Faced with the chore of writing employee policies, many HR and business owners almost always find another urgent task that needs their attention. I know creating clear and effective employee policies are hard and it’s even more tedious to document—not to mention all the extra work that needs to be done when it’s rolled out. It’s time consuming but without these policies, employees may do as they please because there’s no official rulebook they need to follow. Misunderstandings and employment related lawsuits will follow.
The Economist Intelligence Unit surveyed 211 government officials and private sector executives in 2009 to evaluate how well they write policies and handle change management—from the after effects of policy changes in the organization’s direction to the potential issues that may be encountered during the policy roll out.
Turns out, change management problems are widespread both in the private and public sector and it’s damaging to many companies. Faced with the challenges of implementing revised or new employee policies, 30% of respondents confirmed they are only occasionally effective in making policy changes while 50% say they’re only somewhat effective.
In this light, we need to understand how to make employee policies that work to avoid miscommunication and loss of employee trust. Knowing what makes employee policies work will help you create clear policies and implement it with minimal resistance from employees.
Understanding What Makes Employee Policies Work
Employee policies should match company’s mission and core values; otherwise those values are nothing more but fancy ideals. Aside from that, it should also match external laws applicable to your state and industry.
It should be part of the framework in every aspect of running your business—training, recruiting, onboarding, production and even employee retention. Employee policies are not just for compliance and internal investigations you know.
Let me give you an example…
Picture two different companies: Acme and Ajax. Acme gives all new-hires a thick employee handbook listing all policies, this book is required reading during employee orientation and people have to sign a contract proving they’ve read it. A copy of this employee handbook is kept in the HR office for future reference, while employees are free to do as they please with their own copy.
Ajax doesn’t have an employee handbook because it’s reviewed regularly and subject to change according to the current demands of the working environment, so it’s just uploaded online for everyone to see.
Their employee policies are integrated into their new-hire orientation program—not just for reading but as real classroom training with discussions and a test that checks employee’s understanding of said policies. It’s part of their culture.
Which set of employees would do a better job following protocol for the rest of their time in the company? Ajax employees would, hands-down, be more compliant to policies because they know what those policies are and why they’re in place. Their expectations were properly set.
Having a documented, easily accessible and fully explained set of employee policies is vital to running an organization.
Tips for Writing Policies and Procedures that Leave no Room for Misinterpretation
- Context—Ensure all policies are easily understood by providing a context or an explanation of the policy’s use with specific situational examples or if-then situations. Fill out information gaps by asking potential questions that may be raised against the policies.
- Clarity—Employee policies should cover the 4 Ws (What, When, Where, How), including references to related policies but without unnecessary anecdotes and preambles.
- Consistency— Employee policies should be standardized in terms of jargon and phrases used. No need to be fancy here so your thesaurus and clever words won’t be of any help.
- Simplicity—One rule or directive per policy. Don’t be tempted to write vague or all-encompassing rules that may be misinterpreted.
- Compliance—Provide means for monitoring employee compliance and directions for investigating misdemeanors.
All the orientations, trainings and initiatives a company spends on year after year to integrate employee policies into day to day work will be moot if the policies written are easily misinterpreted or manipulated. Strive for clarity.
Whatever you do, don’t:
- Recycle text from old policies without reviewing it or adapting it to the current situation of your company. Old policies may be vague or not applicable given changes in employment laws or current practices.
- Beware of interchanging synonyms and terminology. Style isn’t the main concern in writing policies, its clarity. Avoid interchanging words.
- Review text carefully and watch out for repeated or omitted words, which can nullify the logic of the policy you’re writing.
You know the job isn’t done after the new policy is rolled out, right? Next, I’ll discuss how you can ensure continued compliance to new and existing employee policies.
Policy Owners, the Key to Flawless Change Management and Long Term Results
It’s impossible for employees to keep tabs on policy changes, even the HR team responsible for upholding these policies can forget certain policies so it’s easy for petty problems (or innocuous but potentially serious problems, you never know) to slip through the cracks.
To prevent this, you need to assign a policy owner specifically tasked to uphold, maintain and revise employee policies in his given specialty—one HR staff could be assigned to compensation and benefits, while another is assigned to offenses and employee behavior, while a third is for privacy.
How you allocate their responsibilities is up to you, what’s important is there’s a single point of contact for all matters concerning a specific policy. Each policy owner is also responsible for identifying policy gaps within his jurisdiction.
But sometimes, even with policy owners overseeing the change management, you still can’t 100% prevent pushback from employees. How can you minimize ease employees into accepting these changes?
Approval Loop: The Answer to Employees Resistant to Change
Oracle’s 2009 survey of private and public organizations shows 44% of respondents had greater success in launching new policies because they included employees most affected by the change into the policy writing process.
Remember, good employee policies should be based on the day-to-day working conditions of the workers it affects—not just far flung theoretical rules proposed by managers.
Including employees in the process makes change management easy for everyone in four ways:
- Identify and eliminate potential loopholes that may deter policy from working.
- Giving employees the chance to be heard when creating employee policies gives them a sense of ownership. And they’re more likely to abide by something they helped created.
- They’re less likely to complain about new rules, because they already know why it’s needed.
- You can address any hesitations they may have and make adjustments when appropriate.
I’m not a lawyer or a legal expert of any kind, but I have ran my business for 20 something years now so I know a thing or two about creating employee policies that work. This blog post is meant as a rough guide on creating new policies and the change management chaos that follows—it’s not meant to substitute legal counsel.
How do you implement new policies?
© 2014 Incedo Group, LLC
