Another Day in the HR Field

The morning after a day in Jamaica starts off with a bang in Julie Pugh's session covering Harassment in the Headlines most recently refenced by hashtags #MeToo and #TimesUp.  Her session was titled Have Your Life Jacket Handy: The HR Professional's Role in Addressing Pre-Lawsuit Procedures. Whew! That's a mouthful! However, being prepared is a big deal and deserves our attention, understanding, and consideration to avoid a mouthful of curse words (quietly of course) when you get handed your first EEOC complaint or lawsuit.  Believe me, they are not fun to deal with! I have personally had my share of harassment (especially sexual) complaints during my tenure in HR.  So far this year, I have delivered a couple of programs as well as conducted a couple of investigation and it's only February! The stories I could tell would make you wonder what type of work is actually being done in the workplace.  Matter of fact, I shared one of them in the session that helped Jul...

It's Showtime at sea for attendees of the 1st Annual #HRCruise heading to Haiti and Jamaica.  After a great opening session by Greg Hawks, the first session of the week began with Brad and Suzanna Cooper with US Corporate Wellness .  They have walked attendees through a well thought out, detailed and thoughtful presentation about what corporate wellness should look like.  In my experience wellness programs have been very narrowed.  For example, when I first started my career, there was a $100 prize for the employee who lost the greatest percentage of weight.  I was only 23 at the time without a great deal of other influences buying for my time.  It was a cinch.  I won! I went out and bout a brand new suit to wear to work with my winnings.  I was excited, proud and focused.  I had willpower. However, the wellness program was only focused on one thing, weight loss. A strategically planned program will consider so much more like smoking, stre...

The following was originally posted on the WomenofHR site on 7/14/15. I am reposting here because I will be referring to it in upcoming presentation where I have done some additional research around this topic of Bereavement Leave. My mission is to change the minds of management around the world to improve their culture so that employees feel more comfortable taking the time off they need to "do the work" as you will see in my story below as well as "grieve" which is not a simple 3-5 day process! More to come on this topic in upcoming posts. Thank you in advance for reading and sharing! Bereavement Leave Fail from Women of HR When you’re managing employees and they have a death in the family of someone who has been sick for a while and they have made you aware of the situation, what do you do? Worse yet, what do you do when an employee calls you on their way out of town to tell you that their brother was killed the night before by a hit and run driver? Th...

Guest Post By Kendall Herbert, Emergency Management Specialist Accidents, Emergencies, and Natural Disasters happen every day, and their repercussions can affect everyone. Emergency managers are the experts who assist work centers and businesses to prepare for, respond to, and recover from a wide range of emergencies that could happen. Some insight they offer are: ·         Preparedness : Informing and preparing employees for any type of hazard they could encounter, such as natural or man-made disasters. As the saying goes “Failing to prepare, is preparing to fail” via Benjamin Franklin. ·         Planning : Many plans and procedures can be created to lessen the impact from disasters. Some typical plans include: o    Business Continuity Plan : This will be a guideline for how business will be conducted when an incident or accident occurs. o    Evacuation Plans : When there is a fire or other emerg...

The following was originally written in 2011 and posted on the Women of HR site here: http://womenofhr.com/is-the-good-ol%E2%80%99-boy-network-just-a-myth/ As I prepare for a program on harassment and discrimination to be delivered at the Danville Community College later this month, I was reminded of this post and thought I would share again here. From the archives: From Women of HR By Donna Rogers, SPHR, SHRM-SCP The following are a few hypothetical (not really) life stories related to human resources, being a woman in what is still in some circles ‘a man’s world’ and organizational behavior. At the end of each story, I challenge you to put yourself in the position of anyone in this story and comment on whether or not you think the “ good ol’ boy ” network is a myth or has a touch of reality. There are no right or wrong answers. Have fun! Myth or reality? A fully qualified female non-commissioned officer applies for a commissioned officer position within a department for which she ...

The following was originally written in 2011 and posted on the Women of HR site here:  http://womenofhr.com/bride-to-be-discouraged-employee/ As I prepare for a program on harassment and discrimination to be delivered at the Danville Community College later this month, I was reminded of this post and thought I would share again here.  From the archives (although updated slightly with number of years married, etc. By Donna Rogers, SPHR, SHRM-SCP Last week (in 2011), I was teaching a two-day Certified Public Manager session for a group of association members.  The session was called Human Resources: Productivity and Quality.  During one of our discussions regarding compliance related issues we covered the process of an HR Audit which included as one of many tasks, a review of posters that need to be posted at work sites.  One participant mentioned a poster that drew quite a stir when it first came out, which I personally was not aware of, pictured t...

I had a company encouraging me to update this list over the last couple of months.  Since they focus on veteran hiring and I am a veteran supporting other veterans I am happy to add the following to this original posting from 2017. Silent Professionals is a free veteran recruitment service. Their differentiating factor is that they focus on a very specific subset of veteran employment which is the combat arms veteran. Their site is much more than just a job board because they actually provide a service behind it which is all free to the veteran. As combat veterans themselves, with a vast amount of experience in the private security sector, they are able to use that experience and influence within the industry to act as trusted advocates for the veteran candidate. They boast an incredible 84% job placement success rate for candidates that they recommend to employers. One of the reasons they're able to do that is because of their focus on jobs for combat veterans who are seek...