Quality through Accountability

Human ResourcesFall 2015

Agenda

Professionalism Inter-departmental relationships Work schedules Attendance FMLA Disciplinary processes

Rowan’s Four Pillars

Setting the tone of quality through Professionalism

• Think of the MOST professional person you have ever worked with. What words or actions would you use to describe that individual?

• How did working with this person make you feel?

• How did working with this person affect productivity?

Characteristics of a Professional

• Competence• Reliability• Appearance• Demeanor• Communication• Accountability/Responsibility• Respect• Customer Service

What is the impact of un-professional behavior?

Why does it matter?

• Impacts:–An individual’s personal career

success–success of organization– relationships with coworkers–working environment

Examples: Standards of professionalism

• Take responsibility for your actions and mistakes– Being able to admit fault builds trust

• Know your role and be clear on your responsibilities• Don’t overcommit• Act with honesty and integrity• Know your strengths and limits/boundaries (and be ok

with admitting them)• Stay away from office gossip• Remove yourself from the personal business of others• Keep ethics and confidentiality in mind• Be aware of any negativity or drama you produce

How do you handle this situation?• Debra has worked in the HR department

for the last 8 years. Recently the department changed the process regarding how completed new hire forms are collected from new employees. She does not like the change and has not taken the time to appropriately learn the new process.

• When new hires call to get assistance with their forms she provides them with the old process and refers them to call someone else in the department.

Quality through inter-departmental relationships

• How often is your department’s outcome dependent on the work of another department?

How can we improve interdepartmental relationships?• We must understand what is preventing

or making it more difficult for us to do it in the first place. – Is it the fact of being physically separated

from one another? – Maybe it’s conflicting views or work

approaches that’s leading some to feel more frustrated than cooperative?

Make interdepartmental communication easier

• Establish a procedure, a step-by-step guideline that one can easily follow.

• Schedule quick monthly meetings with those employees involved

• Celebrate accomplishments so that people see the progress and feel more optimistic

• Find out what communication methods are the preferred whether it be by phone, email, or in-person.

Discuss the disadvantages of not having effective interdepartmental communication

• Sometimes, employees don’t recognize the repercussions of not communicating and underestimate the impact it might have on the overall picture of a project.

• Enlighten them on how a lack of communication here, or a fail to follow-up there, can cause delays, accidents, customer dissatisfaction

Ask your employees how they would improve interdepartmental communication• Remember engagement?

Remember that with different departments come different strengths

• Stop looking at another department and assuming that their way of functioning, which is different from yours, is the wrong way of functioning.

• There may be a difference in the way they think, approach a situation, even in how they learn.

• Improving interdepartmental communication means understanding other department’s day-to-day realities, putting yourself in their shoes.

Think in terms of what others need, not always what you need

• employees should ask not what information other departments can provide to them, but what information they can provide to other departments.

Revisit the common goal

• Departments may vary in personalities, strengths and ways of functioning, but if you try to highlight what goals they have in common, it can boost morale and improve interdepartmental communication.

• This way, it’s not always about one work method versus the other, but about the greater good; the purpose of it all.

Inter-departmental scenario• You are the manager of the administrative

services department. In order to move project X forward, it is required that the leadership department signs off to show approval.

• The form was sent to the leadership department one week ago. The employee who is responsible to send it back to your department is known to be untimely with his response. Your office manager calls this employee who tells her “I’ll get to it when I can”.

• How do you handle this situation?

Quality through Work Schedules & Policies

Hours of Work

• Employees are expected to work the hours agreed upon by the supervisor, in order to cover the needs of the department, aka operational effectiveness

• Examples:– 8 am -4pm– 8:30am-4:30 pm– 9 am – 5 pm

Lunch Hour & Breaks

• If you require that employees work through lunch, then yes, you can let them leave early- however this should be the exception not the norm.

• Breaks- they should take their breaks, cannot use them to leave early unless you approve it

Attendance

• Glassboro and Camden– When you notice that employees are

getting close to using 15 days of sick time, OR there is a pattern in attendance, contact Labor Relations Henry Oh 256-4320

– Letters of Counseling for Attendance– Make sure you treat all employees fairly-

look at the whole department

SOM- Attendance– For unionized employees, controlled by

collective bargaining agreements– For most unions, currently these employees

are under the Attendance Control Policy (ACP)

– In any 12 month period, grace period for the first 5 unscheduled absences

– Once you exceed 5, you receive a formal letter of counseling with further unscheduled absences leading to disciplines per a formula

– Best practice- review timesheets every pay period, as fairly and evenly as possible

– Contact Henry Oh is required for counseling and discipline for attendance

Lunch Hour Scenario

• You are a new supervisor in a department. One of your employees, Dan, who works from 8:30-4:30, tells you that he has always worked through his lunch hour and leaves at 3:30.

• Is this acceptable?

Family Medical Leave Act

• FMLA allows eligible employees of covered employers to take job-protected, unpaid leave, or to substitute appropriate earned or accrued paid leave, for up to a total of 12 workweeks in a 12-month period for qualifying FMLA reasons, or up to 26 workweeks in a single 12-month period for military caregiver leave.

Who is Eligible for FMLA?

Only eligible employees are entitled to take FMLA leave. An eligible employee is one who: • Works for a covered employer; • Has worked for the employer for at least 12 months; • Has at least 1,250 hours of service for the employer during the 12 month period immediately preceding the leave*; and • Works at a location where the employer has at least 50 employees within 75 miles.

What benefits are eligible employees entitled to?

• Twelve workweeks of leave (can be intermittent) in a 12-month period for:– the birth of a child and to care for the newborn

child within one year of birth;– the placement with the employee of a child for

adoption or foster care and to care for the newly placed child within one year of placement;

– to care for the employee’s spouse, child, or parent who has a serious health condition;

– a serious health condition that makes the employee unable to perform the essential functions of his or her job;

FMLA Benefits, continued

• Situations arising out of the fact that the employee’s spouse, son, daughter, or parent is a covered military member on “covered active duty;” or

• Twenty-six workweeks of leave during a single 12-month period to care for a covered service member with a serious injury or illness if the eligible employee is the service member’s spouse, son, daughter, parent, or next of kin (military caregiver leave).

Critical Note about FMLA leave!

• PLEASE notify Human Resources as soon as you have been notified that an employee is going out on a leave.

• Also note that time should be recorded on timesheets or Web Time Entry as FMLA. Consult HR for more information.

Rowan’s process for FMLA

• Prior to going out on leave:– The employee contacts Human Resources– Employees are instructed to complete the

request for leave form– The request for leave form goes to the

department for signature• OR…

– If there was an emergency, the supervisor notifies HR that the employee had an emergency then HR contacts the employee

SOM- FMLA practices

• Same FMLA rules apply- protected leave up to 12 weeks however:– If the doctor extends the leave request with

a valid note, SOM will approve the leave up to 6 months of time

– Past practice- consistency– However, the employee should note that

after FMLA leave is over, employees who are on unpaid leave (have exhausted sick time)must pay the full cost for benefits

Certification forms

• All medical certification forms are completed by the treating physician.

• NOTE- the certification forms should be sent from the employee DIRECTLY to HR. The supervisor should have no involvement in these forms.

Medical documentation

• Supervisors are copied on an email from HR stating that the employee has been approved for FMLA beginning x date.

• When the employee is cleared to return to work by the Dr., HR then notifies the supervisor letting he/she know when the employee will return

Recommendation to employee

• HR will tell the employee to contact the supervisor prior to their return so that they can be put back into the work schedule.

What supervisors can and can’t say related to FMLA

• If the employee calls- let them talk- don’t ask questions regarding return date.

• Supervisors cannot call an employee directly to ask for their return date- contact HR if you have a question re: return date

• If the employee calls to say they are not returning on the expected date, supervisors can ask “do you have an estimated return date and please contact HR to update your status”

FMLA- best practices

• Once the supervisor is contacted by HR regarding an employee’s dates of leave, if the employee is still in the office, sit down with the employee and ask what type of work related open issues you should be aware of to cover in their absence

FMLA scenario

• Jane is calling out often on Mondays and is close to using all sick time. It is now October. You meet with Henry Oh to begin a letter of counseling for attendance.

• Prior to meeting with Jane to discuss the letter of counseling, Jane submits a doctor’s note that approves intermittent leave under FMLA.

• What do you do?

Abuse of FMLA

• If you suspect that an employee is abusing FMLA, contact Human Resources

• But be careful!

Quality through Disciplinary Guidelines

Disciplinary guidelines for all employees

• Best practices relating to employee discipline and feedback are applicable to employees of all types.– Forms and specific processes may vary.

• Ground rules are the same:– Supervisors set expectations; employees

perform assigned work and failure to perform such work may result in feedback.

– Good supervisors will set the tone for the entire department.

Note on Weingarten Rights• Please keep in mind that upon request,

represented employees are entitled to have present a union representative for any meeting likely to lead to discipline or in any other meeting or interview with management wherein the employee reasonably believes that discipline may result.

• It is therefore important to notify employees of the reasons for planned meetings.

Disciplinary guidelines for represented employees (non AFT)

– First step: Verbal discussion – provide employee with notice of issue professionally and informally.

– Next: Written notice- e.g., email, noting the issue, that there was a discussion, and a timeline to complete task or change behavior

– Next: Letter of counseling- versions for attendance and/or performance related behavior will be available for guidance• Contact Henry Oh in Labor Relations for

guidance

 

Disciplinary Guidelines- AFT professionals within probationary period• Consider best practices of providing

employee with notice and an opportunity to correct– However, take into consideration that probation is

truly the time to determine the appropriateness of the fit of this employee.

– Have an informal conversation relating to the concern.

– Document the concern in written correspondence (email confirmation or memo to employee).

– If concern is not remedied, move to formal discipline.

Disciplinary Guidelines- AFT professionals within probationary period (continued)– Formal discipline:

• Supervisor calls meeting with employee and notifies employee of purpose of the meeting. (Offers employee opportunity to bring union representative, Bob Zazzali will also attend)

• Notify the union of the concern• Following the meeting, a formal memo (after

review by HR) should go to the file, the union & Bob Zazzali.

• If conduct persists, consult Bob Zazzali for additional disciplinary guidance.

AFT Multi/Year Contracts

• Discharge rights limited by multiyear contracts. Burden shifts to management beyond probationary service.

• However, performance expectations are still applicable.– As such, please use same process for

discipline for Multi-Year contracts as outlined for probationary employees.

SOM• Generally, employee should first be warned in an informal

verbal discussion about the concern.• Written notice- if the concern persists following the verbal

conversation, draft a notice relating to the concern and send it to the employee.

• Staff counseling notice-if the issue does not remedy itself, and additional action is necessary, a staff counseling notice will follow. Draft a notice relating to the concern and send it to Henry Oh in Labor Relations.

• If the issue continues, contact labor relations (Henry Oh 256-4320) for formal disciplinary guidance.

SOM (continued)• Once labor relations has been contacted, note

that the discipline process is guided by the union contracts.

• The disciplinary processed is determined by labor relations and through consultation with the supervisor involved.

• Note:  the performance issue should not only be documented through letters of counseling, disciplinary actions, but also it needs to be consistently recorded in the performance review document.

What is documentation?• Documentation has many purposes in

employee management.– Evaluation: regular review of performance.

Ideally involves objective evaluation of goal achievement and periodic conversations.

– Performance Improvement Plan (PIP). Document aimed at correcting concerns with overall performance of duties.

– Written feedback: aimed at correcting problem behaviors. Includes written counseling, warnings, disciplinary actions. The more timely the better!

A note about formal documentation

• Beware of Email as your ONLY documentation.– Problems include:

• Correspondence about an employee by other employees or supervisors

• Correspondence to employees without clear acknowledgment of receipt by employee or correspondence that does not show the intention of author (may show that issue has continued despite informal feedback but true written feedback should follow)

• Beware of Meeting notes/agendas – Unacknowledged notes of conversations with

employee

What Should You Document?

• Meetings relating to performance expectations and outcomes

• All counseling and disciplinary meetings– Check yourself for unconscious bias and

consider your listener. (how will those words be received by the employee)

Good documentation 1. Timely (contemporaneous to events)2. Time/Date3. Employee Name4. Employee Title5. Name and title of the Author6. Reason for meeting7. Issue or conflict 8. Supervisor expectations9. Employee expectations10.Meeting outcomes11.Discuss follow up (next meeting time etc…)

Let’s put it all together…

• John and Jill work in your department. They have the same job title. John works very hard, is incredibly conscientious, and always completes his tasks on or ahead of schedule. Jill has a poor attendance record, is often late or requires reminders to get her work done. Often she has a bad attitude when working with others.

• What should you do to recognize both John and Jill?

Agenda

Professionalism Inter-departmental relationships Work schedules Attendance FMLA Disciplinary processes