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Avoiding snares in workplace wellness programs

by David L. Johnson Encouraged by health insurance companies, workplace wellness programs have become trendy. Wellness programs help prevent disease and encourage employees to adopt healthier lifestyles. What could possibly go wrong? Well, wellness programs involve biometric screenings, medical questionnaires, and health risk assessments. If the information is in the hands of a third party […]

Veterans: Jobs for Veterans Act Takes Effect This Year; What the Changes Mean to Federal Contractors

It’s time for federal contractors and subcontractors to prepare for changes that will affect their employment practices with respect to veterans. Late last year, President Bush signed into law the Jobs for Veterans Act (JVA), which makes significant changes to the Vietnam Era Veterans’ Readjustment Assis- tance Act of 1974 (VEVRAA) and goes into effect […]

Not Again: SIIA Refutes ‘Misinformation’ About Self-funding

It’s like the Hollywood movie Groundhog Day all over again. The Self Insurance Institute of America (SIIA) wakes up and has to face the same “anti-self-funding” arguments about adverse selection, insolvency and inferior benefits that it refuted last year … the year before … and the year before that. Again in damage-control mode, this time the […]

questions

Alternative Employee Assessment Methods

In a previous post, we discussed some of the challenges inherent in traditional methods of employee assessment, specifically the fact that review of résumés and in-person interviews tend to focus too much on the objective skills of the employee rather than the subjective needs of the organization.

Walking the line between hiring only authorized workers and violating the discrimination laws

by Elaine Young Here are two situations in which you must avoid discrimination while fulfilling your obligation to hire only authorized workers.  Situation #1 ABC Resort is a beautiful, large new resort in the Utah mountains. Some of its managers heard about Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids a few years ago at other resorts […]

‘Unique Interactive Process’ Key to Appeasing EEOC on ADA

In yesterday’s Advisor, the Advanced Employment Issues Symposium panel offered tips for dealing with an increasingly aggressive Wage/Hour Division; today, the panels advice for dealing with ADA issues, plus an introduction to the leading all-HR-in-one website. EEOC is coming after anyone not using a unique interactive process, says attorney Stacie Caraway. They want to see […]

drug test

Reader’s Story: ‘Do I Really Need to Take the Drug Test?’

Drug tests are behind a number of strange but true workplace stories. A few years ago there was the wife who put marijuana in her husband’s meatballs instead of oregano to get him fired from his life-threatening job—he was a cop. And then, there was the man who asked his friend to shoot him to […]

X-Men playing catch-up on genetics–the real-life wave of the present

Remember when the study of genetic information was deemed to be the purview of those in the medical field or reserved for films and television shows that were classified as “futuristic science fiction”? Not anymore. Today we live in a world where everyone is fully aware that their own genetic code and family history could […]

Put the Performance Review Out of Its Misery

"It’s time to put the performance review out of its misery," says consultant and professor Samuel Culbert. "This corporate sham is one of the most insidious, most damaging, and yet most ubiquitous of corporate activities." Culbert, a professor of management at UCLA, goes on to say that the performance review is "a pretentious, bogus practice […]

holiday

Prepare now for worry-free holiday season

It starts with break room tables laden with bowls of candy corn and “fun-size” chocolate bars. Then come turkey and Pilgrim decorations, which quickly give way to workstations sporting menorahs, Nativity scenes, Christmas trees, tinsel, and eventually New Year’s party hats and streamers.   With the kickoff of the fall-winter holidays, employers need to consider not […]