employee handbook on intranet
hr traci
55 Posts
Does anyone have their company's employee handbook on a internal website or intranet? We are thinking of transforming our paper handbook into electronic format so we don't have to head to Kinko's every time a policy change is needed.
What are the legal requirements of informing employees about this? Can we just email and announce to everyone where the webpage is and then have them sign & return a paper acknowledgement after they have looked through the website? Looking for any suggestions!
thanks -
What are the legal requirements of informing employees about this? Can we just email and announce to everyone where the webpage is and then have them sign & return a paper acknowledgement after they have looked through the website? Looking for any suggestions!
thanks -
Comments
we are moving toward an online handbook (however slowly) and have discussed requiring employees to sign a verification that they've reviewed the site and are aware of it.
And the bonus is that it's less expensive and kills fewer trees. Updating is easier to.
As for notifying employees...send an company-wide email...bight colors advising of the new location of the handbook....
maybe even do a "kick off" of some kind...
how do you implement policies??? If you follow that methodology, it should provide some guidance.
I have our EMPLOYEE HANDBOOK on a disk and saved to my company hard drive, whatever that is! We have made a couple of changes in the last 5 years but that is all. Changes and changes all have a paper trail and signatures to support the receipt thereof. I suggest you like wise live with the paper trail, it will pay you dividends in the future. Enhancing your company position to make the EMPLOYEE HANDBOOK more readily available for your employees to read is an absolute plus, plus for the employer. Ya'll are covering all gaps to counter an employee's chance of claiming "NO ONE EVER TOLD ME THAT, I WISHED I HAD KNOWN! THAT READS LIKE MY 6 GRADE EXCUSE FOR FAILING TO TURN MY HOMEWORK IN FOR REVIEW BY THE TEACHER.
PORK
Traci if you will e-mail me your e-mail address I will provide you with something special. Oh, by the way welcome on board, glad you have choosen to speak up and be a live participant instead of a lissener only.
The other white meat is good and oh so PORKY.
Because of a couple ownership changes over the last few years, there have been updated versions put out every 18 mos. or so, and I am really looking forward to this being electronic format!
Thanks for the "welcome aboard" - I am in the office only p/t, so my time is pretty compressed -that's why I haven't posted that much yet!
Good luck!
Ditto here. However, when a change to major policies occur, i.e. not only are we I think required to do so, but we give 2 months notice to the change. We have a form signed by each ee acknowledging where they can find it, who can help them find it & if there are changes. It works great & any ee requesting a printed copied is accomodated - as long as they know that when the 2 month notice comes around - they need to request a new copy or otherwise find the information on the intranet site. I do have to say that we are a small company - less than 120 & non-union. I would feel less comfortable with this approach (even though it makes more sense) if we were larger. Mainly because we are smaller, so there's less folks to communicate the changes to & it's easier to get them access to a computer - if we were larger I would worry people would slip through the cracks.
We are also a small company, 60 EEs today, and do not have some of the issues mentioned in this thread.
Before doing this, I was constantly trying to figure out which "version" of the handbook an employee had from which they were quoting "verse and scripture". I hated the fact that that updated information was not getting filtered to the employee via the supervisor, etc.
Our employees all have access to a computer in the building and they can also access our website from their home computer through an "Employees Only" button on the website.
Good luck....you will love it.
the revision date and "This version of handbook supercedes any previous versions". Just a little added CYA.
If someone prints a page, a statement to the effect of "This policy, having been printed, is now obsolete. Please check the official handbook on the intranet for the most current verion." appears on the printout.
This prevents someone trying to use an old printout as their defense to something.
Carrie
All of our employees are provided with computers and access to the internet - therefore we use our intranet extensively for employee communication and access to policies, forms, etc. We have field offices across the country so this is a very valuable way of getting the same info to all. All new hires receive a binder that is reviewed during orientation that includes our Policies & Procedures aka Employee Handbook, as well as other info (SPD's, forms, etc). We do a brief review of the highlights because let's face it, how many people are REALLY going to read it?? They sign an Acknowledgement Form at that time. Any changes to the Handbook are sent out via an Announce e-mail (a copy of which is kept by me as proof that it went out to all) with directions to review it on the intranet & print another copy. As far as legal requirements, I'm not an att'y but whenever I've consulted the "experts" about distributing items via e-mail &/or intranet I've been told that it is an acceptable means of communication. Keep proof that you sent it. Sometimes, like with HIPAA Notice of Privacy Practice info you can set your e-mail to provide proof of delivery that can be extremely helpful.
Hope this helps.