Things That Payroll Officers Must Avoid

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StrategyDriven Managing Your People Article | Things That Payroll Officers Must AvoidThere are several things that payroll providers must avoid. These violations can lead to imprisonment and fines of up to $10,000. Many employers try to comply with the law, but they are still prone to mistakes that could cost businesses money and reputation.

Falsifying wages

Employees can falsify their wages to benefit themselves or employers. Falsified wages are common ways to cheat payroll departments. Employees may also use their payroll access to forge or alter checks and alter the amounts. Physical reviews are also easier to develop and steal.

Another way to defraud a payroll system is to perform timesheet fraud. This involves submitting timesheets that do not accurately represent an employee’s work schedule. This method is prevalent among non-exempt employees, who may use false timesheets to cover up a problem. An employer can correct time records before wages are paid to prevent any further fraud. Falsifying wages is something that payroll officers must avoid.

Falsifying hours worked

One of the biggest problems in the workplace is that employees may be tempted to falsify their timesheets. Even if you are not at fault, it is vital to maintain accurate time records for both exempt and nonexempt employees. It is critical to keep correct documents of all time spent working, including meal breaks and constant changes. You should also justify what will happen if an employee submits a timesheet containing false information. You should always review your timesheet policy with your employees and ask about any discrepancies in time records. This way, you can resolve any issues before payroll time arrives.

Another ordinary mistake payroll officers must watch out for is the use of ghost hourly employees. This type of employee uses the payroll system to steal from a company. In a larger company, ghost hourly employees may use this scheme to take advantage of the company’s payroll system. Regular audits of payroll records will help you spot irregularities and inconsistencies in payroll budgets. Falsifying hours is also possible with sophisticated time clocks that require employees to enter a unique passcode for each employee.

Falsifying tax forms

While employers who pay their employees in cash have many risks, one of the biggest is the risk of misclassifying them. If payroll officers don’t classify employees correctly, they may violate federal tax laws. The consequences of misclassification can include fines of up to $25,000 per instance and penalties and back payroll taxes. To avoid such a scenario, payroll officers should work with a competent payroll company to classify employees correctly.

Falsifying sick days

In the workplace, employees must give as much notice as possible if they will miss a shift. Unfortunately, many will try to resolve the issue, saying they will return later, but this isn’t appropriate. Instead, call to explain that they’re sick and tell your employer when you expect to return. While coming in with a cough may be uncomfortable, it is still better than not coming in.

While some employees may be able to make it through the workday with the excuse that they’re ill, some might try to fake it. This can cost a company money and goodwill, so it’s vital to have a system to catch false claims. A drive-by of an employee’s house is one way to catch someone out with fake sick days. When a supervisor sees someone on camera, they’ll be fired or given their job back.

Falsifying vacation

There are multiple ways in which an employee may be misclassified as a fake employee. In some instances, employees have been caught doing something illegal, like falsifying vacation hours, and payroll officers are often responsible. Payroll officers may have detected irregularities and declined to process them, but employees and managers have also criticized them. Falsifying vacation and severance hours for employees can be a significant problem, and the consequences of these actions could be costly.

Helping Your Staff to Experience Success

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StrategyDriven Managing Your People Article |Experience Success|Helping Your Staff to Experience SuccessRunning a business is no easy feat, but having the right team behind you can make this venture a whole lot easier. Sure, you may want to retain as much control as possible over your business, its products, its brand and its operations, by managing as much as you possibly can yourself. But as time goes on, and as demand on your company increases, you’ll quickly find that you can’t do everything on your own. Not only does hiring staff allow you to distribute your workload, lifting a weight from your shoulders, but it can also give you access to individuals with specialist knowledge and expertise in different areas that will help your company to progress beyond your own limitations. Of course, when you take staff on, you do become responsible for them in many ways. You’re going to want to make sure that they experience success and are happy in the workplace and their position. Here’s some more on the topic!

Why Help Staff to Succeed?

All too many business owners make the mistake of thinking that if they train and improve their staff, their staff will leave for better opportunities elsewhere. But this isn’t necessarily the case. In fact, employees that are constantly encouraged to experience success through support and training are much more likely to be satisfied in their roles and this can seriously help with staff retention levels. Holding onto good staff members will reduce recruitment costs and prevent you from having to experience dips in productivity as you hire, train and introduce new members to your team as a replacement. On top of this, when you train staff, you benefit from the skills and expertise that they acquire through their training. You will simply find yourself with the best quality team you can possibly have.

Software and Tools

Make sure that your team has the software and tools they need to do their job to the highest standard. Whether that’s communications software like Microsoft dynamics phone integration or a new piece of machinery that helps with the manufacturing process. Ensuring that your team has the best tools in the trade will make sure that they can do their job to the highest standard. Unsure of developments in different areas of equipment and software to specific roles? Chances are your team working in that area knows about the latest developments and releases. Talk to them. They’ll be able to advise you on whether their current options are up to scratch or whether they could do with an upgrade.

Training

The most straightforward and logical way to help your staff to experience success is to provide them with job-specific training. There are so many different options that you might want to consider. A copywriter might benefit from training in SEO. Management may benefit from knowing how to use Excel and other spreadsheet software. Someone in marketing could benefit from a marketing masters degree. The list goes on. Make sure to do some research and consider which areas you want your team to progress into. This can help to introduce you to training programs that benefit everyone. You may also want to consider health and safety training, such as how to do CPR, fire steward or fire marshall training and more.

Personal Development Plans

Remember that not all training has to be completely job-specific. You can help your team with personal development in areas that aren’t necessarily directly relevant to their role. Instead, you can help them to build traits, confidence and other skills that will supplement their position and help them in a variety of professional situations they may find themselves in. For example, if someone feels uncomfortable with public speaking, you may want to help them with some therapy, confidence building exercises and courses in public speaking or speech making that can help them to overcome this. If your team member wants to be healthier, you can help them along their fitness journey, which can help them to feel healthier, fitter and less likely to take time off work. If your team member wants to learn a second language, you can help them with lessons or language learning software, which will then benefit your company if you ever decide to expand into overseas markets.

It really is essential that you help your staff to progress and experience success while they’re working for you. This will keep them on board and significantly increase productivity, which benefits them and benefit you and your business.

Stop Struggling With Efficiency: Here Are Some Top Tips

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StrategyDriven Managing Your People Article |Efficiency Top Tips|Stop Struggling With Efficiency: Here Are Some Top TipsWhen any business owner is trying to juggle their responsibilities, it can be difficult to focus on efficiency. Yet, it is important to know that every business needs to be efficient in order to achieve goals, generate more sales, and see greater success.

If you are a business owner that struggles with efficiency and a high output of work, then here are some top tips.

Speed up manufacturing processes

Should you be a business that sells products, then you will see a huge increase in sales if you increase your manufacturing output. To achieve this, you will need to invest in the right tools and materials.

For instance, if you create uniquely printed t-shirts, then you can speed up the manufacturing process by investing in the best materials, such as printable HTV. This will make your apparel creations much easier to help increase the number of t-shirts you can produce in one day. The more t-shirts you can produce, the higher your sales will be. Hence, your business will attain greater efficiency.

Schedule meetings if necessary

Business meetings might seem essential if you have things to tell your team. But, holding long and regular business meetings can eat up the time that your team could spend working.

Hence, it is a good idea to only schedule meetings if they are necessary. When you do plan a meeting, always ensure that it is as short and concise as possible so that it doesn’t use up too much time. If you hold a lengthy meeting, it might hinder your team’s motivation and, therefore, hinder their productivity and output for the rest of the day.

Create daily lists

Every business will have a list of tasks to achieve each day and each week. Likewise, every business will have more and more tasks to do. Hence, keeping a list will ensure that nothing gets missed.

To ensure that each daily task is complete, a list can help a person become organized. Ticking off each completed task can offer employee satisfaction, which can increase their motivation. In turn, they will feel encouraged to continue with their efforts to ensure that they tick every task off before the end of the day.

To maximize the efficacy of daily lists, it can help to set timings for each task. This can ensure that you don’t spend too much time on one task and maximize your working hours.

Delegate tasks to the right people

Every business will have employees that have strengths in certain areas. Hence, to maximize efficiency and the results of a business, it is a good idea to delegate tasks to the right people.

There is little use in offering a marketing task to someone that specializes in finance, and vice versa. Hence, always make sure to offer the right responsibilities to the right people.

Simple changes to your business can ensure maximized efficiency and business output. In turn, you will recognize more leads and sales, which will help your business attain its desired success.

Raise Employee Morale With These Tips

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StrategyDriven Managing Your People Article |Employee Morale|Raise Employee Morale With These TipsYou’ve clicked on this post because you’re interested in learning how to raise employee morale in your business. You’ll soon see a range of useful tips to try, but first, we want to explain why employee morale is important.

If employee morale is low, it means nobody has the motivation to work hard. Your productivity decreases and you struggle to make sales and gain new customer acquisitions. On the other hand, if employee morale is high, everyone is fully motivated to work towards the collective company goal. Productivity goes through the roof, ensuring you make lots of new sales and gain loads of new customers.

Keeping that in mind, here are the tips to help you maintain and raise employee morale all-year-round:

Feedback sessions

A good way to raise employee morale is by holding one-on-one feedback sessions with each employee. Talk to them about their performance and let them know what they’re doing well at. This praise will really keep them in a good headspace and let them realize that their work is being noticed by you.

At the same time, it’s a good way to provide constructive feedback on things they might not be doing so well at. Be sure to go hard on the praise before and after giving some constructive criticism. The whole aim of these sessions should be to help your employees get the most out of their talents while also boosting morale by giving them a metaphorical pat on the back.

Share the success

Has your company achieved something special lately? Did you hit your sales targets for the month? Have you had a positive article posted about your online? Victories should be shared with your employees as they helped you achieve them.

Sharing success lets everyone feel part of the team. Again, it’s recognition for a job well done. Employees will appreciate that their work is being noticed – and they’ll also feel extra motivation as there’s proof that what they’re doing is good. You create a company environment that’s full of positivity because the successful moments are shared as a collective. Thus, employee morale goes through the roof.

Do things as a team

Often, employee morale is low because the whole team feels disjointed. People don’t feel as though they have a place, so their attitude changes. You can help people feel more like part of a team by doing things together. There are loads of different ideas you can choose to put this into action.

For example, go on a monthly meal together as a team. Or, go out for drinks as a group. You could even host your own party or gathering on special occasions. Find party rentals to get loads of cool games and activities, and it will be a great team bonding session. Things like this will help people get to know one another and feel more attached to the business. It’s impossible to have low morale if everyone gets on and there’s a friendly atmosphere in the workplace. These events or gatherings will help you achieve this.

Create a fun work environment

Lastly, employee morale will go down the drain if your work environment is terrible. Nobody will have high morale if they don’t look forward to going to work. On the flip side, if your work environment is fun and cool, employees will look forward to work.

So, you need to try and make your workplace a relatively fun place to be. Think about little perks you might be able to introduce. Simple ideas work really well. For instance, install a coffee machine in the office so people can constantly get free drinks whenever they want. Maybe have a little chillout area with beanbags and comfy chairs and encourage your team to take breaks. Yes, breaks actually boost productivity – think about that! You could even go a step further and have a table tennis table or pool table for people to use when they’re not working. If people enjoy where they work, their morale is likely to be a lot higher than those that don’t.

Just like that, you can increase the morale of your employees in the workplace. To reiterate, employee morale is more important than you might think. If your business has been struggling, it could be down to the way your employees approach work. Morale could be low because people don’t believe in the company or feel like they enjoy working there. Use the tips above to rewrite the script and create an office that’s full of highly motivated employees!

Strategies To Help You Maximize Productivity In Your Business

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StrategyDriven Managing Your People Development Article |Maximize Productivity|Strategies To Help You Maximize Productivity In Your BusinessAn unproductive business is far worse than not having a business at all; it may be utterly dreadful for your profits and sales; if your firm is not lucrative or profitable enough, you will most likely have to close your doors.

All of your efforts will be in vain if your firm is not productive enough to gain the advantages of your work. Because of this, making guaranteeing your organization is as productive as it possibly can is pretty vital. As long as you can manage to do so – and there are various ways to do this – your chances of establishing your company and producing a profit are greatly boosted.

Continue reading to discover some of the methods you may boost the productivity and success of your organization.

Enhance the well-being of workers

The use of systems and being organized, as well as the application of business knowledge to become better at what you do, are all critical components of enhancing productivity. But these factors account for just half of the equation.

Every other component revolves around your employees, and no matter what type of tools you have in place or what kind of training you give, it will all be for nought if you fail to address one key factor: their well-being.

A happy employee is always going to be more productive than a dissatisfied employee. Their passion for working with you will be contagious, and they will be willing to put forth effort in their job. Most importantly, they will be loyal, knowing that they will be appropriately rewarded for a job well done and that, if they have any problems, they may share them with you.

It is doubtful that an employee will be as productive if they are unsatisfied, think they are not being listened to, or believe their needs are not being handled. Employees will only execute what is needed of them and nothing more, and they will be significantly more inclined to hunt for employment elsewhere, which will be costly to you and disruptive to the firm as a whole.

In order to achieve this, you must first guarantee that your personnel are as happy and fulfilled as possible in their jobs. How you go about it will be influenced by the type of the company, your budget, and the location of everyone’s office.

Make use of organizational resources

The usage of organizing tools in your business may considerably boost your productivity and efficiency.

It is simple for duties to be neglected or forgotten when you do not have any integrational, automation or other equivalent solutions to aid you to comprehend where everyone should be and what they should all be performing right now. When this happens, productivity declines.

Not only will your workers be unclear about what they should be doing and when it should be done (which feeds into their general well-being, as stated above), but you will also be unsure of when to verify that the responsibilities have been performed, or even who to ask in some cases.

When you apply specific organizational tools, everyone may feel much more at ease in their duties since they will all grasp what they are intended to be accomplishing at any given time. They will know how to integrate with Ingenico and any other new workflow procedures you have in place. Additionally, your clients and suppliers will be satisfied as well, because no order, payment, or work will be ignored, and your reputation will flourish as a consequence.