Question: While working, an employee assaulted his coworker in our California workplace. May the injured employee pursue a workers’ compensation claim?

Answer: Yes. An employee who is assaulted at work by a coworker may elect to file a workers’ compensation claim. However, he or she may also file an internal complaint, report the assault to the police, or pursue a civil lawsuit. Whether the workers’ compensation claim (or any other claim) will be successful depends upon the facts. For example, was the injured employee the initial physical aggressor? According to California Law, at Cal. Labor Code § 3600(a)(7), employers are not liable under the state’s workers’ compensation law for an injury that arises out of an altercation in which the injured employee is the initial physical aggressor.

Regardless, after an injury occurred in the workplace, California employers must:

• Provide a workers’ compensation claim form to the claimant within one working day after a work-related injury or illness is reported.
• Return a completed copy of the claim form to the claimant within one working day of receipt.
• Forward the claim form, along with the employer’s report of occupational injury or illness, to the claims administrator within one working day of receipt.
• Within one day of receiving the claim, authorize up to $10,000 in appropriate medical treatment.
• Provide transitional work (light duty) whenever appropriate.
• Give notice of workers’ compensation eligibility within one working day of the crime (assault) that happened at work.

It is not for the employer to determine whether the injury will be covered under its workers’ compensation insurance. Rather, the claims administrator will determine whether the injury is covered.

Another issue worth mentioning is that California employers are required to abide by a duty of care in the workplace. According to Cal. Labor Code § 6401, “[e]very employer shall furnish and use safety devices and safeguards, and shall adopt and use practices, means, methods, operations, and processes which are reasonably adequate to render such employment and place of employment safe and healthful. Every employer shall do every other thing reasonably necessary to protect the life, safety, and health of employees.” Violations of this duty incur significant monetary damages.

Read more about workers’ compensation and the process on the State of California, Department of Industrial Relations’ website. Read more about workplace assaults and Cal/OSHA Guidelines for Workplace Security.

Q&A provided by ThinkHR, powering the UST HR Workplace for nonprofit HR teams. Have HR questions? Sign your nonprofit up for a free 30-day trial here.

Did you know that the California Legislature enacted a number of new bills that became effective in 2018?

Watch Ethos Human Capital Solutions webinar on the new employment laws enacted by the California Legislature and how they will impact your business in 2018. Also, the webinar discusses legal cases that have been or will be decided by the courts and will affect CA employers.

You can download the recorded presentation which covers new laws affecting:

• What you can/can’t ask on applications and during interviews
• Immigrant worker protections
• Changes to minimum wage
• Parental leave

Learn from Lindy Duffy of Ethos Human Capital Solutions and Marla Merhab Robinson, Esp. with Merhab Robinson, Jackson & Clarkson about these changes and what you’ll need to know and do to stay in compliance.

This webinar series is part of UST’s efforts to educate the nonprofit sector. For more learning opportunities, tips and legal updates just for nonprofits, sign up for our monthly e-News today!

Question: What can we do to be better prepared to respond to an active shooter in the workplace?

Answer: Unfortunately, we live in an environment that requires all employers to think about, prepare for, and take appropriate actions to ensure the safety of all employees in active shooter or other emergency situations. Therefore, it is important for employers to offer employees both training and action plans. Most security experts, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) stress the following key points in response to active shooter preparedness:

• Have evacuation and emergency plans in place in all locations.
• Conduct drills and ensure that all employees are trained to be aware of the environments in which they work and to react quickly to evacuate the area in the event of an active shooter situation.
• Ensure that all employees know the locations of the exits nearest to their work areas.
• If evacuation is not possible, employees should know the locations of the best shelter areas and what to do, such as closing and locking the doors and windows immediately, turning off lights and silencing cell phones, establishing sturdy barricades that could possibly withstand gunshots, etc.
• If the situation allows, employees may be trained to take necessary steps to incapacitate the shooter (tackle the shooter or otherwise attempt to incapacitate).
• The simple advice is to run, hide, and as a last resort, fight.

Whenever possible, create your emergency action plans with assistance from local law enforcement authorities. The plan should include all of the following:

• Preferred method of contacting 911.
• Lockdown and evacuation plan.
• Contact information for local hospitals.
• Contact information for, and responsibilities of, individuals to be contacted under your employee assistance plan, if applicable.

In all cases, preparing and having a plan for an active shooter or other emergency will help both employees and managers better prepare for dealing with such a high-stress situation. We also recommend preparing your plan in coordination with law enforcement to ensure best practices.

Q&A provided by ThinkHR, powering the UST HR Workplace for nonprofit HR teams. Have HR questions? Sign your nonprofit up for a free 30-day trial here.

There are some hot trends in recruiting this year that HR professionals should be aware of as they will impact how you hire in the years to come. LinkedIn recently released its Global Recruiting Trends Report 2018 which details survey results of more than 9,000 recruiters and hiring managers from 39 countries – identifying diversity, new interview techniques, data analytics and artificial intelligence as being the most impactful trends.

Companies across the country have found incredible ways to bring diversity into the workplace by using such things as inclusive language to target diverse groups, showcasing diversity in recruitment marketing and utilizing staff member’s stories and experiences in the recruiting and hiring process.

Employers need to take a hard look the organizational culture and if necessary, work on building an inclusive one. Ensuring that employees feel accepted, included and engaged because even the most diverse companies lose employees due to the lack of diversity, inclusion and belonging. LinkedIn found that more than half of the companies surveyed already embrace recruiting for diversity – tackling head-on. They also found that the top reasons for focusing on diversity were to improve company culture and performance and to better represent customers.

Gender continues to be the main topic in diversity but age and disabled workers or veterans, are also high on the list of diverse candidate opportunities. “When different perspectives are recognized and supported, advocated, and most importantly, expected, I think it creates a more inclusive environment,” said Steve Pemberton, Former Chief Diversity Officer at Walgreens. “When you are recognized for bringing a different perspective, it leads to higher degrees of engagement.”

While the traditional interview is still wildly popular and the industry standard, it fails to provide a true assessment of the job candidate – under cutting the impact of more useful information and all too often resulting in a decision based only on a person’s looks and personality.

Forward-looking companies are exploring other means of qualifying candidates that include soft skills assessments (measuring traits like teamwork), job auditions (offering an opportunity to perform real on the job tasks), meeting in casual settings (providing an entirely different view of the candidate), virtual reality assessments (immersing candidates in simulated 3-D environments to test skills) and video interviews (allowing the ability to view a larger pool of candidates in less time). And other companies are taking an entirely different approach and hiring based on potential, not experience.

Collecting data is becoming more and more prevalent in today’s ever changing workplace. It can help organizations increase retention, evaluate skills gaps, build better offers and so much more. It provides the opportunity to better understand the reasons behind the questions we couldn’t before evaluate – filling in many recruiting gaps. Putting quality data to work for you can give your organization an edge above the rest.

Artificial Intelligence is a machine that is able to perform tasks that normally require human intelligence. They can understand verbal commands, distinguish pictures, drive cars and play video games better than we do. These software programs can move job candidates through the hiring process in far less time than it would take us to and removes human bias in the process. It not only saves time and money but also delivers the best candidate matches. Actual people are still needed to persuade and negotiate but the more you use technology, the more time you have to focus on building relationships.

Allow the data and AI to work for you while you spend more time investing in the personal functions of your job. If you don’t embrace change now, it’ll run you down and leave you behind in the years to come.

Most nonprofit leaders recognize that employee retention can be a challenge and with limited resources, can lead to a lack of employee recognition. Nonprofit employees tend to have a passion for their organization’s mission—a sense of pride in their work and view their current employment as a career, not just as a job. So how do nonprofit organizations go about best supporting their employee’s goals and achievements?

Celebrating an employee’s career achievements by offering service awards is an effective strategy on multiple levels. Here are a few ways your organization can continue acknowledging your employees on a consistent basis:

1. Acknowledging reliability: While it can seem like a huge undertaking to implement a career achievement program, organizations that offer such programs are able to keep employees an average of two years longer than organizations that don’t. If the program proves to be effective, employees plan to stay at their current employer for an additional two years on top of that.

2. Reward accomplished career goals: According TLNT’s research, “81% of employees feel career celebrations help them feel appreciated for their work and found that 19% more employees strongly felt their current company cared about employees. Also, 18% more employees strongly felt they fit in and belonged at their current company if the company offered service awards.”

3. Encourage employee & culture connection: Recognizing an employee’s career milestone can offer an opportunity to connect back to the foundation of the organization. This can help employees feel that they are making an impact and doing their part to benefit the organization as a whole.

The benefits of a career achievement program will not only bring focus to your employees and their accomplishments, it will increase the overall morale of the organization and make your nonprofit a desired place to work at for future employees.

The Wage and Hour Division of the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) had issued guidance based on inquiries from businesses about wage and hour issues that arise in the workplace through the distribution of opinion letters for five decades. In 2010, the Obama Wage and Hour Division decided to cease issuance of these letters and alternatively, decided to publish “Administrator Interpretations” of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) topics in its place.

Last year, the Trump administration announced that it would resume issuing opinion letters and began following through on its promise earlier this year when the DOL reissued 17 opinion letters previously withdrawn by the Obama Administration. Those letters addressed a wide range of topics from discretionary bonuses and calculation of salary deductions to administrative exemption qualifications.

Opinion letters are meant to guide employers and employees with respect to both the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) and the Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA) laws by providing a better understanding of what is entailed. As noted on the DOL website regarding Rulings and Interpretations, “As part of the administration of the FLSA and the FMLA, interested parties may seek and officials of the Wage and Hour Division may provide official written explanations of what the FLSA or the FMLA requires in fact-specific situations.”

If you have a question about wage and hour laws that you can’t find answers to, requesting an opinion letter might be the way to go. It is important to remember that opinion letters are not binding but are rather informal guidance provided by the Department of Labor. A positive response can help an employer defend a policy in court while a negative response can get an employer to quickly change bad policies.

While the DOL can’t answer all employer inquiries, any clarity they can provide to employers in areas that are frequently unclear or confusing can be helpful—the hope is that the DOL continues to distribute these letters going forward.

Question: Will the employer have to pay overtime to a nonexempt employee for time spent at a holiday party even if the party is voluntary?

Answer: In the event of an after-hours voluntary party, where there are no consequences for not attending, there is no requirement to compensate a nonexempt employee under wage and hour regulations. However, in the event that a party is held during any portion of an employee’s normally scheduled work hours and the employee is permitted to attend during those hours, even if voluntarily, the nonexempt employee is to be compensated. Therefore if the employee’s work day ends at 5 p.m., and the party goes from 3 – 7 p.m. the nonexempt employee would be paid for two hours (3 p.m. – 5 p.m.). If the party was mandatory or would have any consequences for those not in attendance, the nonexempt employee would be paid for the entirety of the party. If the nonexempt employee provided any work effort towards the set-up, during, or post event clean up, the employee would need to be compensated for all time worked at regular wages, including any eligible overtime.

Q&A provided by ThinkHR, powering the UST HR Workplace for nonprofit HR teams. Have HR questions? Sign your nonprofit up for a free 30-day trial here.

Nowadays, there is a plethora of social media platforms that allow both individuals and organizations to network, share, and promote—but are you truly living up to your nonprofit’s technological potential?

Whether you’re on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn or any other public forums, social media is an incredibly effective way to strengthen your n onprofit ’s voice. Ranging from sector news to teambuilding pictures to campaign promotions, social media is a fast, cost-effective method in broadening your audience and developing your brand.

Here are 7 quick tips that will help your organization strengthen its impact throughout the nonprofit sector via social media:

1. Avoid being a passive presence—Why limit yourself to merely posting information? Social media is meant to be interactive. Support other local organizations and your nonprofit peers to build a greater sense of community.
2. Use social media all year round—Don’t just post announcements and blogs when a specific event or promotion nears. Incorporate news and articles that are relevant to your targeted audience on a consistent basis throughout the year.
3. You’re a human, so act like one—People are more likely to empathize with you and support your nonprofit if the articles and posts they see appear to come from a relatable individual (rather than just an automated robot). When using social media, you must show your personality in order to grab people’s attention.
4. Share, share, share—Your nonprofit’s not the only organization promoting a noteworthy cause. Be sure to share other people’s ideas that you support or that would be of interest to your social media followers.
5. Create trust amongst your community— Whether you’re replying to comments on your blog or soliciting feedback for new content, your followers will be appreciative of your thoughtful communication efforts. Providing people with the information they actually want will make them view you as a one-stop shop for nonprofit news and tips.
6. Tell your nonprofit’s story—How did your nonprofit get its start? How have you grown over the years and who specifically have you impacted? It’s important to tell your audience not only what you do but why you do it in order to cultivate respect and support for your nonprofit.
7. Discuss real-life successes—In order for your audience to get a better sense of how your nonprofit impacts the community, share before and after stories of specific individuals your nonprofit has helped over the years. This way, people can readily put themselves in others’ shoes and determine if your nonprofit is a good fit for them as well.

While many nonprofits are limited by a smaller budget and staff size, social media is a great way to grow one’s network, attract potential donors and supporters, and cultivate a reputable voice that can influence people nationwide.

Sick employees are bad for business – plain and simple. They can wreak havoc on the workplace in many ways – spreading germs, putting additional stress on co-workers who have to pick up the slack or even creating tension amongst the team. While it might seem great to have such dedicated employees who are willing to work even when they are ill, what might be a mild case of the flu for one can land another in the hospital or worse, put multiple members of your team out for weeks.

You need an equitable sick leave policy in place that provides employees a reasonable amount of paid sick leave,  allowing them the time to recover when they’re not feeling well. Additionally, having a clearly written policy that specifies the organization’s standards and what is expected of the employee will help to minimize sick leave abuse. Paid sick leave is not typically required under federal law but may be required under state law – different states have different requirements so make sure to do your research to determine what, if any, state laws are applicable to you.

By implementing a few simple guidelines, you can create a solid yet thoughtful sick day policy that helps to maintain a healthier workplace and keep your nonprofit running smoothing when someone is out. First and foremost, you need managers to not only encourage people to stay home when they are ill but to also stay home themselves when ill – leading by example is the most powerful tool managers have at their discretion.

Secondly, have a back-up plan in place for when those instances do arise so key tasks don’t go unattended for days at a time. For example, cross-train your staff so that everyone has someone who can fill in where and when needed. While this may not be an ideal situation for some, ensuring everyone understands the benefits of such a plan and knows what to expect ahead of time, can go a long way in eliminating some of the stress when the need presents itself.

Also important to keep in mind, while it’s not practical to have someone out of the office for weeks due to a general cold, it is wise to require employees who have been out with the flu and/or a fever to remain home until they’ve been symptom-free for at least 24 hours. This will ensure they are no longer contagious and getting others sick upon returning to work.

If an employer doesn’t offer sick leave, they will only accelerate health issues and the spread of illness, thereby lowering productivity and office morale. Remember, when an employee comes to work sick, it puts you and the rest of your staff in a weak environment, which can affect a nonprofit as badly as the loss of a major contributor. Being sensitive to the health of all your staff should be priority number one.  To ensure you are doing everything you can is to genuinely take an interest in the health of the people working with you. Remember, a healthy workplace is a productive workplace.

Question: Are private employers required to give employees the day off for Veterans Day? And if employees work on Veterans Day, must they be paid at a holiday rate?

Answer: Private employers are not required to give employees the day off from work for Veterans Day. However, private employers may elect to do so for Veterans Day and/or any other holiday.

Veterans Day is a federally recognized holiday, and federal law does not:

• Require private employers to provide holidays to their employees on federally-recognized holidays.
• Require private employers to pay nonexempt employees (whether hourly or salaried) for holidays on which they are not required to work.

Specifically, the federal Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) does not require payment for time not worked, such as vacations or holidays (federal or otherwise). These benefits are generally a matter of agreement between an employer and an employee (or the employee’s representative); thus employers may elect:

• Whether employees will be compensated for holidays.
• To not count holiday pay as hours worked for overtime calculations.

Employers must apply any workplace policy consistently and fairly to all employees.

Note: On a government contract to which the labor standards of the McNamara O’Hara Service Contract Act (SCA) apply, holiday and/or vacation fringe benefit requirements are stated in the SCA wage determinations in contracts that exceed $2,500. On a government contract to which the labor standards of the Davis-Bacon and Related Acts apply, holiday pay and/or vacation pay is required for specific classifications of workers only if the Davis-Bacon wage determination in the covered contract specifies such requirements for workers employed in those classifications.

Q&A provided by ThinkHR, powering the UST HR Workplace for nonprofit HR teams. Have HR questions? Sign your nonprofit up for a free 30-day trial here.