temp. leave

Sorry there have been no posts lately. I will resume shorty. I had to take sometime off due to health reasons.
Mary Beth

How far would you go to keep your job?

I honestly do not go out looking for articles about nudity in the workplace, the seem to find me through the welcome screen on AOL, but anyway.

With the global economy in the pan and many people out of work, would you consider doing something like the people in the following article are planning.

French Factory Workers Get Naked to Save Jobs - Careers Articles

finally a new post....Clear Communication

Sorry for the delay in posting. I have been beyond busy lately and I am sorry that I can not get rid of my picture, which i uploaded by mistake.

When communicating to employees, make sure you are clear and not confusing and make sure everyone is relaying the same message. It seems simple enough, but this is often not done. Sending employees in two different directions is very counterproductive and a waste of valuable resources. This gets you nowhere, the employee can be angry for doing work for nothing and leave a bad vibe around. If its project between a couple of supervisors and an employee or two or three, it is easy enough to pull them aside and discuss it with everyone what is to be done, so everyone is set off in the right direction.

Benefits

If your job includes benefits such as a 401k Match up to a certain percentage, Flexable Spending Account, charity gift match or any other good benefits, take advantage of it. It will benefit you.

First if you employer is matching your contribution to your 401K or IRA, put in the percentage they are match (if at all possible). This is found money and will benefit you. If you can put more, I suggest putting more money into your retirement account, after all its tax free.

Flexible spending accounts are great. First review what your plan covers, plans vary a little on what they cover, for example some do cover child care and over the counter medicine, some do not. You can use last years tax return (if you itemize) as a guide to see how much put away. Just remember if you do not use it but the end of the year, you loose it.

If you are active in a charity and will be writing a check for the cause, why not see if your company matches your charitable gift. Many larger companies do. This will help your donation go that much futher.

Look at your company's benefits package. Take advantage of them, they are there for you to use and help you.

Something for employers to think about...

As my grad school advisor reminded us often, always encourage your employees to be inventive and productive, even if they are not always successful. Out of mistakes great products can arise. One product I think we have all used at one time or another and most have on our desks was first considered a product failure, the product the Post It notes. 3M found the product had a use and encouraged the employee to investigate further, and now Post it notes are an office staple.

Let your employees explore their talents a bit, you never know when a great product or idea will come about.

volunteering and the work place

My view is there is always someone in more need than you and if you can help them, you do just that, help that person. I carry that over to the work place. While going to graduate school, I heard what company of various sizes were doing to encourage employees to volunteer on paid company time. I fully support this, I think people would benefit in many ways from volunteering. Due to the political correctness of today, some people go overboard and some wouldn't participate no matter how easy you made it. While I can see a need for parameters, whats wrong with just saying lets just do it for Jack's Kids and just doing it and if the company time so be it. Reasonable parameters should be amount of time donated and when one can volunteer . (you wouldn't want your employee leaving if he/she had a big project ending that afternoon and it wasn't quite done yet)

I think this can be a win win situation for all. Consider lending a hand to a worthwhile charity today.

working in the buff

I hope they don't schedule interviews on Fridays is all I have to say, what would you think walking into an interview and seeing people in the buff.

What an ice breaker! I must admit I was surprised at the amount of workers who participated in team building event. If it works and people willing to do it, I just do not need to see my coworkers in the buff. What do you think?

Naked Friday: British Marketing Co. Works In the Buff - Careers Articles

In tough economical times, is it better to cut all employees time back to four day work weeks or let a couple of people go? Which one is better for the overall morale of the company. In my opinion it would depend on what critera they used to determine the decission used. I tend to think, if its a small company where all people are well liked random days off are best, atleast in the short term. This gives the people time to search for a new job if they feel business is not improving, but also a way of making the person feel valued within the company.

rewards

In most jobs, little notes or token gifts about a recent positive job performance is a moral booster. Everyone needs a boost every now and then. Since most of the time we rarely hear about the positive that goes on, we only hear about the negative. Companies don't have to do much, for example a friend worked for a leather goods company and they used distinct tags on their products, so for their rewards program they use the tags to write a positive note on when a supervisor sees a worker doing a random positive thing, a tag with his name also goes into a bucket for a drawing for a small gift card at the end of the month. These types of rewards, for the most part do work, they are positive reinforcement in my experience. It doesn't have to cost the company much money, but can help boost the moral in these tough economical times when.

You will see this topic a lot in future blogs, I believe in the power of open communication. Remember you are a spokesperson for the company which employes you. You may not like your job, but becareful not to burn your bridges. This happens with HR people as well, I was once interviewing for a job, and one of my standard questions is do you like your job and why? now you would think they would say yes, and say the positive attributes of the job. I once had an HR job tell me this was one of the worst jobs he has ever had, he hated his boss and the company "sucks". I walked out of the interview. (the picture is one job i would like to have for an hour, it seems like fun, stressful but fun. That is one job that good communication and dedication to ones job is necessary)

Healthy Families Act

The Healthy Families Act was introduced into the House and Senate. It makes employers with over 15 employees to earn up to 56 hours of paid sick time starting after 60 days of employment. The hours could be used for yourself or a child, spouse or parent.

I agree with SHRM, Society of Human Resource Management, I feel the theory is good, but mandating any insurance or benefit, runs the risk to the employee. Some companies who can not afford all the benefits will rob Peter to pay Paul. I see the need, but do we need mandates on every issue?

Over Qualified

This is one of my pet peeves, so excuse me if this seems like a bit like a rant. Two words I hate to hear from any HR or hiring person, yet it is said over and over is they are over qualified. It is my belief that if the person is willing to do the job and is capible doing the job, why not atleast interview them. The hiring people do not know what brought this person to the apply for the position. Give them the same consideration as you would anyone else.

Should men get maternity time

In recent news there has been some hype about giving men the same maternity time as their female counterparts. This is a subject I am torn on, but leading towards no, unless their are underlying circumstances making the need for extra time. I believe men should be given several weeks off when the baby comes home (and prior to birth, if it is a difficult birth and their are other children at home). But to make it a blanket law, I don't totally agree with. They can always use vacation time after the maternity leave ends. Several companies give paid time off for male maternity leave and their is always using vacation time. The people left behind to fill in at your job are already pulled in many directions, this is only adding more to their pockets. for an short point of time.

cell phones and the work place

I think my uncle may be the last adult on the planet without a cell phone. Cell phones are everywhere but do they belong in the work place. It depends on the job. As much as I am attached to my phone, when I worked for an outside organization, they paid me for my time and attention, I believe I owe my full attention, not me trying to text or checking voice mail while doing your job. There is one more reason some companies have banned cell phones, to protect products in the pipeline. It is very easy to take a picture of the computer screen or a proto-type of a product with a camera phone and whose to say its not getting into the hands of the wrong people.

Good Job

Almost everyone can remember their worst customer service experience in the last month, but what about the best customer service, in my experience most people can't. This often happens in the work force as well, Supervisors and bosses hear all the complaints about an employee and rarely the good. While it is our job to be nice, pleasant, and knowledgeable. It doesn't always happen. So if someone goes out of their way to be extra helpful, make it a point to say "thank you" and if you have time, talk to their supervisor. Positive reinforcement is so much better than negative complaints.

We also have to stop and think on how our bad day is coming across to others. Are we making ourselves look bad or not putting forth the right image for the company. Our attitude and demeanor can make a positive impact or negative. You might not love your job, but be thankful you are working, Many people can't find employment right now.

A few months ago, IBM took away free coffee from their offices in an effort to save money. In doing so, I feel they made a horrible mistake. Having coffee in the office kept people in the office, where people continued to talk about business and projects going on. When they took the coffee out of the office, it forced those who wanted coffee to leave to obtain the office cutting down on the casual business communication going on within the office during the coffee break. I think IBM was wrong and this is a case of "penny wise, dime foolish"