After an extremely challenging year (or two) of workforce disruptions, nonprofit employers are finding their footing again. And, with the holidays upon us and more organizations supporting flexible routines—working remote, adopting a hybrid model, or still meeting in-person—many are looking for creative ways to celebrate the holidays with their devoted staff. It’s these events and get-togethers that bind employees together and makes them feel valued while also improving overall morale.

Opportunities to recognize employee achievements and strengthen team connections should never be overlooked but especially not during this time of year. Whether you realize it or not, your employees miss their colleagues and the fun activities they use to do together such as holiday celebrations—even if they prefer working from home. A sense of community among your remote or hybrid team is crucial for building a positive employee experience and maintaining your nonprofit brand.

All of the activities below are designed to accommodate teams regardless of their work location or time zone. You can even run some of these activities over the course of a few days (or weeks) ensuring all participants have time to respond. And, with a little research you can find a plethora of helpful templates, checklists, and directions online to assist with coordinating a fun-filled event.

• Holiday Scavenger Hunt – You can do a simple photo scavenger hunt where players receive prompts and must then capture those images and submit. The first person to submit all the images wins! Or you can utilize an app such as GooseChase to create an unforgettable scavenger hunt experience that everyone will love.
• Holiday Trivia – Categories might include movies, historical events, music, or traditions.
• Gingerbread House Decorating Contest – Provide employees with a Gingerbread House Kit and have everyone join over video to decorate together. You can even create themes such as “horror movie holidays” or 90’s Christmas” to amp up the fun.
• Treat Tasting – Create or order kits that include seasonal chocolates, cookies, or flavored candy canes that everyone can taste together one by one.
• Never Have I Ever – Those who are guilty stay on camera while those who are innocent temporarily switch off their webcams. You can have employees take turns at sharing never have I ever prompts that might include “never have I ever regifted a present” or “never have I ever gotten drunk at a holiday party.”
• Online Secret Santa – Platforms like Elfster and DrawNames make it super easy to host a virtual Secret Santa Exchange that involves everyone on the team, regardless of their location.
• Ugly Sweater Contest – This is a classic holiday tradition that is super simple to coordinate with a virtual luncheon. Ask employees to wear their ugliest or most creative holiday sweater at your next video meeting and then let everyone vote and offer awards like gift cards or gift baskets.
• Virtual Cooking Class – Find someone who’s willing to give a cooking or baking lesson to the whole team. Perhaps there are people on the team who enjoy baking holiday cookies that would be willing to share their favorite recipe. There are also professional organizations that offer lessons of a wide variety of dishes like Virtual Team Cooking Class or Thriver.  
• Fun Year-End Awards – Issue a survey accepting nominations for Most Enthusiastic, Best Pajama Wearer, Most Likely to Have a Dog Barking in the Background, Never Not Drinking Coffee, or Most Likely to Be on Mute and provide fun rewards to the winners.
• Drive-Thru Holiday Lights – If all of your team is working within a 30-mile radius you can all meet up to caravan through a local holiday themed light display—and don’t forget the hot cocoa!

Get creative and take the time to celebrate your team this year by spreading a little extra holiday cheer! By planning something fun and engaging for your team, you can renew loyalty, get employees excited about the new year ahead, and nurture company culture.

One of the main reasons employees leave their jobs is because they don’t feel appreciated—causing many to question their work and often looking for a job elsewhere. Not surprisingly, but now more than ever before employees expect their workplace to deliver a productive, engaging, and enjoyable experience so to keep high performing employees on the payroll, leaders must consider recognition efforts a top priority. Celebrating achievements at work is also an important part of the productivity cycle and can transform the organization by keeping everyone aligned to the mission and values that contribute to its long-term success.

Impactful recognition has little to do with money and doesn’t need to be extravagant to be effective—it should however be genuine and come from a place of appreciation. It’s important that leaders celebrate wins big and small as both are equally valuable and impactful. Often missed opportunities to celebrate an employee include successful completion of large or new projects, teamwork, work anniversaries, and ongoing behavior that positively impacts fellow co-workers. When a manager takes the time to regularly demonstrate gratitude and appreciation for an employee’s accomplishments—both professional and personal—it can motive, engage, and reinforce positive behaviors and outcomes.

Remind your employees that you value their contributions and celebrate their successes. Check out UST’s “5 Ways to Celebrate Your Team” for some creative ways you can start recognizing your team. 

It’s up to leaders to find opportunities to celebrate their employees while also encouraging employees to celebrate each other. By creating a culture of recognition, you can improve morale and ensure your most valuable assets remain motivated to stay.

Question: What are some typical examples of employee discipline? Are there any you recommend?

Answer: Discipline should reflect the severity of the behavior, attempt to correct it, and be applied consistently. You’ll want to consider how you addressed certain behaviors in the past and the precedent you want to set for the future. For instance, if you jump straight to a final warning when a certain employee is an hour late to work, but let another employee come in late regularly without so much as a written warning, you’re setting yourself up for trouble.

We generally recommend progressive discipline. This means you start small and work your way up to termination. Progressive discipline often includes these steps:

• Oral counseling/warning(s)
• Written warning(s)
• Final written warning
• Unpaid suspension
• Termination

At each step, make your expectations clear, notify the employee of the consequences if they fail to improve (that they’ll be one step closer to termination), and document what actions you took. The warnings you give to the employee should stick to the facts, i.e., what infraction was observed, when it occurred, and what policy or policies were violated. Opinions about the infraction should be left out, as these are easily disputed. For example, “Yesterday, you arrived 20 minutes late in violation of our attendance policy” simply states the facts, whereas “You’re always tardy and can’t be trusted to arrive on time” is likely to get pushback.

Q&A provided by Mineral, powering the UST HR Workplace for nonprofit HR teams. Have HR questions? Sign your nonprofit up for a free 60-day trial here. As a UST member, simply log into your Mineral portal to access live HR certified consultants, 300+ on-demand training courses, an extensive compliance library, and more.

Flexible work arrangements have been around for decades but now that we’re beginning to see the new era of work take shape it’s more important than ever to support and manage remote teams in a way that allows them to work effectively from home—ensuring sustainability of day-to-day operations. Managing employees without daily face-to-face interaction has its own unique set of challenges but when leaders focus their skills on the right set of best practices employees—and organizations—can excel.

Being proficient at managing remote employees requires strong communication skills, reachability, positive reinforcement, flexibility, and empathy. Productivity is no longer based on “desk time” and visible activity, managers must now gauge success based on outcomes and revise how they lead their people while finding new ways to keep them engaged.

Implement these best practice tips to improve morale, productivity, and engagement.

1. Set clear expectations and healthy boundaries— Provide guidelines, clarify priorities, and set boundaries. Working from home makes it much easier for work to seep into other areas of life. Ensure your team understands what is expected of them—specifically around working hours and availability, performance and what defines success.
2. Define the why — Ensure your team knows their role in helping the organization to achieve success and maintain sustainability.One’s sense of pride and accomplishment for their work is directly tied to productivity and when employees are happy with their work, they feel valued, see the impact, and want to stay with the organization.  
3. Communicate — Remote employees can feel disconnected which can lead to a whole host of other problems. You can combat this with regular and meaningful communication, recognizing that motivated employees are more productive and engaged. Keep workers up to date on policy and staffing changes and company successes and give praise and positive reinforcement as often as possible. The longer you go without communicating with your team, the more likely they are to become disengaged from their work.
4. Schedule regular check-ins — More frequent use of video conferencing can help to strengthen the relationship between manager and employee as well as the team as a whole. Always set aside some time for small talk—asking about their weekend or plans for an upcoming holiday can help them feel more connected. These check-ins also allow your staff the opportunity to provide updates on their work and express any frustrations they may be experiencing.
5. Take advantage of technology — Tools like Microsoft Teams, Slack and Monday.com provide solutions to some of the biggest challenges a remote workforce experiences and can help to bring remote co-workers together through face-to-face conversations and collaboration. Not to mention can also help with project management and daily task tracking.
6. Focus on outcomes, not hours worked — Trust is crucial in this day and age of work. It erodes your employees’ trust and confidence. Providing expectations (goals and desired results) surrounding work priorities and then allowing employees to own the execution can enhance creativity, reduces stress, and build morale.
7. Provide what they need — Make it a point to regularly ask your employees if they have what they need in order to do their job successfully. As company initiatives and goals evolve, their needs may change by way of what technology they use to get the job done. Set them up for ongoing success.
8. Show compassion, patience, and empathy — The remote work environment is a completely different ball game than being in an office where there aren’t children playing, dogs barking, or Amazon ring the doorbell. All of these distractions can cause unforeseen stress, both physical and emotional, damaging productivity and your bottom line. The most successful managers are good listeners and asking for employee feedback opens the pathway to great conversations and shows you genuinely care.
9. Don’t forget about team building — Bonding activities help foster a sense of unity, boosts morale, and builds connections. Virtual events such as online Bingo, Tiny Campfire, remote MTV Cribs, escape rooms, or happy hour are wildly popular.  
10. Celebrate successes — Now more than ever, your employees need positive reinforcement to keep them motivated. Celebrate milestones and daily accomplishments with a shout-out, host virtual competition games or team luncheons, send e-Cards for work anniversaries and birthdays, or host an Employee Appreciation Day.  You’ll want to plan ahead and get creative.

There are many ways to develop better relationships with a remote team that include transparent communication, open doors, and clear expectations to name a few. Micromanaging employees has never been a favorable practice and can cause undue stress for employees—leaving them to feel like they’re not trusted to do their work. While these best practice tips require time, attention, and consistency, they can help to develop healthy habits that allow your team to maintain productivity and achieve goals.

Question: Generally, our employees are “always on,” meaning they check work emails and communicate with co-workers/supervisors via smartphone during all hours. However, some of our employees are beginning to feel overwhelmed. Any suggestions?

Answer: Although employers may see the “always on” employee as highly productive, the constant state of being readily available can leave employees feeling overwhelmed and exhausted. To combat this struggle, employers may:

• Elect to simplify the workplace and clearly outline expectations of employees during non-working hours.
• Implement more flexible workplace standards encouraging employees to take time off and teach employees how to prioritize the constant flow of work. Employees inundated with information overload will benefit from streamlined information that is easy to understand and apply.
• Teach employees how to delegate tasks and help employees learn new skills to manage their time so as to decrease the sense of a “workaholic” environment.
• Outsource tasks to free up employee time.
• Direct supervisors to not send employees emails or message employees after standard working hours so as to put employees more at ease and not feel the pressure to be “always on.”

Note: The application of any new or existing workplace policy must be applied consistently and without discrimination throughout the workforce. 

Q&A provided by Mineral, powering the UST HR Workplace for nonprofit HR teams. Have HR questions? Sign your nonprofit up for a free 60-day trial here. As a UST member, simply log into your Mineral portal to access live HR certified consultants, 300+ on-demand training courses, an extensive compliance library, and more.

Question: Can we require remote employees to have childcare?

Answer: We do not recommend having a policy that stipulates childcare is necessary. For one thing, in practice, it often isn’t necessary. Lots of employees are able to do their jobs just fine while supervising children in the home. Imposing this requirement (and a huge financial burden) won’t solve any problems, but it may encourage remote employees to start looking for a new job. Even in cases where supervising children does negatively affect job performance, requiring childcare as a solution could be seen as crossing a line into your employees’ personal lives.

Instead of requiring childcare, we recommend setting clear expectations for attendance, availability, performance, and productivity. You can then discipline employees who don’t meet these expectations without giving the impression that you’re micromanaging their personal lives.

It’s also worth keeping in mind that employee expectations around remote work have changed. People choose remote work with the idea that they’ll have more flexibility during the day to attend to their personal responsibilities. If that flexibility isn’t an option, it’s important to make that clear so employees know what to expect.

Q&A provided by Mineral, powering the UST HR Workplace for nonprofit HR teams. Have HR questions? Sign your nonprofit up for a free 60-day trial here. As a UST member, simply log into yourMineralportal to access live HR certified consultants, 300+ on-demand training courses, an extensive compliance library, and more.

One of the biggest challenges nonprofits are faced with is the “great resignation” sparked by the pandemic—where employees are burnt out and pursuing new jobs that better align with their evolving priorities. In order to stay competitive in today’s job market, nonprofit leaders must reinvent their recruitment tactics, work-life balance initiatives and employee engagement strategies.

Don’t miss your chance to download a free copy of UST’s latest eBook, Workforce Management Tactics that Strengthen Nonprofit Brands, to discover 3 key strategies that can help your nonprofit create (and sustain) a resilient workforce.

In this eBook, you’ll discover:

• The importance of refreshing your hiring & onboarding strategies
• Tips for building creative and competitive employee benefit packages
• Innovative processes that help combat preventable terminations

This eBook will help you uncover new strategies that will encourage your current (and future) workforce to carry out your mission for years to come.

Question: Do OSHA’s regulations and standards apply to the home office? Are there any other federal laws employers need to consider when employees work from home?

Answer: The Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) does not have any regulations regarding telework in home offices. The agency issued a directive in February 2000 stating that the agency will not conduct inspections of employees’ home offices, will not hold employers liable for employees’ home offices, and does not expect employers to inspect the home offices of their employees.

If OSHA receives a complaint about a home office, the complainant will be advised of OSHA’s policy. If an employee makes a specific request, OSHA may informally let employers know of complaints about home office conditions but will not follow-up with the employer or employee.

Employers who are required to keep records of work-related injuries and illnesses will continue to be responsible for keeping such records for injuries and illnesses occurring in a home office.

The Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) and its implementing regulations do not prevent employers from implementing telework or other flexible work arrangements allowing employees to work from home. Employers would still be required to maintain an accurate record of hours worked for all employees, including those participating in telework or other flexible work arrangements; and to pay no less than the minimum wage for all hours worked and to pay at least one and one-half times the employee’s regular rate of pay for all hours worked over 40 in a workweek to nonexempt employees.

Employers are encouraged to work with their employees to establish hours of work for employees who telework and a mechanism for recording each teleworking employee’s hours of work. Nonexempt employees must receive the required minimum wage and overtime pay free and clear. This means that when a covered employee is required to provide the tools and equipment (e.g., computer, Internet connection, facsimile machine, etc.) needed for telework, the cost of providing the tools and equipment may not reduce the employee’s pay below that required by the FLSA.

Under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), telework could be a reasonable accommodation the employer would need to provide to a qualified individual with a disability, barring any undue hardship. However, an employer may instead offer alternative accommodations as long as they would be effective.

Q&A provided by Mineral, powering the UST HR Workplace for nonprofit HR teams. Have HR questions? Sign your nonprofit up for a free 60-day trial here.

Turnover is a natural part of any nonprofit organization’s life cycle, and employee offboarding should be handled with the same degree of importance as onboarding a new employee. An offboarding plan offers an opportunity for communication and manage change, to help preserve and improve your employer brand and to generate good faith with the departing employee. There can be many moving pieces involved with a termed employee and clear offboarding procedures help manage the expectations of all parties involved.

When done correctly, the employee offboarding process can offer key management insights and reveal hidden internal issues. From a management point of view, the focus is to address issues at an organization level. Whereas, employees are faced with small issues that aren’t always noticed by managers or the executive team. Not giving attention and time to these small and recurring issues can lead to larger issues which could then impact the productivity of the organization.

Here are some best practices when creating an efficient and smooth employee offboarding process:

1) Learn why the employee is leaving: Maybe the employee wasn’t a long-term fit for your company culture, perhaps they came across a career-changing opportunity, or they weren’t a fit to handle growth gracefully. Regardless of the reason, organizations need to first understand the reason why an employee wants to leave and have a clear plan in place to handle each type of exit. Having the appropriate policies and procedures in place to handle any and all offboarding reasons are key for orchestrating a smooth departure.

2) Conduct a smooth offboarding: A crucial aspect of a good employee offboarding process is to treat employees warmly, regardless of the reason behind their departure. Creating a positive farewell will encourage employees to speak to others positively about their experience which in turn, increases the organization’s brand value. Taking the opportunity to engage departed employees will help with talent acquisition and managing the reputation of the organization’s brand.

3) Ask for feedback: When an employee leaves, it can be a valuable opportunity to collect insightful turnover data. During the exit interview, the employee can offer honest feedback about the organization since they are no longer reliant on this job for financial means. When an employee expresses their desire to leave, sending them an exit interview survey can help organizations uncover areas of opportunities that need to be addressed to improve employee engagement and productivity.  

4) Avoid decreases in productivity: When an employee departs, day-to-day activities overseen by this employee will be interrupted or possibly put on pause—resulting in a decrease in productivity. Cross training with current employees can prevent a dip in productivity, such as, transferring process knowledge, document procedures and responsibilities, and login credentials for business tools.

Depending on the reason for the employee’s departure, exit interviews are an opportunity to collect important insights to improve your current offboarding strategy. The complexities involved in offboarding make saying “goodbye” to employees a challenging task—which is why consistency is the key to a successful exit interview. With the right tools in place, organizations have the ability to standardize the complexities involved in employee offboarding and help you part ways in the most efficient way.

Question: As we begin to return to work, if an employee is out of the office due to sickness, can we ask them about their symptoms?

Answer:Yes, but there’s a right way to do it and a wrong way to do it. In non-pandemic circumstances, employers shouldn’t ask about an employee’s symptoms, as that could be construed as a disability-related inquiry. Under the circumstances, however — and in line with an employer’s responsibility to provide a safe workplace — it is recommended that employers ask specifically about the symptoms of COVID-19.

Here is a suggested communication: “Thank you for staying home while sick. In the interest of keeping all employees as safe as possible, we’d like to know if you are having any of the symptoms of COVID-19. Are you experiencing a fever, cough, shortness of breath, chills, muscle pain, headache, sore throat, or a new loss of taste or smell?”

Remember that medical information must be kept confidential as required by the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). If the employee does reveal that they have symptoms of COVID-19, or has a confirmed case, the CDC recommends informing the employee’s co-workers of their possible exposure to COVID-19 in the workplace (but not naming the employee who has or might have it) and directing them to self-monitor for symptoms. Employers should also follow CDC guidance for cleaning and disinfecting.

Q&A provided by ThinkHR, powering the UST HR Workplace for nonprofit HR teams. Have HR questions? Sign your nonprofit up for a free 60-day trial here.