Employee welfare, health, and safety

Chapter 11 Employee Welfare, Health and Safety

Multiple Choice Question
In most hotels, The Human Resource department…
a) hires staff
b) sets labor policies
c) defines the duties of employees
d) All of the above

e) None of the above
Pay Attention Today!

What’s the meaning of Welfare provision ? Welfare provision generally refers to those policies which are directed at some aspect of employee well being both in a physical and emotional sense.

Why should organizations have a welfare policy ? For saving costs by reducing absence and improving the performance of employees in the workplace by addressing any problem or concerns that they might have .

Three Common “Welfare Rationales”
Legal-Reactive
Corporate Conscience
Company Paternalism
( Marriott, Hilton, Holiday Inn and Forte )

Employee Blogging

Let’s work together and form a policy for the employee handbook regarding blogging

Harvard Law School's policy reads exactly how you'd expect Harvard Law School's to read. It actually starts off with an apology "We don’t mean to turn you off from blogging by immediately inundating you with legalese, but we need to make clear our respective rights and responsibilities related to this service." By posting your Content using the Services, you are granting Harvard a non-exclusive, royalty-free, perpetual, and worldwide license to use your Content in connection with the operation of the Services, including, without limitation, the license rights to copy, distribute, transmit, publicly display, publicly perform, reproduce, edit, translate and reformat your Content, and/or to incorporate it into a collective work. How can you accomplish this without so many words?

With this two-word corporate blogging policy: "Be professional"

In general, the employee handbook should be approached as a guideline for workplace expectations and policies.
The more detailed the handbook becomes, the more likely it is to become a problem for employers and employees alike.

Any ideas on a policy regarding dress-code?
Do we need a policy?

Let’s develop an employee manual tonight and
KISS
(Keep It Simple Stupid)

Welfare…. A variety of issues
Absence Management
(Direct and Indirect)
Direct Costs
- Occupancy sick pay
- Lost production
- Replacement Staff

Indirect Costs
- Burdens on another members
- Leading poor morale
- Lower productivity
- Reduce customer retention

Organization should have a basic sickness absence policy.
Outline the process employees must follow if taking time of sick
Require sick-note
Return-to-work interviews

What should our policy be regarding attendance and absences?

Prevention is better than Cure
Management seeks to adopt a proactive approach in creating a healthy organization and aims to help employees to look and feel better and to be physically healthy or fit.
Gym on site and expert advice.(nutrition)

Prevention is better than Cure (Continue)
Monitoring aspects such as employees’ heart rate, blood pressure, cholesterol and body weight.
Should the company be able to monitor an employee’s health?

Aids / HIV
Aids presents a major managerial challenge encompassing moral, social and medical issues resulting from health, safety, legal and humanitarian problems (Arkin 2005)

Responding to sensitive issues
A member of staff in your travel agency comes to you and informs you that they are HIV positive.
How do you react ?
What’s your policy?

Adam-Smith and Goss(1993)
Three potential responses to the perceived risk of infection in the workplace.
- Rational Response
- Bounded Rationality Response
- Subjective Response

Policy responses to AIDS / HIV
Total denial that AIDS/HIV is a workplace issue.
Wait and see approach.
Deliberate no-policy decision and reliance on existing arrangements.
AIDS/HIV to be treated as any other life-threatening disease.
Introduce specific policy.

Why we should have AIDS/HIV Policy ?
Countering misunderstanding, lack of knowledge, fear and prejudice.
HIV Disability Discrimination Act.

Alcohol / Drug use
The commonest causes.
One in four accidents at work are due to alcohol misuse.

Direct and Indirect Affects
Costs of accidents
Lower productivity
Poor quality work
Bad decisions
Damage to the organization reputation
Absenteeism

Direct and Indirect Affects (Continue)
Unreliability
Managers losing time in dealing with problems
Increased labor turnover

Create an environment in the work place
Long working hours
Availability of alcohol in the workplace
Stressful… employees are expected to be positive while working

Developing policy on alcohol and drugs
Including any legal obligations
A clear outline of the aims and purposes
Detail of the responsibility of different staff
Tighter restrictions for any particular groups
Definition of rule and procedures regarding prescription medicine

Review and reflect
“ Peer pressure is likely to have more impact on changing behavior with regards to alcohol or drugs than organizationally directed interventions”
Do you agree?

Drug and alcohol testing
The moral, ethical and legal aspects of testing
Testing is the best way to address the problem of misuse
Whom to test?

What’s our policy regarding drugs and alcohol?

Sexual harassment
What constitutes sexual harassment?”
Patting, hugging or touching a co-worker
Comments about the way a women looks
Lewd remarks or glances directed towards a male from a female employee
Questions about an employees sex life
Requests for sexual favors
Allowing suggestive posters of either sex in the workplace

A new definition of sexual harassment
“ Any form of unwanted verbal, non-verbal or physical conduct of a sexual nature which occurs with the purpose of violating the dignity of a person, in particular when creating an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment”

Why employers should take action to prevent sexual harassment?
Protecting the company image
Avoiding litigation
Reducing absenteeism
No employee suffer from sexual harassment
The work place should be safe from harassing behavior

Tourism and Hospitality
A breeding ground for sexual harassment?
Hotel often suggest the promise of sexual activity?
Waiters flirt with customer increase customer spend and their own tips

Sexual harassment does not refer to the occasional compliments of a socially acceptable nature. It does not refer to mutually acceptable joking or teasing.
It refers to the behavior which is
Unwelcome
Personally offensive
Debilitating to morale
therefore, interferes with work effectiveness

Stress
Think about what makes you stressed at work…how can stress by alleviated…is alleviating stress a personal issue or a company issue.

Demands
Control
Support
Relationships
Role
Change

Working Time
Flexible work hours
Split shifts
Whatever works

What’s our policy regarding scheduling?

Do we have a policy about work place violence?

Check-out these websites: www.safetyworld.com www.worksafebc.com www.ossa.com www.osha.gov

What policies in your typical handbook can't be distilled into the two words "respect others"?

Policies about harassment and discrimination and office romance are all about respecting coworkers.

Policies about trade secrets and computer usage and even attendance are all about respecting the company.

Policies about dealing with customers or answering the phone or about handling complaints are about respecting the customers.

Even policies about drugs and alcohol are all about respecting yourself.

Let’s take a break and return for a discussion

Multiple Choice Question
In most hotels, The Human Resource department…
a) hires staff
b) sets labor policies
c) defines the duties of employees
d) All of the above

Who does these jobs?
Hire Staff
Sets employee policy
Defines the duties of staff
The final responsibility is in the hands of the department head Top Management set policy (GM and dep’t heads) define the duties of each category of employee

What does the H/R dep’t do?
Recommend and formalize the duties of staff and
Administer, Interpret and Implement plans, policies, duties, etc

5 Ways to Know When It’s Time to Get Out of HR
You actually look forward to firing someone
You say, “This would be a great job if it weren’t for the people” and mean it
You don’t think that anyone can get a 5 in a 5-point rating scale
You think that it’s just a matter of the right forms, no exceptions
You can no longer say no to management, even when it’s the right thing to do

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Employee welfare, health, and safety

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Employee welfare, health, and safety — Presentation Transcript