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Do I need a staff handbook and legislation?
If you choose to employ staff in the UK, all employees are required to have an employment contract in place. This is a legal requirement and typically cover matters such as pay, holiday, benefits, working hours, notice periods and any special requirements or instructions.
Employment contracts are often supplemented by an Employment Handbook (or Mini-handbook) to ensure all staff behaviours are aligned to the businesses expectations and agreed behaviours. Typically, these handbooks cover areas including Disciplinary, Grievance, Data Protection, Health and Safety, but can be expanded depending on the business need and type.
How do I reward my employees?
One of the great things about the Menzies team is that we can work across multiple disciplines to arrive at a bespoke solution that meets your needs. How to reward and recognise your people is a classic example.
Some examples include:
Employee Share schemes and Long-Term Incentive Programmes
Profit and/or performance-based bonus scheme design and implementation. Sales Commission schemes.
Think back to your vision, objectives, and values. Do you reward excellent examples? For example, if you have a bonus payment do you base it on the main measures of success for your business? On a smaller scale, how do you reward an excellent example of, say, customer service when someone has ‘gone the extra mile?
For more information or guidance on how to reward your staff through pay, employee benefits or incentives or to discuss more complex situations, contact us by clicking here
How do I resolve an employment issue?
Productivity is harmed when employees are disruptive, fail to perform to an acceptable standard or struggle to maintain regular attendance. Every line manager knows that dealing with these issues is a massive drain on their time. They would much rather spend that time on positive leadership and new developments.
Not dealing with these issues, however, compounds the problem. Good employees are quickly demotivated when problems are not addressed, and the company risks losing its best people.
What CAN you do to help resolve an employment issue?
We will advise you on what you CAN do about it – not just what you CAN’T – which can include:
- Identifying the most effective way to tackle the issue and achieve the desired result.
- Helping you understand the legal risks of different approaches so that you can balance your appetite for risk with the achievement of your goal.
- Support you ‘hands on’ if necessary with managing the employee.
- Preparing all of the paperwork you need to support the process.
- Pulling in the resources you sometimes need such as Occupational Health specialists when managing absence cases.
How do I retain my staff?
It is not your business that succeeds, but the people within it!
Everything that your business does is determined by its people. Whenever a business makes a major investment in, say, equipment or technology, it goes through a rigorous procurement process and budgets each year to fund ongoing maintenance and upgrades. Do you take the same approach with possibly your biggest investment of all, i.e., your people?
The quality and loyalty of your people will affect your success.
You should be aware of the following:
- How you can find the best talent available and attract them to your business.
- The culture and values of your business and whether they are a turn on or a turn off.
- What your staff love about working for you and what they don’t.
- How to articulate your vision and develop a strategy through which your staff can achieve it.
- Whether your leadership team has the skills and capacity to take the business forward.
- Whether your rewards and incentives are best fit for what you need to achieve.
- If you are helping your people to develop their skills for now and the future.
How do I get the best out of my employees?
1
Develop and Communicate Strategy
2
Hire the best people
3
Pay attention to culture and values
4
Organise for success
5
Clear roles, requirements and measures
6
Actively manage performance
7
Develop skills and talent
8
Get the most out of your pay budget
9
Manage risk and integrity
10
Motivate your people
What rights do my employees have?
Anyone who is classed as an ‘employee’ has certain rights and protections at work. It is worth noting that these will be different to someone who is classed as a ‘worker’ or someone who is self-employed. It is therefore important that you first understand an individual’s employment status.
Focusing on rights for employees in the UK, the list is extensive but includes:
Click here to find out
- National Minimum Wage
- Paid holiday
- The right to receive a payslip
- The right to written terms of employment, to be received on day one
- Various types of statutory leave and pay such as statutory sick pay, maternity, paternity and adoption leave
- Time off for dependants
- Time off for public duties
- The right to request flexible working
- Minimum notice periods
- Protection against unfair dismissal
- Protection for whistleblowing
- Protection against unlawful discrimination
Some of these are day one rights for employees and others only become applicable after they have reached a certain length of service. For example, employees need to have 26 weeks’ continuous service to be able to make a request for flexible working, and you can only make a claim for unfair dismissal after two years’ service. It is also important to be aware that there are Health and Safety laws and Working Time regulations that also apply to employment such as an employee’s right to rest breaks and the duty that employers have to provide a safe working environment.