Jobhop Jobhop's blog : Make More Of The Employee Handbook
The day comes when the new person starts and they get presented with...
“The Employee Handbook”
Do they:
a) Look excited when they receive it, you know that they’ll be reading it that evening whilst eating their tea OR
b) Do they accept it with pain in their eyes, you know they'll only ever get it out in an emergency.
You know your new employees have to have employee handbooks but they don’t have to just be about rules and regulations.
Many companies think as long as they cover the work rules then they’ve protected themselves, but surely an employee handbook should be so much more.
A typical employee handbook will consist of:
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An equal opportunities section
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Company policies
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Company rules
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Anti harassment policy
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Professional attire
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Employment classifications
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Offline/online conduct
And more, but as you can see the list above doesn’t conjur up thoughts of an exciting read!
What if the employee handbook also included:
The story of your company
Every employee, past, present and future ones must know the story of your company. Your employees are your ambassadors, the company story will emotionally connect them, they will tell it to others and continue to tell it when you’ve gone...Everyone loves a story.
The location of your company
Are you proud of where your company is located, then let your employees know. Tell your employees what’s available on their doorstep, get them involved in the local community.
The company CSR
Does your company have a corporate social responsibility? Don’t keep it to yourself, how can your employees get involved?
The company mission
What mission is your company on, what’s the “why” of your existence? Your employees must be told the mission and why they’re doing what they’re doing. If they don’t know the mission or the why then don’t be surprised if they treat the job as nothing more than a job, because to them that’s all it will be.
The company benefits
How will you look after them? What benefits will they get whilst working at your company?
Many companies don’t tap into this enough, the benefits you offer should be in the employee handbook for your employee to show others, which means your employee handbook could be a potential recruiting tool. How about that, your employee handbook could even cut down on your recruitment costs!
Benefits could be anything from healthcare, gym membership to team wear, flexible working, bike parking and even fresh fruit.
The training available
What training opportunities are there? Are there ways for your employees to up-skill? If they up-skilled then what extra opportunities will they have to climb the career ladder? What if, as well as training for skills for the company your employees could acquire life skills? For example a six week course on car maintenance could actually help the company if their car broke down on the way to work. If everyone learned first aid then your employees will feel confident enough to act quickly in a crisis.
The Company Promise
What’s the company promise? It could be that the company promise is to offer flexible working, fantastic training, a great work environment, brilliant incentives, whatever the promise is you have to make sure you keep it. Many companies make all the promises at the interview but then don’t carry those promises out. Living in a transparent, hyper-connected world, word soon gets out that the company is one that doesn’t keep its promises. Put the company promise in the handbook, stand by it and deliver that promise.
The employee handbook is a chance for your company to shine.
A couple of good examples would be:
Zappos
The Zappos employee handbook is a great read, I can’t see any employee not wanting to read the Zappos employee handbook.
You can watch a video of one of the employees from Zappos talk about The Zappos employee handbook here
The Motley Fool
I fell in love with The Motley Fool employee handbook, I mean come on...who falls in love with an employee handbook? Check their online version yourself and tell me you don’t get feeling of love towards it!!
What’s your employee handbook like?
JOIN Jobhop and spread the word.
Julie Bishop Jobhop.co.uk
Pic credit John Trainor
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- Expert