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Source: Small Business
Management
Favorable employee relations require competent
handling of the administrative aspects of the personnel function. These include the
management of:
- Work hours
- The physical working environment:
benefit procedures, including insurance matters, and vacation and holiday schedules
Work Hours
Work hours must meet the needs of the business but should also be flexible enough to
take the personal needs of each employee into account. For example, it may be possible to
set business hours from 8:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m., and allow most people to choose any
regular work day within those hours. It may not even be necessary for everyone to work the
same total hours per week. You might let some employees work a shorter week to fill peak
loads or to keep the business open for more than eight hours a day. In any case, allowing
some flexibility in working hours will not only result in increased employee satisfaction,
but will likely lead to greater productivity as well.
No matter how flexible working hours are, however, it is important that each employee
understand the hours to be worked. Often a simple chart of names and work hours is all
that is needed to assure that everyone knows at a glance, who is working when.
The Physical Working Environment
Conditions of facilities and equipment can greatly affect the attitudes of employees.
The temperature, lighting and cleanliness in and around the working area and the general
maintenance of equipment are all important to an employee's satisfaction on the job. Even
a draft or a cold floor can make a difference in a person's perception of you as a good
employer.
Employees need facilities for lunch, especially if there are no restaurants in the
area. Good employee practices suggest that a refrigerator, a sink, and even a small
employee lunch area for breaks and lunch hours should be available.
Clean toilet facilities and a personal locker or adequate closet space for clothing of
employees are a necessity. Parking arrangements are also important. When an employee comes
to work and finds no parking place, and has to look for one, possibly for some time, he or
she will not start the day ready for high achievement. When it is necessary to ask
employees to park fairly far away - such as in a shopping mall where the better parking
spaces have to be reserved for customers, the need for this inconvenience should be
clearly explained to employees when they are first hired.
Fairness in assigning people to equipment, or equipment to people is another important
procedural matter which affects the satisfaction your people gain from their work. It is
no slight matter if the new vehicle or the new computer is assigned carelessly, without
good reason.
Individually, each of these aspects of working conditions can be significant sources of
complaints and even grievances. Together they have great influence on the work climate
that exists in your firm. Unless you consider all of them seriously, and keep the needs of
your employees in mind, your employees will feel that you have little regard for their
physical well-being.
Payroll Procedures
Wages and salaries are such important matters to employees that it is not only
important to pay fairly, but also promptly and accurately.
People want to receive their pay when they have been told to expect it. Your staff
reacts favorably, not only to prompt payment, but to the immediate correction of any
errors that may have occurred. Employees are rightfully annoyed if their legitimate
requests are treated as impositions. Cheerful attention to such problems will generally be
appreciated especially if it is clear evidence of a spirit of concern for the employee's
welfare. An opportunity to show such concern presents itself every so often when a minor
emergency will force someone to ask for his or her pay a day or two early. If it is at all
possible, and the emergency is valid, it brings goodwill to satisfy such a request. When
such exceptions are granted, however, it should be made clear, in a nice way, that they
cannot become regular practice.
Benefit Procedures
A benefits program brings the best results when employees who have claims are helped
with filing them and if someone follows up when an insurance company does not process the
claim promptly. Information on benefits should, of course, be provided to employees, from
time to time.
Vacation time, too, is important to employees. Some have to coordinate with spouses,
others take advantage of special travel offers or other opportunities. As much as
possible, good personnel policies require that vacation schedules are prepared early
during the year so employees who want to make plans find out whether their preferred dates
are available. You can, of course, specify that you will close certain weeks or that, at
all times, certain positions have to be covered (two salespeople have to be on the floor
at all times, or someone has to be in the shop who can weld, or someone has to cover the
telephone, etc.).
To prevent conflicts from affecting business performance, it should be understood how
they will be resolved - by who asked for a date first or by seniority or some other way.
What applies to vacations also applies to holidays, to some extent. Your company's paid
holidays should be well known to the entire staff of course. Here, too, flexibility could
be used. If you are in a business which is open during some holidays, schedules should be
prepared far in advance so everyone knows who is expected to work and who will have the
day off. If your business can be flexible, it is a good idea to let people shift holidays
if they would prefer to do so, or even allow them to work and earn an extra day's pay.
Here, as in all other personnel functions, it is better to adopt flexible policies which
give great freedom to employees to satisfy personal needs. With such flexibility in the
personnel function, a business can be much more insistent that rules and work standards be
adhered to. This is a fair arrangement. In personnel policies, the company tries to do the
best possible to adapt to the needs and expectations of people. In return, employees are
expected to honor the company's need for reliability, adherence to reasonable rules,
schedules and work standards - all of which have to be clearly communicated by words and
deeds. |
