Creating a great workplace is easier with the right strategy.

 

A G

...if it Fits Your Unique Work Environment

We invest time up front to understand your vision, workforce, and immediate and long term goals. With these in mind, we work with you to develop an individualized Great Workplace Strategy that will bring all the pieces together to help you build your great workplace. Your Great Workplace Strategy will be more than a reflection of legal requirements; it will be tailored to your workplace. It may include immediate solutions or a recommendation for additional review of your current practices and next steps for reaching your goals.

Our understanding of your unique situation will help us determine exactly what we recommend for your workplace. Components of your Great Workplace Strategy will be tailored to your workplace, and may include some or all of the below, as well as solutions customized to your workplace.

 

Creating Employment Relationships

Are you hiring the right people and also protecting the company? You want to know you are asking the right interview questions, and avoiding the wrong questions. Well-crafted applications and offer letters set the tone for the relationship, and are the first important step in creating shared expectations which will guide the employment relationship and provide protection for the company. Background searches, including drug testing and credit checks, may yield important information on whether the individual is a good fit, and we can help you navigate the legal obligations related to these searches. Carefully created job descriptions that establish physical and skill expectations can be important tools in managing performance. We help you create the systems for consistent and legal hiring practices and documentation.

 

Clear Expectations Through Your Handbook

Your Employee Handbook can be a roadmap for performance and success, and is a wonderful opportunity for capturing your company’s unique vision and expectations. A well drafted Handbook also gives your company the comfort of knowing that you are in compliance with the law and have systems in place for addressing personnel issues that may arise from time to time. We help you create a Handbook that reflects your values and expectations, and that establishes performance goals.

 

Establishing Sound Pay Practices

Are your payroll practices clear, consistent and compliant with the law? Clear and legally-compliant shared expectations on time keeping, payment of wages, overtime, rest and meal periods and paid time off reduce payroll confusion and protect the company from liability. We work with you to correctly characterize your employment relationships and to create sound pay and record keeping practices.

 

Protecting the Crown Jewels

Your business is unique, and protecting your confidential and trade secret information is an important part of your success. We tailor policies, practices and agreements to protect your company’s confidential and trade secret information, customer and employee relationships.

 

The Equal Opportunity Workplace

An ideal workplace is one in which employment decisions are based on performance, and not based on the employee’s status in a group protected by law. We help you establish policies that reinforce this important principle, and create practices for maintaining a work environment that is compliant with law and affords every employee the same opportunity to succeed. This may include training on how to uphold an equal opportunity workplace, and how to investigate and respond to complaints in order to maintain your great workplace and protect the company from liability.

 

Systematizing Leaves of Absence

Your employees may be entitled to time off from work either by virtue of your policies or the law. Clear expression of your leave practices creates shared expectations for whether and how an employee may be absent from work. We help you create the policies that will govern these leaves, and the documentation and practices to consistently support these policies. This takes the guess work out of leaves of absence, and gives you the peace of mind that comes from having a system in place.

 

Managing Performance

The decisions you make each day with respect to your employees has a significant impact on whether you are creating shared expectations. With each decision, you are managing or not managing your employee’s performance. We work with you to create systems for managing employee performance on a regular basis. To this end, performance evaluations (formal and informal) are a meaningful tool, if used well. We review forms and written policies and procedures for evaluation of performance, along with practices for evaluating performance, identifying and correcting performance that is not meeting expectation.

 

Rewarding Met Expectations

The key to successful incentive plans is having clear expectations for performance, defined rewards for satisfaction of those expectations, and any conditions for payment of the incentive. We help you create plans that reflect your company’s goals and expectations.

 

The Decision to Terminate an Employment Relationship

Your performance management and termination practices can dictate whether a termination is a smooth transition or an invitation to litigation.

Sometimes, economic realities may require that you lay off employees. We help you understand the laws related to mass lay offs to determine whether you are covered by the laws, and how to make sure your terminations make business sense and afford you the protection of the law.

Sometimes, an employment relationship is a bad fit. Once you have established clear expectations for performance, it will become clear if an employee is not meeting those expectations. We provide you with counsel on how to manage those circumstances, how to improve performance and, where necessary, how best to end the employment relationship. We help you ensure your termination process is complete and compliant.

 

Partnering for Day to Day Counseling

We are your partners in maintaining the peace of mind that comes from having the right pieces in place. We “have your back” when personnel matters arise from time to time. For more information on day-to-day counseling visit our Day-To-Day Guidance page or click here.

 

Educating your Workplace

The following are examples of training that may be part of your Great Work Strategy, or we may recommend training tailored to your specific needs. Through these trainings, we increase employee understanding of the law and your policies, providing your company with another opportunity to ensure compliance and avoid lawsuits:

  • How to interview. With this training on “dos and don’ts” employers will avoid asking inappropriate or unlawful questions, and better identify employees who are the right fit for your workplace.
  • Understanding and avoiding harassment. We educate supervisors and employees to understand, prevent and respond to harassment.
  • Responding to requests for leave. We reinforce your understanding of the sometimes complicated leave of absence laws, and train your workforce on how to understand when an employee may be entitled to leave, and the procedures for granting and managing a leave.
  • Managing performance. This training reinforces best practices for managers on managing, disciplining, evaluating, supervising and where necessary terminating employees.

To learn more about what pieces you may already have in place visit our Rate Your Workplace page or click here. To schedule a Workplace Strategy Discovery meeting give us a call at 619.906.2400 or email us by clicking here.

To learn more about educating your workplace visit our Workplace Education & Training page or click here.

 

Schor Vogelzang & Chung LLP

Partnering to create your great workplace!

2170 Fourth Avenue, San Diego, CA 92101
P: 619.906.2400 F: 619.906.2401

 

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