Creating office policies for your small business can be difficult, as most of us are well aware. How do you handle sick time, vacation time, personal time, or a death in the family? Better yet, how do your clients and/or customers handle it when it happens to you?
I was reading a very interesting article yesterday about “Can You Require Sick Employees to Stay Home“? My first reaction was “Wow! Good question” quickly followed by “as a small business owner I should be able to”. After all, it is officially cold and flu season and already every where you go people are coughing and sneezing; do you really want them bring that to work? I know I don’t want that to happen!
Sunburst, like many other small businesses consists of my husband Ben, myself, and Cheryl {who works 2 mornings a week}. It’s a given that if I get sick so will Ben and vice versa – but what about Cheryl? Does she need to come to work and end up with “whatever” we have, take it home and “give it” to everyone that she comes into contact with? Or should she come to work and we end up getting “whatever” it is she has?
Coming to work when you are sick isn’t any fun for anyone – you, the people you work with in your office, or your clients and customers. When we’re sick we just don’t perform our job duties with our usual amount of professionalism, courtesy, or speed – as a matter of fact I know I get downright crabby when I’m sick; mainly when I can’t think as fast as usual and especially if I have to repeat things to the same person multiple times during the same conversation.
There are no federal laws which specifically address whether or not employers can require employees to say home and not come to work; however, the Americans with Disabilities Act {ADA} does prohibit employers from discriminating against the disabled, although having a cold or the flu is not considered being disabled.
Encouraging employees to take a paid sick day and stay home when they have a fever, is often a common practice for larger companies and might be something that you want to consider having in place as an “office policy”. I’m sure many of you are gasping at this point and thinking “I can’t afford that!”, but think about it – which is cheaper – paying a sick employee to stay home so that others don’t get sick OR letting them come to work and you all end up getting ill? Just a thought….
In the ever increasing 24/7 connected world we live in – expectations run high – and sometimes people overlook that fact that people are sick, are away on vacation, at a Doctor’s appointment, or have had a death in the family. When we are connected 24/7 we fall into that immediate gratification or I gotta have it now trap and when those expectations are confronted by someone being unavailable some of us become very intolerant.
When you are the chief cook and bottle washer {or there is only yourself and perhaps a part time person} for your small business, it’s certainly difficult to justify taking time off; I know it is for us. Most years we are hear every day except major holidays, occasionally we are out of town {or out of state} on business, and if we are lucky once a year we take a week in vacation.
How do you handle situations such as sick time, vacation time, personal time, or a death in the family in your business? Do you have written policies in place or do you pretty much just “wing it” and handle it the best that you can at the moment? How do your customers or clients handle your being unavailable or away?
Many states require you to give employees time off to attend school functions, take family members to the doctor, and even to volunteer to be organ, bone marrow, and blood donors. Find out what these laws cover.
You are probably familiar with your obligations under federal law to grant employees time off for family, medical, or pregnancy-related leaves or military service. (These leaves are covered under the Family and Medical Leave Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Pregnancy Discrimination Act, and the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act.)
(Download free Short-Term Absences model policy including HR best practices and legal background.)
But are you aware that many states have passed “small necessities” laws that also require you to grant employees time off on a short-term basis for a variety of reasons, including time off to meet with their children’s teachers or to see their kids perform in sporting events and plays during normal work hours? In addition, other state laws allow employees to take time off to volunteer to donate bone marrow, organs, and blood. Below is a summary of some of these “small necessities” state leave laws.
* State School Activities Laws *
About fifteen states have laws requiring employers to grant time off on a short-term basis for a variety of school functions, including parent-teacher conferences and recreational school activities.
For example, California allows employees to take up to 40 hours off per year to participate in the school activities of their children and prohibits employers from discriminating against them for taking the time off. Similarly, Illinois law requires a covered employer to provide up to 8 hours of unpaid leave per school year to allow an employee to attend school conferences or classroom activities involving the employee’s children. And, North Carolina employers must provide employees up to 4 hours of unpaid leave per year for involvement in their children’s school activities.
Most states that have these laws do not require that the time off be paid; however, employees typically may be allowed to use any accrued paid leave. For example, Connecticut, Louisiana, Maine, and Minnesota allow employees to use accrued vacation time or other appropriate paid leave to participate in school activities.
And, a few states, such as Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Vermont require advance notice of the need for leave. Others, including Louisiana and Rhode Island, stipulate that employees must try to schedule school leaves so that they do not disrupt the employer’s business.
* Time Off for Family Member’s Medical Care *
A few states also allow certain employees time off to take family members to medical appointments. For example, Massachusetts requires that employers covered by the federal Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) must allow eligible employees 24 hours of leave during any 12-month period, in addition to FMLA leave, for children’s medical or dental appointments and to accompany an elderly relative to medical, dental, or other appointments for professional care. In Vermont, employees are entitled to take off up to 4 hours in a 30-day period, not to exceed 24 hours in any 12-month period, for the medical, dental, or other professional care appointments of children, dependents, spouses, or parents. And, in Maryland, state employees may use paid sick leave for their own or an immediate family member’s medical appointment.
* Bone Marrow, Organ, and Blood Donation *
Several states also mandate or encourage employers to allow employees to take time off to donate bone marrow, organs, and blood. For example, Louisiana, Minnesota, New York, Oregon, and South Carolina require employers to grant employees time off to act as bone marrow donors.
Other states, including Arkansas, Connecticut, and Maine, require employers to provide time off to allow employees to donate organs. And, at least one state, Illinois, has a law that entitles covered employees to take one hour of paid leave every 56 days to donate blood, if approved by the employer.
(Download free Short-Term Absences model policy including HR best practices and legal background.)
* Consider Granting Leave Even if Not Covered *
Since these school, medical care, and donor leave laws vary state-to-state, you should check state law for regulations concerning coverage. Of course, even if your state does not mandate time off for these activities, you should consider allowing employees to use their vacation or other accrued paid leave. These types of leave can be very important to employees trying to balance workplace and family obligations, and any accommodation you can make shows you value your employees’ outside commitments.
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Distributed by Sunburst Software Solutions, Inc. with permission from:
HR Matters E-Tips, copyright Personnel Policy Service, Inc., Louisville, KY, all rights reserved, the HR Policy and Employment Law Compliance Experts for over 30 years, 1-800-437-3735. Personnel Policy Service markets group legal service benefits and publishes HR information products, including the free weekly electronic newsletter, HR Matters E-Tips (www.ppspublishers.com/hrmetips.htm). This article is not intended as legal advice. Readers are encouraged to seek appropriate legal or other professional advice.
This is something that has plagued me for years – should I leave my computer running all the time or not.
It is also a topic that has caused much debate.
Leave your PC running 24/7
Some people say that it’s better to leave your PC running around the clock than to shut it off at night and then boot it up in the morning. The reasoning behind this side of the story, is that if you never shut down your computer you will save wear and tear on it components and, therefore, extend the life of your machine.
Shut if off and boot it up in the morning
Others say that if you care at all about energy consumption (electricity is expensive after all) and how big of a carbon footprint you are leaving – turn off your computer at night. It takes less energy to boot your computer in the morning than to leave it running overnight. Plus there is the fact that many operating systems, Windows included, perform various important housekeeping tasks during shutdown and startup — another very good reason for turning the system off at night.
Personally, I’ve always been the type to shut off my computer at night when I go home (obviously I pay the electric bill plus we have a total of 6 computers in our office) and then power it up in the morning. Sure it takes a few minutes for my computer to boot up and load everything, but what the heck – I check voice mail while I’m waiting. Not having instant access to email as soon as I sit down in my chair is not going to hurt me in any way – while the increased electric bill could certainly put a bigger dent into our checking account!
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Today I was going through a bunch of old PC World magazines and found an article written by Robert Strohmeyer about this very subject. Robert stated in his article that he had interviewed some of the top techies at HP, Seagate, and other major companies, and that nobody seemed to know how this rumor was born. But they all agreed on one thing “leaving your PC running 24/7 was NOT a good thing” and that “the claim of leaving your computer running overnight was good for it – was totally bogus.”
An HP Techie, Ken Bosley, who has spent years researching hard-drive reliability says that “you shouldn’t waste energy to extend the life of a computer by even a very small amount” and discounts the notion that “shutting down and starting up a computer puts undue stress on the components, noting that most systems are retired because of obsolescence, not because of hardware failure.”
Where do you stand on this issue? Do you shut your computer off at night or always leave it running…….and why?
