Does your company have these HR policies?

Svnla

Lifer
Nov 10, 2003
17,986
1,388
126
Take the miles of traveling employees? Really?

My companies (current and previous ones):

1. Only if you have more than 2 sick days in a row.
2. Haven't use it yet and not plan to use it.
3. Nope, that is stupid.
4. Nope, this is stupid.
5. I wish there would be more open dialog of what is/not working.
6. Nope. My miles are all mine.
7. Nope. Thank goodness.
8. Yes. My first company (Fortune 500), you could be fired if you do so.
9. Nope. If you work extra, you will get time off.
10. Nope. This is stupid.

What say ya'll? How are things in your companies?

Here is what the article said"

1. The policy that requires employees to bring in a doctor’s note when they are sick. Who goes to the doctor for a bad cold or the flu? I called the doctor’s office when my kid had the flu. The nurse heard me list my kid’s symptoms and she said, “Keep him at home!” She wouldn’t make an appointment for him, and I don’t blame her. It’s stupid to go sit in a doctor’s office when you should be at home sleeping and drinking fluids.

2. The policy that requires an employee to bring in a funeral notice in order to get paid for bereavement leave when someone in the employee’s family dies. This is the lowest of the low. If you don’t trust your employees, why did you hire them?

3. The policy that prohibits managers from giving references for their former employees. If you don’t trust your managers to give references responsibly and professionally, why do you let them lead teams of employees and interact with customers and vendors?

4. The policy that requires job-seekers to give up their salary history details. This practice will be illegal in Massachusetts when a newly-signed law takes effect, and should be illegal everywhere.

5. The policy that subjects grown-up adults to Progressive Discipline and Performance Improvement Plans instead of sitting down with them and asking, “What isn’t working, from your perspective? What do we need to talk about and clear up, that we haven’t talked about enough yet?”

6. The policy that steals frequent flyer airline miles from the person whose actual tush was in that airline seat. People who travel for business don’t get paid for the hours they donate, when they could be at home and doing whatever they want to do. At least give them the frequent flyer miles they earned! Any company who needs to pinch pennies by stealing their employees’ airline miles has a leadership problem that stealing airline miles from employees will not solve!

7. The policy that employees who want to transfer to a different department have to get their current manager’s approval first. This is brainless on the face of it, because you don’t have to get your manager’s approval to go and work for a different company. Requiring employees to get their manager’s approval for an internal transfer is a great way to drive talent out the door.

8. The policy that prohibits employees from talking about their salaries with other employees. Whenever I see a company with this policy in place I ask them, “What are you afraid of?” Your employees are adults. Let them talk about whatever they like. That’s how you build trust.

9. The policy that lets salaried employees work until 10 p.m. or midnight without so much as a comment but dings them when they walk into work 10 minutes late in the morning.

10. Any policy that ranks or stacks employees one against the other, like Forced Ranking programs or performance review systems that allocate only a few spots for Top Performers, a few more spots for Above Average performers, and so on. While you’re reforming your out-of-date performance review system, why not ditch performance reviews altogether the way progressive companies are doing right and left!

http://www.forbes.com/sites/lizryan...arrassment-to-the-hr-profession/#33a37cd3703f
 
Last edited:

Ns1

No Lifer
Jun 17, 2001
55,420
1,600
126
forbes doesn't play nice with adblock, so if you want a larger response you should c/p the forbes article.
 

SSSnail

Lifer
Nov 29, 2006
17,458
83
86
forbes doesn't play nice with adblock, so if you want a larger response you should c/p the forbes article.
Every time I looked into a thread started by svnla, and I want to reply, it's always linked to some bullshit websites with a gazillion scripts running on them. I just promptly close the thread and move on.

That's my policy.
 
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TwiceOver

Lifer
Dec 20, 2002
13,544
44
91
1. One company i worked for required 3 WORKING days of doctor requiring off in order to use any sick time. So for me I worked "4th shift" which was Friday - Sunday. With this policy the only way I could use sick time is if I was basically dying.

9. My current employer basically requires you to use vacation time for anything over 15 minutes off. Even though one week on salary I might work 60 hours and the next week 39.75 + 15 minutes of vacation.
 

Svnla

Lifer
Nov 10, 2003
17,986
1,388
126
Every time I looked into a thread started by svnla, and I want to reply, it's always linked to some bullshit websites with a gazillion scripts running on them. I just promptly close the thread and move on.

That's my policy.

The door is that way. Straight ahead is the whine and bitch area.

forbes doesn't play nice with adblock, so if you want a larger response you should c/p the forbes article.

Done.
 

Cozarkian

Golden Member
Feb 2, 2012
1,352
95
91
I didn't think #6 is even possible with post 9-11 flight rules. #8 is illegal as sharing salary information with coworkers is protected concerted activity under federal law.
 

Ns1

No Lifer
Jun 17, 2001
55,420
1,600
126
1 - no
2 - no
3 - no
4 - no, but most do it anyway because they're fields on the online application
5 - yes, but after said conversation(s) have taken place. it's not the first step to discipline
6 - lol no what the fuck, fuck any company that does this
7 - yes
8 - no
9 - no
10 - kind of
 

OutHouse

Lifer
Jun 5, 2000
36,410
616
126
3 days then note if you are out longer.
No, that’s fucking stupid and insulting.
No
No
No
Fuck that shit
No
No
No, I was “late” this morning due to Patch Tuesday.
No, but we used to do peer reviews. It got canned due to people using it to bitch about personal grievances about the person being reviewed.
 

Pulsar

Diamond Member
Mar 3, 2003
5,224
306
126
1. employees to bring in a doctor’s note when they are sick

That is simply stupid.

2. The policy that requires an employee to bring in a funeral notice in order to get paid for bereavement leave when someone in the employee’s family dies.

This is absolutely required. I don't what fantasy land you work in, but I have had hundreds of people working for me and I know that I can only trust a handful of them. Here's the deal. You're looking at it from an employee's point of view. I'm looking at it from the manager's side. If I give you free paid days off because you claim to be on bereavement, I will be in trouble. You will too. A funeral notice is a very simply thing to verify a death in the family.

3. The policy that prohibits managers from giving references for their former employees


Stupid.

4. The policy that requires job-seekers to give up their salary history details.

Stupid.

5. The policy that subjects grown-up adults to Progressive Discipline and Performance Improvement Plans instead of sitting down with them and asking, “What isn’t working, from your perspective? What do we need to talk about and clear up, that we haven’t talked about enough yet?”

Uh... that's the first step in the progressive discipline process. The reason you absolutely have to use a system like that is because when it comes time to fire someone, you better have a list of actions taken, what they did to deserve it, and it needs to all be documented. Otherwise it's lawsuit city and YOUR job is at risk for being a shitty manager.

6. The policy that steals frequent flyer airline miles from the person whose actual tush was in that airline seat.

Stupid.

7. The policy that employees who want to transfer to a different department have to get their current manager’s approval first.

Required. In a situation where I have a single employee with expertise that my department is needs to run, then it would be absolutely stupid to allow him to transfer to another position until he is replaced or has trained someone else. If hirings are frozen - since they so often are for cost reasons - getting a replacement can take a while.

8. The policy that prohibits employees from talking about their salaries with other employees.

Stupid.

9. The policy that lets salaried employees work until 10 p.m. or midnight without so much as a comment but dings them when they walk into work 10 minutes late in the morning.

That's a managerial policy largely. In some situations it can be required. Often the start of a shift is the most important period in production.

10. Any policy that ranks or stacks employees one against the other, like Forced Ranking programs or

Uh, welcome to the reality of a free market and competition.

You sound extremely naive.
 

Bart*Simpson

Senior member
Jul 21, 2015
602
4
36
www.canadaka.net
Since I got my CISSP two years ago and then my IAPP this past spring I really stopped having to give a shit about the silly rules at my job. I'm here because I enjoy the work and if that changes I get about two to three job contacts per day and can quickly find something else to do. The job would be lucky to get someone with an A+ to replace me.

Moral of the story: Be of value to your employer and you don't need to worry about the bullshit.
 
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Six

Senior member
Feb 29, 2000
523
34
91
I know a few companies like that...all in the manufacturing field.
 

etrigan420

Golden Member
Oct 30, 2007
1,723
1
81
No to all except #1, and only then if longer than 4 days.

The dumbest HR policy I've ever experienced was when I had to take a "longer than expected" recovery after voluntary surgery. They had some bullshit rule about how you couldn't take over a certain percentage of sick leave within a fiscal year *even if you had the leave on the books*. It just so happened to be near the beginning of the fiscal year...

Fucking derp.
 

jpiniero

Lifer
Oct 1, 2010
16,613
7,098
136
1. People abuse sick time sooo much. No, a hangover is not a valid excuse. I've never had to deal with this since I could just work from home, but I could see this at a company where absenteeism is a big problem. Bereavement is the same deal.

3. There literally is no benefit to the employer to allow references, so why allow it? I know it's difficult to get a job these days without a reference, but is that really their former employer's problem?

4. Companies do this more to get intel on comparable salaries more than to squeeze someone they want to hire and that person wants a big raise. I don't think this changes things more than you would think. I believe they can still ask what you want up front.

5. PIP's only happen when they've already made the decision to fire someone. It's just a legal thing they have to do before it happens.

TBH the way things are going, FTE/PTO/etc are going to be a thing of the past so most of these things are going to be moot eventually anyway.
 

Red Squirrel

No Lifer
May 24, 2003
70,285
13,645
126
www.anyf.ca
1. I think my company it's like 3 days but at manager's discretion, I always found that concept stupid too, who wants to go sit in a clinic for 8 hours when sick? Thankfully my boss does not really enforce it, if you're sick, you're sick.

2. I'm not aware of anything like that, there's various rules about how you are related to the person and how many days you get, but that too is at manager's discretion and my manager is pretty good about it.

3. This is a new policy they started, I find it's stupid and pointless, but there's probably some political or bureaucratic reason behind it.

4. Not aware of anything like this as far as I know

5. Nope. There's a certain 3 strike process for bad employees and union has to be involved and stuff though. you have to screw up fairly bad like showing to work drunk multiple times or constantly being late etc to be fired from my company, and TBH, that's how it should be. Some people make mistakes, shit happens, etc especially in a technical role. Should not have to walk on egg shells all day.

6. Not aware of anything like this, but I don't travel much if at all with company so not up to par with these type of rules

7. Not quite, but there used to be a policy that your current manager can keep you for as long as they want, ex: till they find a replacement. I got stuck at a position I wanted to leave for like a year because of that. Thankfully they changed that in the following union agreement, there is a max amount of time, like 90 days or something, I forget.

8. Nope, that's just stupid.

9. OT has to be approved by manager, you can't really just volunteer for no reason. Typical reasons for OT is someone is sick and you need to take their shifts etc. Summer is typical for racking in OT because we are super short staffed, so it only takes one little thing to happen where someone can't come in and then you have to call out someone.

10. We sort of have this, but not sure if it's still active. Basically there's a performance review and a few people can be nominated for an award. I can't complain about such program, because I got an award myself and was flown out of province. :p

Some of th epolicies my company has as far as IP and conflict of interest I think is pure BS though. Basically the policy states that ANYTHING you create on your spare time is property of the company. You are also not allowed to do anything on the side that is remotely similar to the company's offerings. That I can sorta understand I guess, but I still have trouble accepting the idea that a company can dictate what you can/can't do on your own time. But whatever, most companies have this, you just have to sign it and just watch out if you do partake in anything like that. I've never heard of my company actually enforcing it on anyone.
 

foghorn67

Lifer
Jan 3, 2006
11,883
63
91
1- Only for an excessive amount of days in a row.
No for the rest. Glad I'm not in the corporate world anymore.


Sent from my SM-G930T using Tapatalk
 

BoomerD

No Lifer
Feb 26, 2006
66,037
14,445
146
1. The policy that requires employees to bring in a doctor’s note when they are sick.
The only time I've had to deal with that was after you used a certain percentage of your annual sick leave allotment, or if you were going to be off more than 3 days in a row. (but I've only had paid sick leave a few times in my life)

2. The policy that requires an employee to bring in a funeral notice in order to get paid for bereavement leave when someone in the employee’s family dies.
I don't see a problem with this. If the employee wants paid time off for a funeral that isn't theirs, a simple note from the cadaver should be simple. :p

3. The policy that prohibits managers from giving references for their former employees.
I'm not sure it's a matter of trust...Companies have been sued because of bad reviews written about previous employees, and often, only HR can comment...and then, only about the dates of employment.

4. The policy that requires job-seekers to give up their salary history details.
Working for union scale, this was seldom a problem for me, but after I had to give up construction, potential employers looked at me kind of funny when they saw my wage history as compared to what the salary was for job I was applying for...

5. The policy that subjects grown-up adults to Progressive Discipline and Performance Improvement Plans instead of sitting down with them and asking, “What isn’t working, from your perspective? What do we need to talk about and clear up, that we haven’t talked about enough yet?”
Progressive disciplinary policies are designed for one thing...to cover the company's ass in case an employee sues for "wrongful termination." Any "correction of behavior" that results is merely a nice side benefit.

6. The policy that steals frequent flyer airline miles from the person whose actual tush was in that airline seat. People who travel for business don’t get paid for the hours they donate, when they could be at home and doing whatever they want to do. At least give them the frequent flyer miles they earned! Any company who needs to pinch pennies by stealing their employees’ airline miles has a leadership problem that stealing airline miles from employees will not solve!
meh...the company paid for the flight that earned those miles. IMO, the miles belong to the payor, not the traveler.

7. The policy that employees who want to transfer to a different department have to get their current manager’s approval first. This is brainless on the face of it, because you don’t have to get your manager’s approval to go and work for a different company. Requiring employees to get their manager’s approval for an internal transfer is a great way to drive talent out the door.
Stupid on the face...let a manager restrict the transfer for a short time...allowing the transferee to finish a project and allow the manager to fill the position with as small an interruption as possible.
8. The policy that prohibits employees from talking about their salaries with other employees. Whenever I see a company with this policy in place I ask them, “What are you afraid of?” Your employees are adults. Let them talk about whatever they like. That’s how you build trust.
While I personally think this is stupid and SHOULD be illegal, in most states, it's not. (can't be having the peons comparing their pay stubs, now can we?)

9. The policy that lets salaried employees work until 10 p.m. or midnight without so much as a comment but dings them when they walk into work 10 minutes late in the morning.
Working more than 40 hours per week as salaried SHOULD be illegal. Want your employees to work 50, 60 hours per week...or more? Pay them overtime.

10. Any policy that ranks or stacks employees one against the other, like Forced Ranking programs or performance review systems that allocate only a few spots for Top Performers, a few more spots for Above Average performers, and so on. While you’re reforming your out-of-date performance review system, why not ditch performance reviews altogether the way progressive companies are doing right and left!
I always hated performance reviews. I think I only had one where I left not wanting to shove the paperwork up the ass of the manager giving the review.

In the end...employers have the rights to do a lot of shit that the working peons hate...right or wrong, and what they're allowed to do changes at the state line. (yes, SOME things are restricted/mandated by federal law, but it's the most protection for the employee.)

I always liked California's "Overtime after 8 hours per day or 40 hours per week" law. Granted, it doesn't cover EVERYONE in EVERY job...and there are some exceptions that allow 4x10 hr. work weeks...but it's still great for the average working stiff.
 

Anubis

No Lifer
Aug 31, 2001
78,712
427
126
tbqhwy.com
1) no
2) no - but there is a set number of days you get paid for, you can take more
3) no idea
4) no idea prob no
5) pretty sure there is some sort of performance plan for people who under preform, or they just get transferred to a different division
6) we get to keep the miles/hotel points, if you are nonexempt you get paid for travel time
7) we have this, people get blocked all the time, normally not by manager but someone higher up in the chain
8) not sure its a rule but its generally a bad idea
9) no such thing
10) we have an annual performance review system, but its not directly compared against people
 

Chaotic42

Lifer
Jun 15, 2001
34,614
1,782
126
1) No. Our time off is completely discretionary with no questions asked. It's generally considered nice to estimate how long you'll be out though.
2) Nope
3) Nope
4) Nope
5) Definitely yes. Firing people is an epic amount of work.
6) No. We get paid from the time we leave the house for the airport until we check in to the hotel and vice versa for the return trip.
7) Not sure about this one
8) Yes
9) No. Our management team actively tries to make sure that no one has to work crazy hours and calls them out in a positive manner when they do, while having internal discussions about how to prevent it in the future.
10) We're only allowed to have a certain number of high performers and aren't expected to have any low performers. Most people end up right in the middle. Our team skews high because we've built up a great team.
 

pcgeek11

Lifer
Jun 12, 2005
22,235
4,935
136
1. The policy that requires employees to bring in a doctor’s note when they are sick. Who goes to the doctor for a bad cold or the flu? I called the doctor’s office when my kid had the flu. The nurse heard me list my kid’s symptoms and she said, “Keep him at home!” She wouldn’t make an appointment for him, and I don’t blame her. It’s stupid to go sit in a doctor’s office when you should be at home sleeping and drinking fluids.

No, Doctors note only after 4 consecutive days.

2. The policy that requires an employee to bring in a funeral notice in order to get paid for bereavement leave when someone in the employee’s family dies. This is the lowest of the low. If you don’t trust your employees, why did you hire them?

No, Only a phone call.


3. The policy that prohibits managers from giving references for their former employees. If you don’t trust your managers to give references responsibly and professionally, why do you let them lead teams of employees and interact with customers and vendors?

No idea.


4. The policy that requires job-seekers to give up their salary history details. This practice will be illegal in Massachusetts when a newly-signed law takes effect, and should be illegal everywhere.

No, and none of their business.


5. The policy that subjects grown-up adults to Progressive Discipline and Performance Improvement Plans instead of sitting down with them and asking, “What isn’t working, from your perspective? What do we need to talk about and clear up, that we haven’t talked about enough yet?”

No, Just annual evaluations.


6. The policy that steals frequent flyer airline miles from the person whose actual tush was in that airline seat. People who travel for business don’t get paid for the hours they donate, when they could be at home and doing whatever they want to do. At least give them the frequent flyer miles they earned! Any company who needs to pinch pennies by stealing their employees’ airline miles has a leadership problem that stealing airline miles from employees will not solve!

No. They pay for the hours travelling also.


7. The policy that employees who want to transfer to a different department have to get their current manager’s approval first. This is brainless on the face of it, because you don’t have to get your manager’s approval to go and work for a different company. Requiring employees to get their manager’s approval for an internal transfer is a great way to drive talent out the door.

No, no permission required. We do have to notify the manager that we are applying for an internal job posting.

8. The policy that prohibits employees from talking about their salaries with other employees. Whenever I see a company with this policy in place I ask them, “What are you afraid of?” Your employees are adults. Let them talk about whatever they like. That’s how you build trust.

Actually that is the practice at most employers.


9. The policy that lets salaried employees work until 10 p.m. or midnight without so much as a comment but dings them when they walk into work 10 minutes late in the morning.

No.


10. Any policy that ranks or stacks employees one against the other, like Forced Ranking programs or performance review systems that allocate only a few spots for Top Performers, a few more spots for Above Average performers, and so on. While you’re reforming your out-of-date performance review system, why not ditch performance reviews altogether the way progressive companies are doing right and left!

No I've never seen a "ranking" system for performance.
 

MixMasterTang

Diamond Member
Jul 23, 2001
3,167
176
106
6. The policy that steals frequent flyer airline miles from the person whose actual tush was in that airline seat. People who travel for business don’t get paid for the hours they donate, when they could be at home and doing whatever they want to do. At least give them the frequent flyer miles they earned! Any company who needs to pinch pennies by stealing their employees’ airline miles has a leadership problem that stealing airline miles from employees will not solve!
meh...the company paid for the flight that earned those miles. IMO, the miles belong to the payor, not the traveler.

But you don't get miles for paying for a flight, only for actually having your Butt in the Seat (BIS). If you buy a ticket and don't fly, you don't get miles. I don't see how it would work out for a company anyways, airlines charge around 1 cents per mile to transfer them from 1 account to another, so it's not really worth it. Also the problem comes with people who travel personally as well you usually cannot have 2 frequent flyer accounts with an airline to divide your personal and business flights and even if you could it would be counterintuitive because the more your travel on 1 account the better status you get.

I view it more of, if a company is that petty to try and take your miles from a flight (which anymore really doesn't amount to much now that everything is revenue based) then it's probably a company I really wouldn't want to work for anyway.
 

Puffnstuff

Lifer
Mar 9, 2005
16,187
4,871
136
Most of those are standard business practices these days even in unionized environments.
 

OutHouse

Lifer
Jun 5, 2000
36,410
616
126
This is absolutely required. I don't what fantasy land you work in, but I have had hundreds of people working for me and I know that I can only trust a handful of them. Here's the deal. You're looking at it from an employee's point of view. I'm looking at it from the manager's side. If I give you free paid days off because you claim to be on bereavement, I will be in trouble. You will too. A funeral notice is a very simply thing to verify a death in the family.


so my wife dies and you want a note from me to attend her funeral? you sound like a asshole McDonald's manager.