Getting It Right From The Start

It all starts with knowing what you want people to do and how they will fit in to your team. Good recruitment practices will save you time as you will be prepared for sourcing candidates, creating a short-list of candidates, interview candidates and make that all important offer to the best candidate. The resource materials will ensure that you act consistently with candidates and treat them fairly and equally, avoiding bias.

Contracts of Employment

There is a legal requirement to provide every employee with a written statement detailing their terms and conditions of employment. The Written Statement should be provided on or before day one of employment. The templates within this folder meet the legal requirements and will protect your business. If you have industry or job specific clauses that are required I would be happy to create appropriate additional content to suit your requirements. The resource materials provide everything you need to put contracts of employment in place and to document any changes you introduce at a later date.

Paying Your Employees

Guidance to help you manage wages, tips and the package of benefits you offer your employees including wage increases.

Working Time

Guidance to help you comply with the Working Time Regulations; deal effectively and fairly with Flexible Working Requests and manage different working patterns including annualised hours, compressed hours, term-time working and zero-hours.

Getting The Best From Your Employees

Clearly setting out duties, goals and performance standards for your employee to achieve will ensure everyone is working together towards achieving your business goals. You will then be able to effectively evaluate and manage employee performance and easily spot where you have gaps in skills and knowledge.

Time off from Work

All employees have a statutory right to annual holiday. Unplanned absences i.e. sickness, unexpected emergencies involving a dependent and AWOL employees, cause the most problems though and need quick action to nip them in the bud. The latest legislation introduces a statutory right to time off for employees with caring responsibilities.

Having a Baby or Adopting a Child

All employees have a statutory right to time off work when they are having a baby or adopting a child. The rights apply to mothers and fathers including same sex couples and those having a baby through a surrogacy arrangement. The latest legislation introduces rights for parents whose baby is needs neo-natal care and for parents whose child dies.

Equality and Diversity

Equal opportunities is about treating everyone fairly and with respect. Failure to comply with the legal obligations can lead to claims for discrimination. The managers guidance notes look at the different types of discrimination, the protected characteristics as set out in the Equality Act and in relation to disability discrimination consider the duty to make reasonable adjustments. The latest legislation introduces the duty to prevent sexual harassment in the workplace.

What To Do If Things Go Wrong

Dealing with capability, grievances or disciplinary matters in the correct way is essential in order to resolve matters as quickly and amicably as possible and to avoid claims for unfair and constructive dismissal.

Terminating The Employment Relationship

Some employees will choose to leave, if the recruitment process is working right these will be reduced to a minimum, occasionally a resignation might lead to a constructive dismissal claim. But there will be situations that arise where you need to ‘exit’ individuals from your business and these must be managed in the right way to avoid claims for unfair dismissal.

HR Administration

Unfortunately employing people requires you to collect, process and store a range of data and information about each employee. For instance: right to work in the UK, DBS checks, references, holiday records, sickness records, maternity and paternity records, pay rises, disciplinary records and then finally how and when an employee left. The resource materials in this folder will help you create good recording procedures and ensure compliance with the General Data Protection Regulations.

Other HR Related Issues

A drop-box section for smaller subjects that don’t warrant having their own folder such as ACAS Early Conciliation, Dress Codes, Driving at Work, Employing Under 18s, Online Shopping, Relationships at Work and Searching Employees

I like breaking down processes into simple easy to follow steps so you can be confident everything you do will be legally compliant and will be done efficiently and in a professional, friendly and knowledgeable way.