Guidelines for Writing and Disseminating Employee Handbooks

This paper is concentrated upon the issues connected with handbooks for employees, touching upon the main rules of writing and handing them out, upon the main points that should be mentioned there and the positive sides of such documents.

Actually employer should decide himself whether to make or not to make the employee handbook, and though there are a lot of recommendations concerning the content and main points of it, he chooses as well himself what to include into it.

If the handbook is prepared in a proper way there is a number of advantages that it could bring to the employer, in case it is not constructed or handed out correctly it might cause even some problems. That is why, if the employer still decided to issue it he should pay a lot of attention to the main rules and to fulfilling of them in the best way. Besides he should pay attention to legislation as well, for example to: “Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act (“Title Vll”) or the Federal Age Discrimination in Employment Act (“ADEA”). These statutes apply to employers who have “…20 or more employees for each working day and 20 or more calendar weeks in the current or preceding calendar year.” (2).

A very important thing before publishing the handbook is the positive attitude, the employer should never forget that the main goal of making it is not to warn the workers concerning the hard consequences in case they fail to complete any of company practices. The working environment should on the contrary be shown in a positive light, so that the workers feel safe and motivated to do their best fulfilling the tasks of the company. There is a more detailed list of potential purposes of the handbooks:

– as it was already mentioned the employee should feel himself quite comfortable and needed at his work place

– the employee should be aware of the certain rules and basic terms of the company he is working for

– the employee should be as well aware not only about his obligations , but about his benefits, like for example paid vacations, holidays, health insurance.

– the employee should be presented the main information about his company, like some historical overviews or other important facts

Usually it is vital to include the point concerning the right of the employer to make changes in the booklet.

In a way the handbook is a welcome pass for the employee to the company. It should provide some basic facts concerning the history of the company and the type of business it is doing. Some examples of practices in work with customers also belong to this part of the handbook. If there are both part-time and full-time employees, it is better to provide information about the kinds of the work they are doing and about their working hours. Some companies built the so-called employee assistance programs, then they are advised to tell about them in the handbook. It is logical that employees know for sure what salary they will be paid.

Returning to the list of company benefits for its workers, it is necessary to mention that employees should find the information how to work in order to get use of these benefits in the handbooks as well. To the list of company benefits usually belong paid vacations and the points mentioned in the Employee Retirement and Income Security Act (“ERISA”). It is also good to provide a list of documents where the employees could find the more detailed information in case they need it.

“The Federal Family and Medical Leave Act guarantees employees, under certain circumstances, up to 12 weeks of leave time during any 12 month period” (2). It is possible to leave the work place without payment for 12 weeks a year in some cases like:

–       taking care of a family member who is seriously ill.

–       Taking care of own health in case it prevents from fulfilling the duties at work

–       Taking care of a child under 12 months and in some other cases.

The employees do not have only benefits and rights, they have their obligations and even moral ones as well. For example there are some companies, where the employees have the straight access to business plans or some other important confidential information. Then the employer should write in the handbook about their duty to prevent unauthorized access to the information. There are situations when in case the employee has the intention to leave, he is not allowed to work for some competitor company or organize the competing business himself, it has to be as well mentioned in the handbook.

According to the Federal Fair Labor Standards Act (the “FLSA”) the employer is not allowed to pay his employees less than the minimum wage. Also if people work more than 40 hours a calendar week they should be paid at one and one half times their regular rate for their work.

The situation when workers claim that they had worked more hours and never got paid for that is rather common, it is better to write in the handbook that employees should make a report about all hours they worked and overtime hours as well. There is a practice when individual time cards are used for all employees and in case they are marked correctly and thoroughly there are fewer problems with working hours.

It is clear that discipline plays an important role at any company. In order to inform the employees about the main rules of conduct at the workplaces the handbooks should be used. “A good introductory statement might tell employees that “Most of the time your good judgment will tell you the right thing to do. But for your information, the following are some examples of conduct that can lead to termination of your employment.” (5). There are a lot of moments that should be touched upon in the list of rules, for example: the way of making the job, subordinations rules, falsifying documents or records and so on. The employees should be as well aware from the handbook about the punishment to which absence or leaving workplace without serious reason might lead.

The company should as well inform its employees about treating them on an equal basis, not making any kind of exceptions because of religion, sex, origin, age, color, status and so on. There are other documents where such issues and sexual harassment as well should be described, but so far the handbook is also ok.

At last another important issue is the disseminating of employee handbooks. Here is a certain procedure that should be done in order to avoid misunderstanding and problems. As soon as the employer decided to publish such a handbook, he should pay great attention to the content of it. After that he should provide this information that he sorted out for his workers, otherwise all his work will turn out to be not necessary.

The employer should make a receipt of the handbook for his employees, otherwise they could try to deny the fact of getting or even seeing it. It should be a separate document, which is later on added to the employee’s personal profile, but before it is to be signed by the employee, proving that he received it, read it and understood all the points of it. The employee should be as well aware that the employer still has the right to make the necessary changes in it.

Overall, this paper presents a short research of the main points connected with handbooks for employees, provides some generalized information about the matters that should be discussed and mentioned there and gives the important insights concerning the way of disseminating employee handbooks.