Employee handbooks are a road map for the employees to understand the business they’re becoming a part of and how they play a role in the growth of that business.
A good handbook provides information about workplace rules & regulations, what is expected of the employees, employee benefits, and legal aspects of some particular actions. On the other hand, a poorly written, overwhelming handbook just causes confusion.
Let’s look at following 5 clauses that are unnecessary to be added in employee handbook and result in making them ineffective and over complicated:
1. Keeping Outdated Policies
New laws are made and organizations have to change their policies accordingly. One mistake that a lot of employers unconsciously make is skip the trending policies from the employee handbooks. Inclusion, racism, diversity, human rights, verbal and non-verbal harassment etc. are the policies that need frequent updation according to the law.
While every change doesn’t necessitate that a new version of a handbook be made, it does require regular revisions. While frequent revisions are necessary, they can be hindered if you’re using a manual handbook. Using an online handbook like this one can make the job of updating policies and notifying to your employees much easier.
2. Lunch And Tea Breaks
Are we back in school where we get to eat only in a specified time frame? Asking your employees to have specific lunch hours shows your business off as a controlling and overly restrictive one. Who even has their hunger conditioned to a specific hour of the day?
When employees are given the freedom to eat and relax, they can socialize with other employees. Employees perform better with work friends AND an added bonus is that you can see how responsibly your employees behave when they are given the freedom to be however they want to be. Employee performance survey sorted!
3. Writing Down Rigid Disciplinary Action
There’s always something that has never happened before in your career as a manager and so, you can not possibly list down every imaginable disciplinary action. Yes, it is important to make tough outlines for handling issues such as harassment but allow manager discretion in unique and unprecedented situations.
When you will make a rigid policy, it will not allow you the space to review the problem at hand but just to follow it as it is. Leave some room for error and allow flexibility so you don’t get yourself, your business and your employees in unnecessary trouble.
4. Computer Usage And Social Media Usage Policy
Going to the prison and going to a workplace should have some differences! The more strict policies you add, the more loopholes you create for yourself and your company. If your employees are not able to work in a relaxed environment, they might not be able to work at all!.
Dictating employees about technology, wifi, mobile or social media usage is straight out restrictive and to be honest, pretty unnecessary. If they get the work done, that’s what should matter. If you find your employees excessively wasting time using social media, then you can talk to them directly instead of putting a policy in your handbook.
While some might argue that the above mentioned policies are a must have in the employee handbook, that’s our take on what seems to be a waste of space in an employee handbook. There’s a lot to consider when planning and implementing an employee handbook. When you do it the right way, it will be a valuable tool for everyone at your company for years to come, and set you in the right direction in achieving the goals of the organization.
Hernaldo Turrillo is a writer and author specialised in innovation, AI, DLT, SMEs, trading, investing and new trends in technology and business. He has been working for ztudium group since 2017. He is the editor of openbusinesscouncil.org, tradersdna.com, hedgethink.com, and writes regularly for intelligenthq.com, socialmediacouncil.eu. Hernaldo was born in Spain and finally settled in London, United Kingdom, after a few years of personal growth. Hernaldo finished his Journalism bachelor degree in the University of Seville, Spain, and began working as reporter in the newspaper, Europa Sur, writing about Politics and Society. He also worked as community manager and marketing advisor in Los Barrios, Spain. Innovation, technology, politics and economy are his main interests, with special focus on new trends and ethical projects. He enjoys finding himself getting lost in words, explaining what he understands from the world and helping others. Besides a journalist, he is also a thinker and proactive in digital transformation strategies. Knowledge and ideas have no limits.