Excuses Excuses Excuses

Throughout the course of your career as a manager or supervisor, you’ll likely hear a number of excuses for why an employee was not able to complete an assignment, be on time or otherwise do what they were supposed to do.  Below are some of the more common excuses and ways to address them:

·  “It’s not my job.”  This is a common excuse used by employees to get out of doing work.  If the assigned task is related to their essential job functions, it is likely to fall under “other duties as assigned” in their job description.

·   “Everyone else comes in late.”  This excuse falls under the “if everyone jumps off a bridge, does that mean you should too?” explanation.”  The focus at this point should be addressing this particular employee’s attendance while letting the employee know that everyone is subject to the same attendance requirements.

·   “I didn’t know.  I’m new.”  This excuse only lasts so long before the newness of it wears off.  If you explained the process, policy or procedure during orientation or during the employee’s initial training, then being new to the organization is not an excuse.  Additionally, being new should not prevent the employee from asking questions and seeking assistance from others.

·   “I have too much work to do.”  When confronted with this excuse, ask the employee to provide you with a detailed outline of what tasks he/she is working on and the percentage of time he/she is working on each task.  It may be that the employee needs to better manage their time or focus their priorities on value-added tasks.  Also, if the employee is exempt from overtime, take note of when the employee arrives and leaves the office and how long he/she is taking for lunch.  You should make sure the employee is working the required number of hours per day or week and not taking extended lunches or breaks or coming in late or leaving early.

While some of these excuses may be legitimate, it’s important for a manager and supervisor to hold employees accountable when it comes to performing the essential functions of their job at a meets expectation level.

This article should not be construed as legal advice.

Interns For Your Business

Offering students an internship to gain hands-on work experience is a beneficial opportunity for everyone, if executed properly.  To ensure a positive outcome for both parties, the Society for Human Resources Management (SHRM) recommends keeping these six requirements in mind when creating internships if the position is unpaid:

• The training should resemble an educational program where the internship provides students with real life educational experiences that can only be gained outside a classroom.  Students should be able to apply what they have learned in the classroom to their experiences in the workforce.
• The employer should structure the internship toward an educational goal, including ongoing instruction and supervision.
• The training is for the benefit of the trainee and is not intended as a way for businesses to take advantage of free work.  The experience will increase the intern's chances of being hired in the job market and/or allow them to earn academic credit.  A key point, according to  SHRM is, "unpaid interns who fall into the category of 'trainees' rather than 'employees' frequently perform tasks that are useful only for training purposes and that provide little to no benefit to the employer."
• Trainees or students should not displace regular employees nor be entrusted with the same work as a regular employee or a recently departed employee; nor may the employer lay off an employee to be replaced by a student or trainee.
• Employers should have a policy with strict supervision of interns and assign a mentor.  Supervisors should actively participate with interns.
• The employer should derive no immediate advantage from the activities of trainees or students.  SHRM suggests that "a key caution is if the employer is the primary beneficiary of an internship, for example, and the employer reduces costs or accomplishes necessary tasks through the intern, the DOL will consider the intern an employee under the FLSA.  If the intern is the primary beneficiary of the experience, the DOL is much more likely to consider the intern a trainee."

"Please note trainees or students are not entitled to a job at the end if the training.  To ensure that the intern has no expectation of employment, the DOL recommends that an employer draft a written agreement with the intern stating that the intern should have no expectation of employment and should not presume any guarantee of employment after the internship.  Though an employer should make it clear that an intern is not entitled to a job at the conclusion of the internship, employers should not be discouraged from offering jobs to interns.  

The employer and trainees/students understand that trainees/students are not entitles to wages for the time spent in training.  before beginning the relationship, employers should draft a written agreement stating that payment for the intern's services is neither intended nor expected during the internship."

This article should not be construed as legal advice.

Same Sex Marriage in the Workplace

Without addressing the social, moral or religious arguments, the topic of same sex marriage has direct and indirect consequences to employers. 

As more states pass legislation recognizing same sex marriage, it is imperative that employers understand the law, as well as implement its provisions in a timely and accurate manner.  In some cases, the legislation may be as broad as prohibiting discrimination in the terms and conditions of employment when it comes to an employee’s civil union status or sexual preference.  In other cases, it could mean offering the same benefits to same sex partners as are offered to individuals who are legally married.

But there are other areas that employers must address when it comes to same sex marriage.  For example, some individuals in your workplace may not approve of, or support, same sex marriage and may vocalize their opinions openly.  These comments may be offensive to individuals who are involved in a same sex marriage as well as to others who support same sex marriage in general.  As a result, the employer may need to address complaints of hostile work environment, harassment, discrimination and unprofessional conduct or other violations of company policy.  If the comments include threats, company policies prohibiting violence in the workplace may also be implicated.

To minimize these issues, the employer should proactively provide diversity training to all employees and emphasize the need to respect others.  Employers should openly discuss any changes to federal or state law regarding same sex marriage and its impact on the workplace as well as the employer’s and each employee’s obligation to comply with the law.  A discussion on the consequences for violating the law and/or company policy should also be addressed.

Finally, it is important for the employer to review its internal policies and procedures and identify areas that may not provide the same rights or protections to individuals in same sex marriage compared to individuals who are legally married.  Once these areas are identified, the employer should identify if they are legally required to or otherwise want to offer the same rights and protections to both groups.

This article should not be construed as legal advice.

Innovative Approaches to Working Together

A tall woman in a soft pink blazer opened the front door to the office and proceeded down the hallway toward her desk.  As she passed by a co-worker’s office space, she asked if the files she had requested were completed and on her desk.  The co-worker rolled his eyes and answered that he was still working on it.  The woman stopped and turned toward the gentleman that gave her such a crass answer.  She replied with an icy tone and continued toward her office…

Do you find that your work group or department is not working together as well as they should be?  Do you see personality differences among your employees that are negatively impacting the work environment?  Is there an inability by your employees to manage conflict effectively?

If you answered “yes” or even “sometimes” to any of these statements, your team may benefit from professional intervention.  There are consultants and organizations that can assist your team in learning to appreciate the differences in each individual and work together to resolve differences.

One such approach is to conduct a 360-degree profile of each person.  This process involves each employee completing a self-questionnaire about their work preferences, beliefs and approaches to working on various work-related issues.  The questionnaire is then completed by the employee’s direct supervisor, and a pre-determined anonymous number of peers and direct reports, thereby giving the employee a 360-degree picture of how they are perceived by others in the organization. 

A second approach involves having everyone in the team answer the same set of questions involving how they approach different work situations.  The results are then summarized on a quadrant and assigned a color.  For example, a person identified as the color “yellow” may exhibit personalities that are passive or easy-going, while a person identified as the color “red” may exhibit personalities that are more dominant or controlling.  By understanding the personalities of a coworker, one can hopefully better understand why individuals act the way they do.

A third approach involves the completion of a questionnaire based on how an individual would react in different situations, such as dealing with an aggressive employee or a difficult employee.  The results then identify if the individual is prone to conflict avoidance, conflict resolution, and so on.  By better understanding how one deals with conflict, an individual can take appropriate action to resolve conflict in a more effective manner.

While each of these approaches involves different questions and results, they are all focused on helping individuals be more productive and effective in the workplace.  However, taking the assessment and understanding the results is but the first step.  For these assessments to be worthwhile, the individual must also take action to build on their strengths and overcome their development areas.

This article should not be construed as legal advice.