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An HR Director, a Boomer, hires a new graduate as the HR Coordinator. The new Gen Y coordinator sits in an office next to the HR Director, but this new employee sends her boss several emails a day. Today, she has an important issue to be resolved so she sends an email. When the HR Coordinator doesn’t get an immediate reply, she resorts to texting her boss! Finally at the end of the day, the frustrated coordinator abruptly asks her boss, ”Why, don’t you answer my emails and my text messages?” and the equally frustrated HR Director says, “Because you sit right next door to me and if it’s that urgent you could have asked me in person.”   

 Are generational preferences at work here and do these preferences cause conflict?  

While it is never good to generalize, Boomers tend to like face-to-face interaction and Gen Y’s tend to communicate a lot more on-line using texting, and social media. No wonder, when Gen Y have grown up with technology at their fingertips. They text, Twitter, and Facebook their 100′s of friends in seconds. They like immediate response and they are wired 24/7.  

With these differences, it’s not surprizing to find that 48% of small business owners are not happy with the interpersonal skills of Gen Y (SMART Company). I’m sure at the same time the Gen Y group wouldn’t be too happy about business owners wanting so much face time!   

But face-to-face interaction is important for effective communication that builds relationships. You cannot recognize the subtle nuances and changes in body language, tone of voice, and facial expressions, even with emoticons, that tell us something more is going on than what the words are saying.    

Effective communication starts with being aware of our own preconceived assumptions!   

The key to developing better communication between generations is recognizing and understanding the preferences of others and getting rid of preconceived assumptions that one is better than the other. Both the Boomer and the Gen Y’er in the scenario at the start of this article, have a chance to build their relationship. Neither of them are mind readers, so unless there is dialogue and discussion about their communication preferences, the relationship will suffer.

If they become aware of each others preferences, the HR Director may choose to welcome a carefully crafted email that the HR Coordinator has compiled with several less urgent questions, and the HR Coordinator might just use the face-to-face communication method that her HR Director obviously wants when she has more urgent questions that need to be resolved. That’s a start.   

What do you think?    Joanne

During the HR Audits we conduct with clients there are three mistakes that frequently crop up when it comes to the Ontario Employment Standards Act (ESA). Those mistakes are as follows:

1. Vacation pay:  Employers think there is no problem with paying vacation pay instead of approving time off for vacation. Small organizations often encourage this practice because one absence makes a big difference. However, few realize that it is the employer’s responsibility to ensure that employees take two weeks vacation per year, in week long increments. If employer’s don’t do this, they could be liable if an employee suffers from burn out, or other emotional or physical illnesses. Employers make another mistake when it comes to vacation pay. Often they use base pay only when calculating vacation pay. Vacation pay should be calculated on base pay, plus additional earnings such as bonus, and overtime. The only time you don’t have to include bonus earnings is when they are “discretionary.”
2. Overtime:  Managers and business owners incorrectly think that overtime is for hourly people only and salaried employees don’t get overtime. Even large organizations like CIBC make overtime mistakes (see class action law suit over overtime). Overtime applies to salaried employees, unless they are a manager or they have a specific professional designation as outlined in ESA legislation. However, even a “working manager” is eligible for overtime in certain cases.  A “working manager” is someone who manages staff, but also spends a good deal of time doing the same work as the people s/he manages.
3. ESA Poster:  Organizations often do not comply with displaying ESA posters in areas that are accessed by employees. This is the first thing an ESA Officer will look for when they conduct a workplace audit. It’s a simple thing to do to comply!

Many employers don’t seek help when they need it. If ESA information is confusing, an employer is sometimes hesitant about picking up the phone to call an ESA officer to seek help. They believe that this will put them on the ESA radar and they will be auditted because of their questions. ESA employees are there to assist you in understanding the act.

It pays to be proactive when it comes to ESA compliance with fines ranging from $250 all the way up to $100,000 for a first offense and/or 12 months in jail. A little planning can save headaches later.

If you would like to learn more about how to protect yourself from ESA complaints, click here to contact us.

Best regards, Joanne

Are you ready for Bill 168 on workplace violence and bullying? The bill becomes law on June 15, 2010 and the ministry will be auditing organizations to ensure compliance. If you aren’t ready, the ministry can shut down your business until you have the policy, forms, and training complete. Of course, fines and penalities can cost your organization dearly for something that can be implemented with a little help. If that’s not incentive to be proactive, I don’t know what is!

As mentioned in a previous blog, this bill was prompted after an inquest about the murder of nurse Lori Dupont by her ex-boyfriend and co-worker, Dr. Marc Daniel. The legislation is intended to protect workers from violence and harassment on the job.

Do you want to save time and money?

Do you want to save hours and hours of work? Do you have the time to research and become an expert on policy development? We can help implement the policy, process, procedures, and training to ensure you are compliant in a cost effective manner. Why spend thousands of dollars in employee hours and aggravation when we have a cost effective guaranteed package to get you compliant quickly.

Bill 168 amends the Occupational Health and Safety Act. Here are some of the things you need to do to be prepared:

1. Conduct Workplace Violence Risk Assessments: Employers must conduct regular assessments in the workplace for risks of violence to ensure workers are protected. Do you have the templates and forms necessary to be compliant quickly?  We do!
2. Assess current policies and develop a workplace and harassment policy incorporating the new requirements of workplace violence and bullying, including:
   -Domestic Violence: Employers are expected to take reasonable precautions, if they are aware or ought to be reasonably aware, to protect workers from domestic violence in the workplace .
   -Disclosure of Persons with a Violent History: Employers must also disclose information to a worker about a person with a history of violent behaviour.
   -Right to Refuse Work: Employers must allow workers to refuse work if they believe they are at risk of violence in the workplace.
3. A complaint and investigation procedure must be developed.
4. Training and education must be conducted.

Are you having difficulty getting started? Have you adapted the specific policies that are impacted by Bill 168? Do you have the policies and tools in place?

No worries. We can help you quickly develop the policies, processes, checklists and tools necessary. We even have a presentation that will help you train your staff quickly. Click here to email or call us NOW. Get compliant quickly and don’t get left out in the heat on June 15th!  Take advantage of our Bill 168 package.

Believe you can and you’re half way there. ~ Theodore Roosevelt

As mentioned in previous blog posts, I’ve been fundraising for the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health. I set a goal of $1000 for my “i quit” campaign. And thanks to the generous donations from my sponsors, I’ve exceeded my goal (119% as at March 3, 2010) and SunLife Financial will match my donation! I’ve become more active running 2 to 4 miles at least 3 x a week and I’ve been going for walks whenever the sun peeks out from behind the clouds! 

The first ever, “i quit” campaign was launched at the start of January. I signed up and set my goal and as time went on I wondered if I had set an unachievable goal. I checked my dashboard as it slowly moved up. I talked to people about why I was fundraising. 

But still with a slow start, I thought I wouldn’t make my goal. I was feeling a bit negative and thought to myself, “Well, at least I raised some funds.” But then I thought, “Why am I giving up?” If I was thinking that I might not reach my goal and if this was acceptable to me, then I probably wouldn’t meet my goal. 

I realized that I was sabotaging my own results with my thoughts and beliefs. I started to look at the goal as a challenge that I would meet with a little extra effort and planning. I thought about how good it would feel to meet my goal and how the money would help so many people. This positive self-talk, made me more motivated to keep going. I was following my own suggestions from a previous goal setting blog post!

To my delight, the end result was great. With the help of my generous sponsors, I not only exceeded my goal, but Jacqueline Buscombe, Development Officer, for Annual Giving, at the CAMH informed me that I was the top fundraiser for their first ever 2010 ”i quit” campaign!   If you click here, you can read more about it. If there is another person listed on this page, that’s great too because that means their fundraising efforts bumped me off the top fundraiser podium, and that’s good news for the CAMH!

Thanks again to my generous sponsors. I couldn’t have done this without you.

And as far as positive thoughts and self-talk go, we can all use this method right now. I’ve spoken to some clients over the past couple of weeks to touch base with respect to business and the economy. Most are hanging in there. All find it hard to keep positive. If we are conscious of our thoughts, we might be able to change the economy with positive-thinking and actions by individuals, multiplied by many. Optimism backed up by a realistic plan of action is good for the economy.

What do you think?  Share your thoughts in the comment section.   Joanne

The campaign is now closed!  Thank you for your support and donations.

Other blog “iquit” blog posts: 

”I quit” – the start

Will you help me reach my goal - the middle