Andie Burjek, Author at Workforce

June 2, 2020June 29, 2023

Employers grapple with laws about work schedules

Chicago’s fair workweek law goes into effect on July 1, 2020.

Chicago joins the ranks of other cities like San Francisco, Emeryville, San Jose, Berkeley, New York City, Seattle, SeaTac and Philadelphia that have predictive scheduling laws. Oregon, meanwhile, is the only state with one of these laws in effect, while New Hampshire and Vermont have more limited scheduling-related laws.

The past few years has seen a wave of predictive scheduling laws, making it a hot topic in industries like retail and hospitality, said Ari Hersher, partner at Seyfarth law firm. Hersher described predictive scheduling as “the next big thing” — much like a wave of paid sick leave laws that began surging in the late 2010s and created a patchwork of local and state laws across the United States. COVID-19 has only increased this trend of paid sick leave laws.

Also read: Shift scheduling strategies can be improved through technology

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a few notable impacts on fair workweek laws in 2020, he added. Industries like retail, food service and hospitality that have been greatly impacted by the pandemic are also the industries primarily impacted by predictive scheduling laws. While COVID-19 has not stopped cities and states from enacting the laws currently in place, it’s uncertain if new laws will continue with the same momentum as they did pre-pandemic.

“It remains to be seen what will happen post-COVID. I think there will be an interesting push and pull,” Hersher said. “There will be a strong desire to not overly restrict these businesses like retail that have been so devastated by the coronavirus, but also [give] all these employees — who may have kids out of school or need to work multiple jobs in order to manage — the scheduling stability and notice that they can manage their lives.”

COVID-19 aside, these laws already exist in several municipalities. Hersher went over these laws about work schedules and how employers can work with them.

Also read: How to reduce compliance risk

The meat of these laws

Laws vary by city or state, but they generally include four common provisions, according to the National Retail Federation. These provisions are:

Advanced posting of schedules.
Employer penalties for unexpected schedule changes.
Record-keeping requirements for employers.
Prohibitions on requiring employees to find replacements for scheduled shifts if they are unable to work.

Predictive scheduling laws are meant to address common concerns hourly employees have, including unpredictable, unstable and often insufficient work hours. As a 2018 Economic Policy Institute article explained, “Employers in some industries have increasingly adopted scheduling practices that leave workers in desperate need of additional work yet hampered in their ability to actually seek supplemental work elsewhere or find a new job altogether.”

Certain scheduling practices that some employers adopt “shift more of the risk and costs of doing business from firms onto their employees,” the article continued. For example, they may require employees to maintain “open availability” for all hours the store is open, giving them basically no input in the days or times they work.

Also read: Leave management should be as simple as submit, approve and hit the beach

Impact on employers

These laws put a strain on employers, for whom most scheduling changes aren’t intended, Hersher said. Employees may call in a few days or hours before their shift starts, leaving employers little time to find a replacement. They need flexibility to create good schedules.

Also read: Predictive Scheduling Laws — What Are They, Where Do They Exist and Employers’ Reaction

The financial penalties for breaking predictive scheduling laws are substantial for employers, he added.

In addition, some employers may have to comply with multiple predictive scheduling laws, depending on what states or cities they operate in. Complying with this patchwork of laws is complicated and requires different workplace policies for different locations.

The Society for Human Resource Management suggests that employers should audit their locations. “A centralized staffing model can quickly become outdated, or even worse, a liability. Location-specific policy changes may need to be made, and managers may require retraining on how to handle staffing shortages.”

Also read: 3 Steps to Navigating Effective Wage and Hour Compliance

Potential solutions

Using predictive analytics to create schedules weeks in advance is one solution to avoid overstaffing and understaffing, Hersher said. Certain technology solutions may help, too, if they can help employers take different regions’ predictive scheduling laws into account as they create schedules.

Communication is also key. Some newer predictive scheduling laws include the “suggested interactive process,” he said. This is optional but encourages employers to have a dialogue with new employees. Usually, when someone begins an hourly job, their manager tells them what their days and hours will be. With the interactive process, the new employee can have their say in the conversation. “I have another job or other responsibilities these days and times, but what about this schedule instead?”

The employer has the ultimate decision over the employee’s schedule, Hersher said, but having that conversation can help employees feel respected and heard.

Laws about work schedules during the COVID-19 pandemic

Fair workweek laws are still in place and being enforced in the midst of COVID-19, Hersher said. For example, in San Francisco the Office of Labor Standards Enforcement is continuing to pursue complaints, file investigations and move forward with these laws like before. On a city-to-city basis, there are realistically different enforcement levels, he said, but it’s important to remember that municipalities or agencies don’t need to pause their enforcement work in light of store closures.

“Retail is already facing a lot of challenges. And whether the government wants to put a lot more financial burden on their existence is something they’ll really have to consider,” Hersher said. “It’s a delicate balance to come up with a law that doesn’t force shops to close but is also protective to employees.”

Hersher believes the conversation around predictive scheduling will have to evolve because of coronavirus.

While predictive analytics generally can help businesses with employee scheduling, it will be much more difficult to predict scheduling needs for the next year and half or so because of the pandemic, he said. Historical data from previous years may not be applicable in post-pandemic times, and businesses don’t know to what degree people will return to restaurants and stores.

He suggested that employers do what they can to create schedules far in advance and focus on honest conversations with employees.

“Employers can say, ‘We’ll give you 30 days notice, but please understand that our scheduling needs are volatile,’ ” he said. “People should [try to] understand each others’ needs and be mindful of them.”

Employers can also communicate to all their employees and explicitly ask who would want additional hours if they become available and what other days and times they could work. Taking a proactive measure like this can help both sides in helping employees get more hours and helping employers get the people they need.

June 2, 2020March 29, 2021

The most common scheduling problems for employers and how to address them

shift scheduling, technology, custom fields

Hourly employees have common scheduling problems, which helped spur a series of fair workweek laws now in effect in the state of Oregon and in many cities across the United States. The impact of these laws on businesses should not be ignored, though.

The COVID-19 pandemic has also added another layer to the scheduling complexity environment. Industries like retail, food service and hospitality that have been greatly impacted by the pandemic are also the industries primarily affected by predictive scheduling laws.

Depending on state or local laws, businesses all face scheduling challenges. Here are some of the most common scheduling problems and how to address them.

Also read: Shift scheduling strategies can be improved through technology

The most common scheduling problems for employers

1. Overstaffing and understaffing

The clear problem for businesses with overstaffing is that they’re unnecessarily increasing their labor cost with no return on investment, said Ari Hersher, partner at law firm Seyfarth. And labor costs are already one of the biggest costs for businesses, along with real estate.

Meanwhile, if a shift is understaffed, the business is not efficiently meeting demand. Its employees may be overworked and need to work extra hours, and the business may have to pay these workers unplanned overtime, Hersher said. Meanwhile, in jurisdictions with predictive scheduling laws, an employer may need to pay additional wage to staff that are added last minute, he added.

2. TIme

Creating a schedule takes time, and managers already have busy jobs. Using technology solutions could help, yet the Sierra Cedar “2018-2019 HR Systems Survey” found that only 42 percent of organizations use labor scheduling applications.

Also read: 3 Steps to Navigating Effective Wage and Hour Compliance

3. The need for flexibility

Managers need flexibility to create schedules, Hersher said. Employees may quit, call in sick or simply not show up, and then managers must figure out how to quickly find a replacement.

Employers in jurisdictions with predictive scheduling laws may have further responsibilities, he said. Some of these laws have employers document that someone called out of their shift, offer proof that they called and store the information for three years in case of audits. For managers who supervise a large number of employees, the number of call outs they get in a week may be substantial.

Sometimes there are tech solutions, he said, but the patchwork landscape of predictive scheduling can complicate that. Employers with locations in cities or states with different laws need a way to take all laws that impact them into account.

Also read: Predictive Scheduling Laws — What Are They, Where Do They Exist and Employers’ Reaction

4. Compliance

According to XpertHR’s survey “Top HR Compliance Challenges for 2020,” 10.1 percent of employers surveyed said that pay and scheduling issues is their top compliance concern, topped only by benefits (16.2 percent) and recruiting/hiring (28.3 percent).

The most common scheduling problems for employees

1. Overstaffing and understaffing:

Understaffing has an obvious impact on employees, leaving them overworked and with low morale, Hersher said. And industries like retail and food service with many hourly workers already see high turnover.

Meanwhile, given the right context, overstaffing also may impact workers negatively. They may get sent home, therefore not getting paid for hours they expected to work. Employees who earn commission for sales or tips for service may also find this situation bad, Hersher added. If there are only six customers and seven servers or sales associates, they wouldn’t expect to earn a fair wage for their time.

2. Predictability and cost of living:

Many hourly employees work in cities with high costs of living, and they could be working multiple jobs, Hersher said. A lot of these may be part-time jobs. For these workers, advance notice in what their schedules will be has a lot of value.

As the Economic Policy Institute explained it in a 2018 article, “Volatile hours not only mean volatile incomes, but add to the strain working families face as they try to plan ahead for child care or juggle schedules in order to take classes, hold down a second job, or pursue other career opportunities.”

The power of analytics

Predictive analytics could help many of these issues, Hersher said. Retail has experienced an explosion of data studying people’s buying habits, how long they stay in a store and how much they purchase, which should allow employers to staff more efficiently.

This could benefit employers and employees in a few ways. With predictive data, employers could still create schedules in advance, which means predictability for employees. And if employers are able to create more accurate schedules, their risk of either understaffing or overstaffing decreases, which could help deter some of the negative impacts that understaffing and overstaffing may have on both employers and employees.

“The more you can spot trends, the better you can anticipate needs and the more you can reduce changes,” he said.

May 25, 2020July 11, 2023

How to reduce compliance risk

Compliance is complicated and time-consuming, and employers don’t have the time to become experts in every rule or regulation that impacts their business. For any organization, addressing how to reduce compliance risk requires the right external and internal resources.

Failure to adhere to compliance requirements exposes an organization to lawsuits, costly fines and other penalties as well as negative publicity and harm to business reputation, noted XpertHR in its report “Top HR Compliance Challenges for 2020.” The organization surveyed 700 HR professionals, 28.3 percent of whom said recruiting and hiring was their top concern. Meanwhile, 16.2 percent said so about benefits and 10.1 percent about pay and scheduling issues.

Of those challenged by pay and scheduling issues, 13.3 percent said they are extremely challenged by the misclassification of exempt and non exempt employees, compared to only 6.6 percent in 2018. And 9.8 percent feel extremely challenged by state and local minimum wage increases, down from 12.9 percent in 2017.

In 2020, 21 states and many localities — including 20 in California alone — will be impacted by minimum wage increase, the report noted.

Also read: Labor compliance software sorts through complex legal issues

XpertHR Legal Editor Beth Zoller said that it’s also important for employers to be proactive about trending issues like harassment training, hairstyle discrimination, pregnancy accommodations and prohibiting pre-employment drug testing.

No matter what the compliance issue, there are many ways to efficiently address how to reduce compliance risk, ultimately benefiting both employees and employer.

Also read: Regulating recruiting amid constant technological innovations

Workforce planning

In the XpertHR survey, 8.3 percent of respondents said workforce planning was their top compliance concern. Zoller defined “workforce planning” as “the continual process an employer uses to align the organization’s business needs and priorities with those of its workforce to make sure it can comply with legislative, regulatory, service and production requirements and organizational objectives.”

Among today’s global workforce, she said, employers must understand both the internal and external factors that impact workplace processes like recruiting, retention, training and performance management.

These internal and external factors include the rise of flexible working arrangements and remote workers, the use of independent contractors to replace traditional workers, and the use of technology to increase communication and productivity, Zoller said. All these are areas in which employers must be careful to be compliant with the various regulations, such as those regulating remote work, classifying employees correctly.

Also read: Tax compliance a key consideration for remote work policies

Benefits compliance

Benefits compliance was the second biggest compliance concern for employers, according to the XpertHR survey. Dorian Smith, national practice leader for Mercer’s Law & Policy Group, specializes in health and welfare benefits.

There are different trusted advisors HR or workforce management professionals can reach out to for different buckets of compliance, he said. For health benefits, representatives from the insurance carrier or third-party administrator can provide guidance. Attorneys specializing in ERISA can help answer retirement-related questions. Complying with a variety of regulations means partnering with a combination of different advisors that cover an employers’ bases.

Employee leave laws

Even before the COVID-19 pandemic introduced new employee leave requirements through legislation like the Families First Coronavirus Response Act, the paid leave landscape in the United States was a “hornet’s nest,” Smith said. COVID-19 rules simply added another layer to an already complicated paid leave environment, where employers often must pay attention to different state and local laws that could affect their business.

Whichever HR or workforce management professional deals with paid leave at an organization should maintain a relationship with the carrier that administers the leave program, and a major carrier should have an understanding of the paid leave environment, Smith said. Still, while they can provide support to navigate the organization through compliance, they generally don’t provide strategic support, he added.

He gave an example of an organization that is looking to shut down a location. They may have the right to do so compliance-wise, but strategically they should think about the make-up of the workforce in that location. Are they predominantly older or part of another protected class? That is a strategic way to look at this situation, since an organization does not want to be exposed to a discrimination lawsuit.

Many areas of compliance are “part compliance, part strategy,” he said. “You can’t do strategy without thinking about compliance.”

Smith also suggested that organizations should engage with their internal or external legal counsel before they make decisions regarding paid leave strategies. Smaller organizations will likely need more external help because they may not have internal resources. But it doesn’t stop there.

“This issue isn’t isolated to smaller firms. Even larger employers with ample internal resources will need outside help,” Smith said.

Mercer, for its part, began a toolkit during the COVID-19 pandemic that is updated every week to reflect what state and local paid leave laws have been amended or created. This is meant to help organizations stay current on changing laws.

On XpertHR’s survey, 5.7 percent of respondents said that “leaves of absence” was their No. 1 compliance concern. Of these people, 28.9 percent said they are extremely challenged by keeping up with rapidly changing leave laws, up from 11.2 percent in 2017 and 19.5 percent in 2018. And 16.1 percent said they feel challenged in determining which leave laws apply to their organization, up from 8.3 percent in 2017.

Depending on size and location, an employer may be required to comply with a variety of different leave laws, Zoller said. These leave laws include paid sick leave, paid family leave, bereavement leave, domestic violence leave, jury duty leave and military leave.

She suggested that employers invest in online compliance tools to help them stay up to date with changing laws and requirements on the federal, state and local level.

Best resources

Considering how to reduce compliance risks may be daunting. But regardless of the type of compliance issues an organization has, there are resources available. These resources include:

Internal or external legal counsel.
Online compliance tools.
Your insurance carrier.
Consulting firms that specialize in your compliance area of interest.

Don’t get bogged down by weighty compliance responsibilities. Creating smart partnerships can help an organization stay compliant.

May 22, 2020June 29, 2023

The most pressing workforce management issues of 2020

workforce management 2020, mask, COVID-19

While the buzzword “the future of work” is often thrown around as if it’s the new, exciting, sexy thing, it just refers to a reality that’s always been true. The economy changes, technology changes, and social trends impact the way people want work. Workforce management — as a field that relates to employees’ wages, schedules, promotability and more — can be impacted by large economic and social trends as well as technology.

Smart workforce management professionals pay attention to what trends impact their organization and workforce and plan ahead. Some trends relate to the COVID-19 pandemic and others relate to forces that existed much before that.

Based on information from various reports and expert interviews, these workforce management issues are some of the most immediate for 2020 and what practitioners should be thinking about.

Employee safety

In environments like factories, workplace safety has always been a point of focus, while the same could not be said for the average retailer or office setting. “All of a sudden, that’s changed,” said Matt Stevenson, partner and leader of Mercer’s Workforce Strategy and Analytics practice. Due to COVID-19, employers are concerned with how the work environment must change to ensure employee safety.

Also read: COVID-19 and workers’ compensation

Currently, this is one of the most significant workforce management issues, he said. I’s impossible to predict how long this hyper-focus on employee safety will last. He surmised this depends on whether a COVID-19 vaccine is developed and when.

Stevenson gave the example of polio. Before the vaccine it was a serious threat, and there were polio epidemics globally. After the vaccine was created, safety issues related to polio stopped being a concern. On the other hand, he added, viruses like HIV still don’t have a vaccine decades after being identified in 1981.

Also read: When employees return to work, consider these guidelines

Shifts in the way work is done

One outcome of COVID-19 is that certain jobs are done differently, Stevenson said, especially with remote work. Some organizations did not change their operating models because they didn’t have to, and the pandemic made it so they did not have a choice.

For example, the use of telemedicine has grown since the pandemic started, Stevenson said. Telemedicine has existed for years, but there was some resistance to it, and it was often underutilized. With a pandemic that limits physical contact, people began embracing telemedicine. It’s possible this trend could continue after the pandemic ends.

That’s what happened with retail stores, Stevenson noted. Online shopping for goods of all types is the norm these days, although consumers still can visit brick-and-mortar locations.

Industries like hospitality, leisure and travel have been especially impacted by the pandemic, he added. It’s difficult to imagine how a shift to something more online-friendly would look for these organizations.

The future of the physical workplace

Whether remote work will be as accepted after the pandemic ends is still unknown, but there’s a possibility that organizations will be more open to a largely remote workforce.

As employers think about their return-to-work plan, they may start with only bringing people in they have to, Stevenson said. From there, a large portion of the workforce may remain remote. This could lead to a big picture question of, “Do I need this big, expensive office space if I can just have employees work from home instead?”

This is already happening in the tech sector. Twitter recently announced that staff can work from home permanently.

Not enough flexibility for employees

Deloitte’s “2020 Global Human Capital Trends” report highlighted organizations that took employee-friendly approaches — giving employees more jurisdiction over their work schedules and offering them new flexible time off programs. These approaches are designed to allow employees to “live and work at their best” ultimately had positive impacts for companies. Company culture was improved, and teams saw better communication and collaboration.

More flexibility is good for worker well-being, which is good for business, according to the report. It surveyed respondents on how they have redesigned work to promote well-being in the organization. The top three answers were “giving workers more autonomy in how they do their work” (45 percent of respondents), “using technology to promote connectivity and collaboration” (41 percent) and “increasing flexible and/or predictable scheduling” (39 percent).

“Worker input is critical to understand what changes to work practices may have the greatest impact on well-being,” the report noted. For organizations who want to take this route, they need to think about how to get that employee input and act on it.

Interestingly, the report also noted that forward-thinking organizations should “stop obsessing about generations,” which leads to too many oversimplifications about employees. Ultimately most people, regardless of their generations, want many of the same things in a workplace — including their preference for flexible schedules.

A larger focus on workforce science

Mercer’s “Global Talent Trends 2020” report highlighted the need for HR and workforce management professionals to get better at workforce science — a practice that can help professionals address many workforce management issues. For example, the survey found that only 24 percent of respondents said their organization has data on who is at risk of burnout. Only 43 percent of organizations surveyed used metrics to identify employees likely to leave, and only 18 percent have looked at the impact of pay strategies on performance. This is an area organizations can improve on in future years.

The report didn’t paint a grim picture, though. Mercer’s surveys have found that the use of predictive analytics has increased from 10 percent in 2016 to 39 percent in 2020. While there’s more employers can be doing with analytics, they’ve also been stepping up their game the past five years.

“The good news is that the workforce science discipline is gathering momentum,” the report stated. “That said, insights into workforce management could be adopted more widely.”

May 19, 2020May 19, 2020

How to improve manager effectiveness

on-demand workforce, benefits, freelancers, collaboration, communication

As the link between front-line workers and company leadership, managers have a key role in making a company run smoothly. But due to the nature of their job, they also have the potential to negatively impact business in terms of reputation, employee relations and business results. That’s why leaders must pay attention to how to improve manager effectiveness.

Some 32 percent of employees do not feel that their immediate manager acts as a coach and mentor, according to a 2019 Mercer study. Furthermore, 23 percent do not feel inspired by their boss and 29 percent do not think their manager evaluates their performance fairly.

Organizations may struggle with how to improve manager effectiveness, but it doesn’t have to be a struggle. Here are some basic guidelines for managers and company leaders to address this.

Also read: Employee communication how-to’s during a crisis

Advice for management

1. Build trust: Not cultivating team trust is where many teams fall apart, said Sari Wilde, managing vice president at Gartner, whose areas of expertise include recruiting, current and future leadership, and critical skills and competencies.

Managers can build this trust several ways, she said. They set out to build personal relationships with their team members. They can run their team in a way that embraces and celebrates individual differences.

Also read: How technology can help your employee engagement strategy

One exercise Wilde’s team uses to build trust and strengthen the relationships between employees and managers is called “Each One Teach One.” Each team member takes turns saying something they want to learn and something they’d be willing to teach someone else. This gives everyone the opportunity to get to know each other more and learn from one another.

2. Ask questions: Good managers don’t make assumptions about their employees’ work, Wilde said. They ask questions.

Ineffective managers may assume they know everything and tell employees how to do their jobs to a microscopic level. But it’s much more effective to ask questions, understand employee needs and realize the context in which they are working. From there, they can break these assumptions or misconceptions and manage more accurately.

Advice for leadership

1. Define effectiveness: Create key performance indicators for managers and specific, measurable objectives around those KPIs, said Andres Lares, managing partner at Shapiro Negotiations Institute. What do you want you managers to do, and why are those objectives important to the organization?

KPIs vary among supervisors. For sales managers, they include average sales per employee or this month’s sales compared to previous months. For other managers, they include evaluation results from team members and how many of them have earned promotions.

Wilde also provided some KPIs for effective managers, including: skills preparedness, employee engagement, intent to stay at the organization and discretionary effort (how hard employees work).

2. Be patient: Have realistic expectations of how much time it will take to see results.

“If you want them to build trust with their team, they need the time to develop it and the time, from a daily or weekly standpoint to develop and manage their team,” Lares said.

To help managers meet these expectations, they need resources and processes in place to help them, he added. Without offering the proper tools and formal processes, leaders are not allowing managers the necessities to actually achieve the organization’s goals.

For example, at SNI, they implement manager field guides within the organization so that managers can use what they’ve learned in training. “This gives managers a tool to coach their people and establishes a cadence (time) for them,” Lares said.

3. Rewards and recognition: Like any other employee who wants acknowledgement from their managers when they have done a good job at completing an important assignment, so do managers need that recognition from company leadership, according to Lares.

“Increasing their team’s productivity should be rewarded — for both the team and the manager,” he said, adding that this is much easier if KPIs have been defined and if managers are provided the resources to achieve these goals.

Leaders continue to coach, train and invest in managers who improve. If managers don’t hit their KPIs, even with ample time, tools and processes available, there’s a possibility that the job isn’t a good fit for them. Leaders can potentially change their roles and see if that fits their skillset better.

Effective managers will ultimately benefit the organization, Wilde said. “When you have a great manager, they are much more likely to create great managers underneath them,” she said. Managers should be good role models for the people below them at the organization. One way to recognize good managers is by assigning them high potential, highly dedicated team members. The manager will benefit, and the employee can learn under them and go on to become another effective manager for the organization.

The risk of not addressing ineffective managers

While how to improve manager effectiveness may seem difficult, it’s important to offset the many potential negative consequences of bad management. The axiom “people leave managers, not companies” exists for a reason.

Ineffective managers may drive down team performance, limit creativity and risk-taking on the team and make employees want to leave, Wilde said. As the author of the book “The Connector Manager: Why Some Leaders Build Exceptional Talent — and Others Don’t,” she’s found several reasons people leave managers.

Some managers have an “always on” approach with the team, she said, meaning that they give ongoing feedback to employees so excessively that employees feel suffocated and stifled. “Always on” managers want to be the person to give advice, answer their questions and tell them what to do — even if they don’t know the answer. They may be trying to help, but being involved in every aspect of an employee’s work can be detrimental.

Managers aren’t helpless if their current management style isn’t working. They can work to improve their shortcomings and offset these potential negative consequences and ultimately build a stronger team, making their organization strong as well.

May 15, 2020October 22, 2021

Payroll challenges eased by software solutions

Payroll can be a complicated and time consuming process. If employers fail to be compliant — intentionally or not — they may face potentially debilitating business consequences.

Workforce management professionals can use technology solutions to address complicated payroll challenges.

Challenge: Maintaining tax compliance

Tax compliance challenges come in many flavors. The Federal Unemployment Tax Act poses potential complications for employers, and employers must be careful to compute their FUTA tax liability correctly.

Further, certain flexible work arrangements may introduce tax complexities to employers who must figure out how, when and where to withhold state taxes for their employees. Remote work is mostly a positive trend. Employees are generally more productive working outside the office, and employers can consider a larger pool of candidates for a job. But the company must make sure they have an effective system that takes state and local tax laws into account, especially if it manages a geographically scattered workforce.

The right payroll system will help employers do this by allowing them to input all relevant tax laws in the system. Then managers don’t need to worry that the laws aren’t being addressed in their payroll, and they can continue benefiting from a flexible, remote workforce.

Challenge: Balancing federal, state and local compliance laws

An “overwhelming alphabet soup of laws, regulations and agencies” govern the workplace — and not just regarding tax compliance. Federal agencies like the EEOC and OSHA and regulations like FMLA and COBRA affect workplace decisions on everything from payroll to health care to time off and beyond.

Managers may have a lot on their plate in addition to payroll, like creating effective schedules, controlling wage costs and taking overtime in account. While they deal with everything on their plate, they also have many legal responsibilities to balance.

Labor management software can take on the most difficult part of this process, knowing how to apply different laws and regulations to every payroll decision. This leaves time and mental energy for workforce management professionals to focus on other parts of their job, rather than getting bogged down by compliance concerns.

Benefits of payroll software

Payroll is a baseline, necessary duty of many managers’ jobs. Still, they have many other responsibilities that occupy their time and attention. Technology allows them to automate what is taking up too much of their time and energy and increasing efficiency at the organization.

Try Workforce.com software for your payroll and scheduling needs, which has saved managers: several hours a week by automating time consuming tasks like payroll.

May 14, 2020June 29, 2023

Don’t be afraid to try new things: Jay Fortuna’s journey through HR

Jay Fortuna, a 2017 winner of Workforce’s Game Changer Award, is now the head of learning & development at FinTech company Rewards Network. As someone who’s been recognized for his achievements in human resources, Fortuna answered some questions for Workforce.com about his career path in L&D, the latest trends and innovations in HR and advice he would give his younger self.

Also read: How technology fits into an HR manager’s job description

Workforce: How have you grown professionally over the course of your career?

Jay Fortuna: I have been incredibly fortunate in a career where I have often been given the chance to raise my hand to take on more. Because of this, I have had the opportunity to take on the philosophy of being a life-long learner as it needed to yield results quickly.

I graduated college with a marketing degree and knew that it wasn’t the exact niche inside the business world where my passion truly was. I spent the early part of my career working hard to make chances and opportunities present themselves around learning and development.

WF: How has your career changed?

Fortuna: I was provided with an opportunity early in my career to move from sales into L&D, and I have not looked back since. I entered the L&D world as a facilitator and continued in that role in some capacity for years while I worked hard to master instructional design and transform into the leader I am today. Because of my willingness to learn more and make myself better I have been afforded the opportunity of becoming a well-rounded learning professional and because of my success while doing so I have been able to elevate in my career at an accelerated pace.

WF: What are some of the trends you’ve seen in HR over the past few years?

Fortuna: Over the past decade or so the biggest transformation — [other than] the continued growth of the use of technology, which will always be a constant — is recognition [of] that true and deep impact proper learning and development can have on the business. L&D has earned a seat at the table.

WF: What advice would you tell yourself five years ago?

Fortuna: In 2017 when I received the Game Changers award I was leading a small but mighty team, and we were attempting to change the landscape of an industry that had been struggling with organic growth for over a decade. At that point I didn’t think about anything else except accomplishing the goal in front of me and thinking about how I was going to attack the next five beyond it.

I wish I would have told myself then enjoy the moment and spend more time with the people that were there supporting me. I have always had a “Superman mentality” and because of it I missed out on some chances to enjoy the successes.

WF: What have you learned over the course of your career in HR?

Fortuna: The most valuable lessons I have learned over my career in HR are to be willing to raise your hand and never underestimate your ability to make an impact. Being willing to raise your hand for a project, even though you may have never done it before, will allow you to live the concept of being a life-long learner. When you are forced to learn a new skill on your accord, you often look at the task differently. It becomes a growth opportunity versus a task which was demanded of you.

WF: What do you foresee in the future of HR?

Fortuna: With the changes in learning happening so fast, I foresee the future of learning to continue [its] rapid shift to just-in-time learning. This type of learning mixed with programs designed with hyper job focus could make it possible to get learners to a point of proficiency at an unprecedented accelerated rate. When you take these two approaches and properly mix them with blended learning, the sky’s the limit.

May 8, 2020June 29, 2023

Employee communication how-to’s during a crisis

The usual employee communication strategy goes out the door when a company faces a crisis. Special circumstances like natural disasters, workplace shootings and pandemics put employers in a challenging situation. The future is uncertain, people are constantly learning new facts and messaging has to be carefully crafted.

Meanwhile, emotions may be high while people deal with the aftermath of a potentially traumatic event, and employers must be able to communicate messages carefully and empathetically. Added to this challenge, distance may be an issue. Disease outbreaks, hurricanes and snowstorms may leave a workforce separated from each other, either working remotely or unable to work at all.

It’s important for organizations to develop a crisis communication plan. Within that plan include details that relate to specific crises. Technology will be a key part of these strategies, especially when there’s a possibility that employees and managers won’t be in the same office for an unknown amount of time.

Here are some tips on how to utilize technology in a crisis communication strategy.

Communicate the organization’s response:

Whatever the crisis, employees want to know what is going on with their jobs and updates on the company. If a company closes temporarily due to a disaster, for example, people want to know when it will open again. Are their jobs safe? Is the employer taking proper health and safety precautions as they reopen the workspace? Are employees’ concerns and questions being addressed or ignored?

While managers may not have all the facts, they can set up weekly calls or send ongoing communication that gives employees whatever information is available. That way, people don’t feel out of the loop and know that their concerns are being considered and addressed by management.

A mobile communication solution is especially valuable since employees can access the information they want whenever and wherever on their own device.

Share only trustworthy sources and facts:

In times of crisis, misinformation and myths can be spread just as easily as facts, as crises like the COVID-19 pandemic and mass shootings show. Coronavirus myths include that antibiotics kill the virus and that only older people and people with chronic conditions are at risk. Mass shootings myths include that people with a mental illness are more likely to commit acts of violence (they’re actually much more likely to be victims of violence).

The important lesson for employers here is that rather than relying on the opinions of random people online — even if they seem credible — they should rely on basic facts from the experts.

As managers regularly communicate with employees as part of their crisis management strategy, they shouldn’t further spread misinformation.

Show empathy:

Just sharing facts won’t show empathy for the anxiety, trauma or other negative emotions employees may feel during a crisis. Compassion and a sense of understanding can go a long way to easing employees’ fears.

This is also an area managers can practice. They don’t have to go in blindly when they want to show a human, vulnerable, empathetic side to employees. Practice could be role-playing with someone else and analyzing what responses worked. Or it could mean researching how to communicate with people who have been through a crisis and practicing how to say it genuinely to another person.

In the case where managers and employees are separated, managers can show their team members on a personal level as well via their company’s mobile chat tool. It could be as simple as asking someone how they’re doing or communicating to them that management cares about their well-being. Just be sure it is genuine.

Don’t ghost employees:

Even though employers have enough on their plate when dealing with the aftermath of a crisis, they shouldn’t neglect their employees , who often are hailed as an organization’s “most valuable asset.” Ignoring the impact of the crisis on these people won’t reflect well on the manager or the organization.

It can be easy to keep in touch with employees and keep the lines of communication open with the right tech tools. Workforce.com allows managers to communicate with employees, whether it’s to share important information with them or just to reach out and show empathy for their situation.

Tools like this exist and can make managers’ crisis management responsibilities more effortless and streamlined. Utilize the latest communication technology in your crisis communication strategy.

May 6, 2020June 29, 2023

How technology can help your employee engagement strategy

technology employee engagement scheduling

Employee engagement is an elusive goal that organizations constantly strive to attain. Despite these efforts, though, polls consistently show that only about a third of employees are engaged at any one time. Experts say it could take years to see significant change in engagement scores.

Even so, it’s worth the long-term efforts to increase employee engagement. According to a 2018 Gallup poll, higher engagement rates are correlated with higher productivity, better retention, fewer accidents and 21 percent higher profitability.

Here are some employee engagement tips and how technology can make a workforce management professional’s life easier and more streamlined as they try to increase engagement.

Cultivate a sense of purpose among employees: One reason employees may feel dissatisfied with their jobs and plan on leaving is because they feel a “lack of purpose” at work. A recent Deloitte study found that only 37 percent of millennials think business leaders “make a positive impact on the world.” A separate Deloitte report clarified that the workforce as a whole, not just younger generations, appreciates when a company adopts a higher purpose — “moving beyond profit to a focus on doing good things for individuals, customers and society.”

Part of showing employees what the values and mission of the organization are includes showcasing workplace examples via the company’s communication channels. Employers can share stories of employees embodying the company’s mission or values, and technology-enabled communication platforms can help employers spread the message to as many employees as possible.

Ask for feedback on a regular basis: If employers want to identify their engagement issues, they have to listen to what employees are saying. There are many ways to get this feedback, experts say. Employers can conduct both annual surveys and periodic pulse surveys, host employee focus groups and monitor social media posts. Further, they can communicate with employee teams about what they like about working for the organization versus what needs to change.

“Approach employees as true partners, involving them in continuous dialogues and processes about how to design and alter their roles, tasks and working relationships,” advised Boston University Professor William Kahn — who coined the term “employee engagement” 30 years ago — in a 2015 Workforce.com Q&A. “That means that leaders need to make it safe enough for employees to speak openly of their experiences at work.”

Give employee feedback on a regular basis: Similarly, employees also want to receive feedback about their own performance. They want to see that the company they work for is invested in their

career. According to a 2019 LinkedIn survey, 94 percent of employees say they would stay at a company longer if the organization invested in their career growth and development.

This is also an area in which technology can help. As more employees work remotely at least part time, continuous feedback doesn’t always have to be delivered in person. The right tech tool can allow those conversations to happen even when a manager and employee aren’t regularly in the same office.

Workforce.com software is one platform that allows managers to communicate with employees any time, anywhere via a mobile app, helping provide remote feedback. In addition, managers can use it as a shift-rating tool to evaluate their teams and share feedback.

May 6, 2020June 29, 2023

Always be curious: Khalid Raza’s journey through human resources

Khalid Raza, a 2016 winner of Workforce’s Game Changer Award, is now a talent acquisition leader at EY. As someone who’s been recognized for his achievements in human resources, Raza answered some questions for Workforce.com about his career in HR, the rise of data analytics and the importance of constant curiosity for a well-rounded talent professional.

Also read: How technology fits into an HR manager’s job description

Workforce: How have you grown professionally over the course of your career?

Khalid Raza: Career is not a destination but a journey where evolution happens with each experience. The growth of a professional is a story of continuous transformation stemming from experiences, interactions, reactions and self-reflection. Success and failures contribute to the depth of learning.

I had the luxury of being surrounded by visionary and compassionate leaders, talented team members who always set the bar higher, and my family which stood by me at all times. My professional growth has been fueled by curiosity to learn, do and achieve more.

WF: How has your career changed?

Raza: [As] someone who gets bored of [the] mundane, I moved roles within HR frequently, allowing me to appreciate and inculcate an understanding of every function and role. The organic accumulation of knowledge has helped me be more effective at all times. I am fortunate to not have a unidimensional career.

WF: What are some of the trends you’ve seen in HR over the past few years?

Raza: Equipped with data and analytics, HR now takes more informed decisions and provides measurable business solutions.

WF: What advice would you tell yourself five years ago?

Raza: The only advice I have is to be more curious about the business we work for. HR exists to support the organization. Isolated efforts yield amputated outcomes.

WF: What have you learned over the course of your career in HR?

Raza: People are the key to success. Organizations that understand this theme continue to grow through tough times, too. Humans are not resources. The most successful teams are [successful] because of the people driving the transformation.

WF: What do you foresee in the future of HR?

Raza: I see more real-time analytics impacting outcomes [and] more open organizations, allowing leadership to tap and leverage mutual knowledge of all the employees. Those days are gone where a bunch of suit-clad executives decide in a boardroom what the strategy of the company should use, oblivious of the fact that the next big idea may come from a desktop engineer.

Impact of changes need to be understood in real-time through sentiment analysis.
Tailored bouquet of compensation structures.
Skills and value-driven compensation and growth.
More focus on inclusion than diversity.

WF: What are some things that you value most about your career field/position?

Raza: Talent or HR as a function deals with people, and as I alluded earlier, people drive companies to success or failure. I value the impact HR makes to the organization’s growth.

WF: Do you have any advice for HR professionals?

Raza: Yes, I’d [like to share this] guidance to HR professionals:

Be Curious.
Strive to learn more at all times — people, experiences, struggles, success, and failures — there is always a lesson to be learned.
Don’t network. Build relationships. Adding random people on a social network is of no use unless you have built relationships with them.
Always find a mentor who can guide you — be it a career mentor or a skill mentor.

Also read: HR 101 for new human resources managers