It may be tempting to delay the task of writing your formal HR policies and procedures, especially if you are running a startup or a small business. You might have more pressing matters to attend to – or perhaps you have a small team and want to keep things friendly and informal.
However, despite the importance of trust between employer and employees, the absence of clear and transparent guidelines inevitably leads to misunderstandings. Don’t wait for problems to formalize your policies. Establish clear HR procedures and ground rules for your employees, protect your rights as an employer, and ensure your team stays on the same page.
Let's delve deeper into the essential HR procedures you should include in your employee handbook.
Why Your Department Needs HR Procedures
The answer is simple: while you can just press the "start" button on a computer program and then sit back, employees need HR policies and procedures to work effectively and grow appropriately in their roles and complex workplaces.
Moreover, clearly defining your company’s rules and regulations for employees – and consistently following them – can protect your organization from costly lawsuits.
What Are HR Policies and Procedures?
HR policies are formal rules and guidelines that companies set up to manage their employees. On the other hand, HR procedures are step-by-step instructions that outline the actions to be taken to comply with these policies. Defining these policies and HR procedures is one of the core functions of human resource management.
HR policies cover a variety of different aspects of HR management, such as:
- Recruitment
- Dress code
- Overtime compensation
- Leave
- Sick days and personal leave
- Performance evaluations
Goals of HR Policies and Procedures
While some HR procedures and policies are legally required, this is not the only reason they are necessary. Besides protecting your organization from legal claims, policies play a crucial role in fostering a culture of trust, fairness, and inclusion.
The benefits of having clear and comprehensive HR policies include:
- Providing legal protection for your company
- Transparently communicating terms of employment
- Setting employee expectations regarding their career growth
- Helping address employee complaints and disputes
- Speeding up decision-making processes on various HR issues
- Ensuring all employees are treated equally and fairly
- Creating a safe and healthy work environment
- Serving as a foundation for streamlining and automating HR processes
How to Write Effective HR Procedures
Maintain consistency in the structure and format of your HR policies and procedures. While each company has its internal templates for writing HR policies, the content is usually quite similar and includes the following elements:
Policy name
Policy effective date (and dates of any revisions or updates)
Name of the person responsible for updating the policy and answering questions about it
Purpose of the policy
(Optional) Definitions of specific terms used in the policy
Main policy statement
Scope and applicability (including allowable exceptions)
To be effective and achieve the above-mentioned goals, HR policies must be searchable and easily accessible to employees. Publish HR policies in the employee handbook or the company’s intranet portal and share them with the entire team.
Use internal links to organize related policies together and allow your team to browse the employee handbook like their internal Wikipedia.
5 HR Procedures You Can Implement Immediately
Recruitment and Hiring Policies
Employees are the foundation of your company, and developing smart HR procedures for recruitment and hiring ensures the stability of that foundation.
Every HR department should have clear policies and procedures for how job openings are advertised, applications are created, candidates are pre-qualified, and candidates are moved through the hiring process.
Designing smooth, engaging, and professional recruitment policies can help your company seal the deal with top talent. Companies that invest in a strong candidate experience improve the quality of their hires by 70%. With the "war for talent" heating up, you can’t afford to lose top employees.
Employee Data Protection Strategy
From onboarding documents and I-9 forms to paperwork and performance evaluations, HR departments are responsible for an incredible amount of sensitive employee data.
Therefore, best HR practices call for implementing strategies and procedures for protecting employee data. Failing to do so can lead to costly lawsuits.
One way to ensure your employee data is secure is by using a centralized digital records management system. By going paperless and storing employee documents in the cloud, an employee management software like DocSuite HR can securely share files, control who can access files and when, and produce an audit trail for all actions taken on each document.
Employee Training and Development Policies
In a 2022 survey by the Institute for Work, 22% of employees cited opportunities for growth or promotion as the main reason for leaving a job, while 11% cited a lack of training, resources, and empowerment. Clearly, training, development, and career growth are crucial factors for employee retention.
Employee turnover is expensive – estimated to cost a company between 1.5 to 2 times the employee’s annual salary to replace them – so creating employee development strategies as part of HR procedures is critical. By providing employees and managers with training materials and clear paths for advancement, you will prevent top talent from moving on while improving your company’s bottom line.
Illegal Discrimination Policies
HR is responsible for protecting employees from discrimination in the workplace. As headlines have proven, not all companies take this responsibility seriously.
Since 2000, about 99% of Fortune 500 companies have paid settlements for one or more discrimination or harassment cases. It’s crucial that every HR department creates, publishes, and consistently enforces illegal discrimination policies that prevent employees from being treated unfairly based on factors including race, age, religion, health status, sexual orientation, and gender.
Disciplinary and Termination Policies
When an employee underperforms, tensions can rise. Managers are often unsure how to handle these situations, and morale can suffer when an employee appears to be punished arbitrarily or terminated.
Setting clear disciplinary and termination policies can help ensure your employees are treated fairly, instill confidence in managers, and keep your company out of court. Along with developing HR procedures for disciplinary actions and termination, it is important to create performance improvement plans with measurable goals.
The Connection Between HR Procedures and DocSuite HR System
The connection between establishing HR procedures and the DocSuite HR system lies in enhancing the efficiency and effectiveness of HR management through technology. Here are some clarifying points for this relationship:
Organization and Automation
DocSuite HR helps organize and automate many administrative HR processes, such as payroll management, attendance, leave, and performance evaluations. This reduces the administrative burden and allows employees to focus on strategic activities.
Improved Accuracy and Reduced Errors
Using DocSuite HR can reduce errors from manual data processing. All information is stored digitally and systematically, making it easier to access and review accurately.
Data Analysis and Decision-Making
The system provides tools for analyzing employee data and extracting detailed reports to help management make informed decisions about recruitment, training, career development, and other HR procedures.
Compliance with Laws and Regulations
The system can help companies comply with local labor laws and HR regulations by providing regular updates and reminders of important deadlines.
Improved Internal Communication
The system can facilitate communication between management and employees through self-service portals, where employees can access personal information, submit leave requests, or view company policies easily.
In summary, integrating the DocSuite HR system into HR procedures improves operational efficiency, enhances accuracy, ensures compliance, and contributes to achieving HR goals more effectively.