HR News May 2011

Welcome to the May edition of HR News. April was certainly a busy month with new employment legislation coming into force, a royal wedding and some might say too many bank holidays all at once! In this months edition we look at the problems facing employers dealing with long term sickness, the new paternity rights which came into effect on April 3rd, the new Bribery Act and an article on redundancy, should we engage employees in the process and decision making cycle?

Long Term Sickness - A Real Pain!

A recent poll carried out by a national health insurer found that nearly half of employers consider long-term sick leave to be a problem for their business, with more than a quarter admitting that it gives them a major staffing headache.

Despite the impact that staff sickness may have on a business, the research also suggested that employers often worry a lot about how best to respond.

More than one-third (34%) of employers said they worried about how they could balance obligations to employees whilst managing the business at the same time.

The study of 1,000 adults and 688 employers found that business owners feel torn between their emotions and business duties when dealing with employees who are on long-term leave of absence.

Health problems such as back pain still heavily contribute to work absence (27%), but more companies have to deal with highly emotive conditions such as cancer (19%), mental health issues (30%) and drink and drug-related issues (16%). In addition, nearly one in five employers (16%) said they had dealt with staff that were experiencing heart problems.

While traditional business pressures remain - with more than one-third stating that they were concerned about how to balance legal obligations to the employee whilst managing the business - employers increasingly faced emotional challenges. More than six out of 10 said their primary concern when an employee went on long-term absence was the health and well being of the employee. A further 23% were anxious about the pressure that this absence would put on other employees' workloads.

With survival rates from conditions such as cancer improving, many employees were eager to return to the normality of the office.

Yet, nearly one in five employers admitted that when dealing with someone with a potentially life-threatening condition, they would find it even harder to manage the needs of business and their duty of care to the employee. A total of 14% said they would be anxious about finding a way to deal with the employee without causing upset. The research shows that many companies are affected by long-term sickness absence, with employees needing to take into account the care and consideration of their employees when they are unwell and to give the expert physical and psychological support to help them return to work.

Streamline staff absences with TeamSpirit Human Resources Software.

New Paternity Rights Come Into Force

In April we saw the new Paternity Law coming into force. Parents will be legally entitled to share time off work during their baby's first year, with father collecting any statutory maternity pay which would otherwise have been paid to the mother.

Recent surveys however have suggested that despite these more flexible working rules, few men will request this time off because they are worried about their job security in the current economic climate.

This "additional" unpaid leave is on top of the two-weeks paid leave that all fathers are already entitled to, which came into force on April 3^rd. The new rule applies to the parents of any babies due from this date. Fortunately if your baby was due before April 3rd, but arrived after this date then parents would still qualify for this additional paternity leave.

But while these rules give father the right to ask for an extended period of leave it doesn't mean that employers have to automatically grant their request. They have to consider the request formally, but can give valid reasons for turning it down. These changes allow parents to share childcare duties during the first year, and allow father to take paid or unpaid leave, once the mother returns to work. As such they will help couples where it is the women who earns more, making financial sense for her to return to the workplace sooner.

But fathers won't be able to step in from day one. They will only be able to take this additional leave once their baby reaches four months (20 weeks). If at this point the mother chooses to go back to work, the father can collect the statutory maternity pay to which she would have been entitled. This is paid at £128.73 a week and is payable until the child reaches 39 weeks. At this point any additional leave is unpaid, whether it is the father or mother taking this time off. Men granted this leave will be allowed a maximum of 26 weeks - during which their employer has to keep their position open.

These new rules will also apply to couples adopting children.

The Bribery Act 2010 Coming Into Force 1st July

Guidance relating to the Bribery Act 2010 (which comes into force on 1st July 2011) has just been published. It explains procedures that commercial organisations can use to prevent bribery.

From July, it will become a criminal offence for commercial organisations (an organisation that 'carries on a business') to fail to prevent bribery. This will happen if one of your employees or contractors bribes another person, intending to obtain or retain business for your business or to obtain or retain an advantage in the conduct of your business.

However, there is an important defence. If your business had adequate procedures in place designed to prevent people associated with it from engaging in such conduct, then you will not be guilty of any criminal offence. We suggest you review your business, carry out the relevant risk assessments and determine whether your procedures are adequate to prevent bribery. Employers are being urged to introduce appropriate anti-bribery procedures without delay.

The R Word

Many employees today are still wondering if their jobs will be safe, with managers wondering what sacrifices they should be making to ensure they and their colleagues are protected from the dreaded R word.

Employers will also want to know what measures they should be taking to ensure that savings could be made. This includes introducing pay freezes and shorter working weeks, as logic has it that this will save money in the short term and therefore help protect jobs.

Many larger organisations in the UK have debated with their staff whether to safeguard their jobs in the future, they should reduce employee's working week hours or ask them to take additional holiday without pay. The CBI has recently issued a proposal that businesses that are facing tough times should be able to freeze staff salary for six months, and instead pay them double Jobseekers Allowance. Several large companies are introducing combative measures, such as Toyota who have negotiated with their trade union a wage cut of 10 percent, KPMG are discussing the prospect of staff working a four day week, and JCB have agreed a 25 percent pay cut across the board.

However it could be argued that this is just merely delaying the ultimate threat of redundancy.

The recession has meant fundamental changes occurring in the way that employees are rewarded, employed and managed, but it could be viewed as an opportunity to put more focus on employee engagement and implement better and stronger long-term management strategies. HR and senior management could also look at ways of engaging departments that are failing to decide on their own future - Is this harsh or could this help with the bad feeling that is always felt in this type of situation? Employees could be consulted on whether to take a pay cut or decide whether the team should be looked at in a more traditional ways such as reapplying for their jobs or agreeing on as set number of redundancies in the department.

There has to be greater clarity about strategic vision and organisational wide goals so that departments and individuals are aware of targets they should be achieving, and efficiencies they should be making. Businesses also need to start asking themselves if they know the true cost of their recruitment, training, absence and poor performance practices, as lack of knowledge in any of these areas can contribute to unnecessarily high expenditure.

Produce strategic reports to ensure that your business is motivating and retaining its best people with TeamSpirit HR Software.