Strategic HR Lawyer

George and Michael have had a series of very helpful posts on the subject of employee handbooks.  I feel compelled to add a comment or two.... 

1. Many times employers will develop a company handbook and it is perceived as a human resources document that contains all the "human resources" policies.   What this really means is that management and other functional areas of the company typically view it as something outside of their domain, that another department is responsible for and that has nothing to do with them.  WRONG!  The handbook is a company document that every manager is responsible for.  The role of the HR department is to facilitate the composition of the handbook and to facilitate communication.
2. The next problem is that these other areas then decide they need a policy of their own - so they develop their own purchasing manual, or travel and entertainment policy, or perhaps an internet policy.  Then they go about writing and distributing their own little policy manuals.  They collect all these little forms, keep them in a secretary's box in their department and then when they want to discipline someone for violating one of their little policies - guess what?  They can't find the pile of forms, the drafting of the policy was never reviewed by counsel and HR hardly knew it existed.  NOT a GOOD IDEA!  All of the documentation procedures that George mentioned yesterday are just a snippet of details these others forgot.  So when the lawyer gets a call about this little charge that was filed, too much time is spent gathering up where all the little piles of boxes are that contain all of those sign off forms and additional time is spent trying to figure out how to get past the drafting nightmare created by the policy.
3. The ideal policy system in the company works like this: 

• First, HR is the keeper of the policies for everyone.  The policies are not HR's policies, but rather are the company's polices that relate to employee practices and can apply to various functional areas throughout the company.
• When there's a problem with a policy, implementation, or compliance, HR is right there to ensure that proper steps are taken.
• Let's not forget that the goal of any handbook or policy system is to COMMUNICATE!   Employees expect to receive policy communications from HR.  When they start receiving it information from elsewhere, after a while there is no sense or predictability in the internal systems.  Worse yet, they may tend to discount its importance. This leaves employees confused, people are left out of the loop and are not aware of the guidelines which govern their work lives.
• Last, but not least, a great HR department is a valuable internal resource that should have a fair amount of expertise in developing and implementing policies and employee communication.  If I was a manager in another area who needed to implement a policy, I'd be calling HR first!

Keep up the good comments guys!  Although I may chime in here and there.....