employee worked and are using to determined overtime. Sick, Holiday, Vacation, etc. are not considered worked hours.

• Best practice - Manager set yourself up for success, check clocks daily to catch any missing punches and work with your employee to update them. (Do not wait until last minute before payroll is due).

 

Non-exempt employees are heavily regulated by Federal and State rules, because these workers are exploited by companies and these laws protect them to ensure fair compensation and they are paid for all hours worked. This happens across industries but is most prevalent in blue collar fields.

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There is strict employer accountability, an employer must track hours accurately and will face severe financial penalties, back-pay fines and lawsuits. Best practice is to be transparent and ensure all hours are paid.

 

Wage & Hour – these laws are federal and state rules, that encompass minimum wage pay, hours worked, youth employment, and overtime rules.

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• Minimum Wage – this is the national (Federal) baseline for hourly wages to begin at. Your state can have their own baseline; in which case the employer must pay whichever is the higher wage.

  • Example:

    • Federal $7.25/hour

    • State (NY) $16.00/hour

    • In this scenario the NYS business would pay $16.00/hour, not the Federal $7.25/hour.

• Overtime Wage – for any hours worked over 40 hours in a single week (or based on State precedence), must pay at 1.5 times regular wage.

  • Example:

    • $25.00/hour (regular wage/hour)

    • $37.50/hour (1.5 times regular wage/hour)

    • 48 hours worked in a week (40 hours at $25.00/hour & 8 hours at $37.50/hour)

• Works Worked – all hours the employee worked need to be tracked by the employer and paid to the employee. An employer cannot penalize an employee for ‘not acknowledging hours’ and not paying them. Any changes to tracked hours must be communicated to employees.

  • Example:

    • Frank scheduled 39 hours, and worked 46 hours in a single week

    • Frank clock in/out using company payroll/service app; forgot to acknowledge all hours in that app

    • Frank must be paid 46 hours (40 hours at regular wage and 6 hours at overtime wage)

      • Employers CANNOT disregard the 46 hours, because they forgot to acknowledge this in the system. Frank’s manager is responsible for tracking these hours worked.

      • Frank MUST be paid for all his hours worked.

      • Clocking Errors – these happen and need to be updated and corrected in the system by the manager (as soon as possible) to ensure the hours they are validating are correct. CANNOT be used as an excuse for not paying for all hours worked.

• Youth Employment – there are more restrictions for youth labor laws, there are based on age range, types of jobs, and more. Based on State and industry, review the information with local Department of Labor to ensure you understand the limitations and documentation required in your state and area.

• Best practice - Manager set yourself up for success, check clocks daily to catch any missing punches and work with your employee to update them. Unsure you understand your company’s payroll system or apps used, so you make accurate corrections. Communicate with employees on changes in writing (best).

 

Job Descriptions & Compensation – continuing under FLSA, there are pay transparency requirements and job descriptions that list out the duties or tasks the employee was hired to do (if State has higher levels, those take procedure to Federal rules).

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• Pay Range Transparency – this will vary by state, this means the employee is required to list the range of pay, not a vague statement of the pay in the job posting and/or description of the role.

  • Example:

    • Transparency: Administrative Assistant $18.00 - $25.00/hour

    • Vague: Administrative Assistant $18.00/hour or up

  • Pay or Compensation Ranges were developed for benchmarking pay by market; this helps companies remain competitive for standard job roles.

• Job Descriptions – are critical in the workplace, these reflect the duties and responsibilities the employee will be accountable for completing. This is necessary to assign the corresponding classifications (noted above).

  • Employer requirement – needs to keep a detailed record of job duties and pay rates associated with for compliance with minimum wage and overtime mandates.

 

Important Notable: Compliance is embedded in every part of the employee/employer dynamic. HR isn’t making up reasons to delay your new job request or posting; everything needs to line up and be compliant.

 

Applicants & Hires – are covered by Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Title VII of the Civil Rights Act (EEOC), Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA), and Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), and a few more regulations and it’s important to understand the basic of each as a manager

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• Title VII of the Civil Rights Act (enforced by EEOC) – it’s illegal to discriminate against an individual because of their race, color, religion, sex (includes sexual orientations, gender identity, and pregnancy), or national origin. If they are qualified and can perform the job, then they should be hired.

• Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) – it’s illegal to discriminate against a job applicant with disabilities, requiring a reasonable accommodation during the application and interview process.

  • Reasonable accommodation – this means a change, adjustment or exception made to a work environment that lets the individual with disability perform the work with a modified work schedule, specialized equipment and/or changes to the building.

    • Schedule: flexible hours and/or extra medical leave

    • Equipment: special keyboards or mouse, screen readers, ergonomic tools or chairs

    • Building/Environment: ramps, quiet work areas, close parking spots

  • Essential duties – individual with disabilities must be able to perform the core or essential duties or tasks of the job.

  • Undue hardship – employers do not have to provide changes that cost too much or cause a major disruption to operations.

    • Example:

      • Redesign manufacturing flow

• Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) – it’s illegal to discriminate against a qualified applicant who is age 40 or older. Like ADA, if they can perform the duties of the job – then they should be hired.

• Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) – there is strict regulation about how an employer obtains and users consumer reports, credit histories and background checks on applicants. This one is why your HR would handle, as a manager, if this information is shared, it must be kept confidential.

• Best practice – Manager do not discriminate during hiring or after hire based on the employee's race, color, religion, sex, age, gender identity or national origin. Work with HR on any disability accommodation, do not attempt this on your own. Any information provided to you from employee and HR is confidential and should not be discuss with anyone else.

 

Workplace Safety & Health – this section covers Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and Workers’ Compensation; both have to do with work environment and safety in that space. When accidents occur, they need to be documented accordingly.

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• Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) – employers need to maintain health and safety standards in the work environment. There is a Federal and at a state level oversight. The employer is required:

  • Safety Program & Rules

  • Protecting Employee Rights

  • Training & Inspections

  • Report Injuries – reportable versus non-reportable on OSHA 300 report:

    • Immediate notification - Fatalities, inpatient hospitalizations, amputations, or eye loss

    • Recordable – any injuries that cause an employee to be days, work restrictions, medical treatment, and are serious.

• Workers’ Compensation – is an insurance the employer must cover injuries that occurred at work. It doesn’t not matter if the employee did something dumb – if they were injured. It is important to have a record of all injuries.

  • Injuries, First Aid, & Workers’ Compensation:

    • Injuries – any incident(s) where an employee was hurt, repetitive motions, contacts with objects, over-exertions and slip, trips, and falls.

    • First Aid (varies by State) – an employer may take care of an injury with a first aid kit or in some states an employer can pay out of pocket all costs associated with the injury. The critical is no lost days (scheduled days employees can’t work) and days of treatment and follow up of treatment. These are considered non-reportable injuries on OSHA 300

    • Workers’ Compensation – are injuries being paid through WC insurance, employee or employer can initiate claim and they it runs through the insurance process.

  • Best practice – Manager follow all internal injury and injury tracking procedures – always. Make sure you know the process well enough to train your employees on what to do if an injury occurs.

 

IMPORTANT: It does not matter if the employee did something stupid, if they were injured at work the incident needs to be documented and treatment of injury. Based on the level of injury additionally reported on the OSHA 300 log. Manager – make you an injury or incident report is completed in full and on file.  

 

Employee Benefits & Retirement – as a manger it’s important that you understand your company’s eligibility for health plans and retirement benefits. General understanding of costs. This is NOT a topic for managers beyond general information. Direct employees to HR for detailed information.

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• Best practice – Manager make sure you understand eligibility and basic benefit offerings. Do not allow the employee to tell personal confidential information, sway them to the appropriate third party or HR to assist the employee.

 

Child Support & Garnishments – this is NOT a topic for managers. Direct employee to payroll or HR. Do not attempt to answer any questions on these topics; business is required to comply by issuing authority and they are where the employee will be directed too.

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• Best practice – Manager do not discuss with employee, direct them to payroll.

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***Some employees like to overshare personal situations and problems, but as a manager it’s critical that you understand where the line is and don’t cross it***

 

Leaves, Sick & Time Off Policies – leave of absences and time off are two different things; as a manager you need to understand the difference between them.

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• Time Off Policies – these refer to what a company offers their employees as a benefit; they are not legally mandated by Federal or State agency or law. These are paid personal or paid time off (PTO) time (sometime private sick pay is under this as well)

• Sick Time – based on state mandate, and number of employees a company is required to offer sick time pay. Can be lump sum or accrual basis earned and time increments.

• Leaves – these are either Federal or State mandated leaves of absences or a company’s internal policy for employee being out a period. Paid or unpaid leave. Some protect the employee’s job.

  • Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) – this is a federal leave that allows an employee to take up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave, that is job protected for an eligible family or medical reason.

    • Employers must have 50 or more employees

    • Employees must have at least 1,250 hours of service with that employer

    • Employee can use for:

      • Serious health condition – employee, their child, their parent, or their spouse

      • Birth, adoptions, or foster care placement

      • Active Duty – qualifying exigencies for employee’s child, parent, or spouse on active duty or impending call to active duty

    • Child definition - means a biological, adopted or foster child, stepchild, legal ward, or child of a person standing in loco parentis (in the role of a parent), who is either under age 18, or age 18 or older and incapable of self-care because of a mental or physical disability at the time that FMLA leave is to commence.

      • For military family leave, the child of an eligible employee may be of any age.

 

Why is this leave important for managers to know?

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It’s the ‘trigger spot’, this is where managers fumble and cause legal liability for themselves and the company, which could have easily been avoided if they just understood the point where they needed to get HR involved.

The moment the employee informs their manager of a qualifying event THAT is considered the moment the company’s been notified.

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• The employee does not need to specifically state FMLA or a formal wording of an event – BECAUSE the manager should know what they are and how to handle the situation in an appropriate manner.

  • Best Practice:

    • Understand the qualifying relationship and reason

    • Employee’s length of employment

    • Protecting the employee’s privacy, this shouldn’t be an out in the open topic.

    • Contact HR immediately and explain the next steps to the employee. This means at notifications

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• Short Term Disability – varies by state, provide income support for employee’s who are out of work on non-work-related medical disabilities. Typical length of time is 6-8 weeks of coverage. This is administrated via insurance.

  • Supplemental Short-Term Disability – may be offered at your company, where employees can purchase additional benefits. This is administrated via insurance.

• Long Term Disability – varies by company, provides additional benefits to employees out on non-work-related medical disabilities. Duration of time varies based on policy. This is administrated via insurance.

• Paid Family Leave (PFL) – varies by state (currently only NY and CA), provides paid time off to bond with new child or care for sick relative at partial wage. This is administrated via insurance.

• Leave of Absence (LOA) – varies by company, most employers have an internal policy to help for situations that don’t fit in one of the above leaves, it an agreement between the employee and employer on the period the employee will be out.

• Best practice – Manager its important to be aware of the leaves and time off policies; for any medical notification speak with HR as soon as you are informed.

  • Strongly encourage new managers or existing managers to work with HR and have them show you paperwork and explain the process, so you have a full understanding of this leave.

  • Managers can be held personally liable if they are informed and do not start the leave process with HR from that point.

 

Performance & Compensation Reviews – as a manger you must understand your organizations performance review process and compensation increases, either related to or embedded into a practice.

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• Compensation practice – varies by company, it’s important to understand how your company operates and follow those practices.

  • Pay Ranges – pay ranges per role, amount new hires are brought in at and what existing employees are at currently all come into play at this point. To avoid unfair compensation issues; new hires shouldn’t be brought in and paid higher than existing workers in that same role.

  • Labor budget – it’s critical to understand how your company looks at and budgets for labor dollars. If not, this is where managers place themselves in uncomfortable situations with the company and their employees.

• Performance Review practices – varies by company, it’s important to understand how your company handles these. They aren’t a requirement.

• Best practice – Manager it’s important to understand the pay increase structure in your company. Also, what the performance review process is or if there is not one. Do not create your own without the approval of HR; the process needs to be documented and added to company handbook for it to be policy.

 

Employee Management – as a manager, you need to be comfortable understanding the basic rules and regulations, from there it’s all about boundaries, expectations, and skills to support your team and get work done.

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• Company Handbook – this is your guide and let you know what can and can’t be done, the policies and procedures of the organization in which you need to comply with.

• Boundaries – these are about you and how you operate. You enforce them by your actions or words.

  • Examples:

  • No work calls after 6p (so calls after will not be reviewed until 8a the next day)

  • Email checked between 5a to 7p Monday – Friday (or if on vacation not checked at all)

  • Text not accepted after 5p (or not at all)

• Expectations – these are what you expect from your employees

  • Examples:

    • Understanding job description, roles, and duties

    • deadlines or project guidelines

    • Execution of goals

• Active Listening – practice this important technique of communication with employees, listen until they finish speaking and reply with what you heard and then answer or add to the conversation.

• Conflict Resolution – the goal is to understand the core of the breakdown, then work to resolve that issue and follow up to ensure the conflict is resolved. Remember, each employee will react or view this from a different point of view.

• Empathy – this is an understanding of another person’s perspective or thoughts, and the reaction to it.

• Emotional Intelligence – developing a base for reading non-verbal cues, creating a safe environment to support the individual or team in collaboration, morale, and overall engagement. This especially helps with conflict resolution.

• Avoid – the ‘friend’ method and ‘rage or shouting’ method, both will backfire and make managing others more difficult. Employee respect fairness and consistency, not favoritism and threats.

 

IMPORTANT: Never react or discipline based off of another employee's opinion of wrongdoing. Validate the information being provided, or you will get yourself into a situation that will never resolve it itself. Collect the facts, dates/times, documentation to make sure before moving forward with a conversation. 

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