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Can Your Employees Sue You for Emotional Distress

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StrategyDriven Managing Your People Article |Suing for Emotional Distress|Can Your Employees Sue You for Emotional DistressAny business should consider the mental wellbeing of its employees. Work is stressful enough without people having to deal with the outrageous behaviors of others. Major depression and burnout cost companies billions of dollars every year. In this context, the stress in the workplace is not something to neglect. From a legal standpoint, employees have the right to sue a business for emotional distress. Here is what you need to know.

Employers Have Double Legal Duties

As an employer, you have the legal duty to avoid inflicting emotional distress to other people. You must use reasonable care to prevent such issues. You are responsible for all your employees’ conduct. Say an employee causes emotional distress to another employee or a client. If you knew and did nothing about it, you are vulnerable to a lawsuit.

Making the Difference between Legal Types of Emotional Distress Cases

An employer must follow the letter of the law and its spirit. You may do everything right and face legal exposure. Some of your employees may have asked themselves, “can you sue for emotional distress” at least once. The answer is “yes,” but it depends on the situation. Most people will not sue you because you are annoying as a person. They will if:

  • you are a negligent manager;
  • engage in reckless/outrageous behavior towards them;
  • your management led to workplace accidents and injuries;
  • you ignore their complaints.

With burnout syndrome, depression, or sexual harassment, the law is intricate. In this context, you need to know the difference between NIED and IIED.

The best way to move forward is to hire legal aid. It may be hard as a small business to find the right law firm. But, it will save you money in the long term. Most likely, it will protect your reputation.

NIED – Negligent Infliction of Emotional Distress

Employees can sue for NIED when someone else’s negligence leads to their emotional distress. The proof varies from state to state. These are the general provisions when making a case:

  • The employee must prove that the defendant (employer) engaged in a negligent activity.
  • The employer is open to an NIED suit if he/she willfully violated a statutory duty.
  • The plaintiff suffered significant emotional distress (as described by the law). They must prove its occurrence, persistence, symptoms, etc.
  • The plaintiff’s emotional distress is a direct consequence of the defendant’s negligence.

Example: Employees can sue within an NIED framework if a piece of equipment fell and nearly crashed them.

IIED – Intentional Infliction of Emotional Distress

Bad behavior opens the door to an IIED suit. There are no guidelines on what represents extreme, reckless, or outrageous behavior. It is why IIED is hard to prove in court. Don’t misjudge the courts and lawyers, though. An IIED claim must target conducts that go beyond the usual workplace insults, threats, or annoyances. They should not exist, either, but they do not pack a big punch in court. What comes with heavyweight is the following combination of factual elements:

  • The employer/their agent’s conduct was deliberate and reckless. And there is proof to back up this claim.
  • The defendant/their agent engaged in extreme or outrageous behavior (and the plaintiff can prove).
  • This conduct led to an employee’s emotional distress.
  • The employee can prove the causality and the severity of the distress.

Example: You are open to IIED claims if you neglected an employee’s complaints regarding sexual harassment. Your failure to respond to numerous notices for months will most likely put you in the defendant’s chair.

In IIED claims, fright or shame can fall under the umbrella of “emotional distress.” As we said above, you are responsible for the conduct of all your employees. Consider promoting a safe working environment. Remove any risks of sexual harassment, bullying, shaming, emotional abuse, social isolation, etc.

Can You Put a Price on Your Employees’ Feelings?

If an employee wins an NIED or an IIED claim, you have to pay for damages. The payment is relative to the severity of the emotional injury. You should consider legal advice in such cases, even if you are a small business. Many NIED and IIED cases settle outside of court. You need to know your rights, your employees’ rights, and the methods you have to make their lives better and safer.

Employee Wellness: Tips To Make Employees More Productive At Work

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StrategyDriven Managing Your People ArticleAny company will reap many benefits when they have healthy and engaged employees. An employee wellness program curated and designed correctly will boost morale, increase productivity, and reduce stress. Wellness programs have always been thought of as something nice-to-have rather than a must-have. What employers don’t think about is the benefits in the long term. In the long run, the company will see the results. Wellness programs help employees to stay healthy and lessen absences. The cost of having this employee wellness program will just be minimal compared to the benefits in the long run. Listed below are some tips to make employees more productive at work.

1. What is a Wellness Program?

Before crafting and designing your employee wellness program, you first have to understand what it is. A wellness program is any program with the goal to improve the health and well-being of the company’s workforce. Wellness programs are supposed to help employees overcome general health issues and educate them about what they should do to maintain a healthy lifestyle. Usually, companies hire third-parties to conduct the program and seminar depending on the need and expertise. There are many great ways to increase productivity, and wellness programs are one of them.

2. What improvements to target?

The way to design your wellness program should address specific needs and target personal wellness. Programs structured can target physical fitness and stamina through regular exercise, Zumba, or yoga classes for employees. This doesn’t only increase welfare but also improves self-image and self-esteem, which you want in your employees. At the same time, this also reduces the stress that your employees feel. Targeting specific health-related issues will translate into a more reliable workforce and smoother workflow.

3. What are the kinds of wellness programs you can implement?

There are tons of programs that a company can implement for the well-being of their employees. Be sure to provide flexibility in the programs so many of your employees can join in. Here are just some suggestions and recommendations for great employee wellness ideas:

  • Zumba Classes
  • Diet Guidance Programs
  • Physical Fitness Programs
  • Quit-Smoking Programs
  • Physiological Testing Programs
  • Stress Management Programs
  • Nutrition Classes
  • Blood Pressure Screening
  • Cholesterol Tracking
  • Fitness Tracking
  • Gym Plans
  • Guided Meditation Classes
  • Cooking Classes
  • Team Building Activities
  • Anxiety Workshop
  • Annual Corporate Flu Shots
  • Healthy Lifestyle Education
  • Mental Health Days
  • Emotional and Mental Health Education and Resources
  • Book Clubs
  • Healthy Potlucks

4. Healthy Snacks

With working for at least 8 hours a day, employees will grow well into the snacking culture in no time. Unfortunately, most companies only have low-quality vending machines that offer junk food such as soda, candy, and chips loaded with fat and sugar. These snacks not only decrease productivity, but it also makes a serious dent in the health and well-being of an employee. An excellent way to improve the nutrition of your employees is to provide easy access to healthier snack choices throughout the day.

5. Launch Health Competitions

Nothing else gets people off their chairs than incentives. If economics taught anything, it’s that people respond well to incentives. Why not incentivize health? Gamify employee fitness by starting challenges and giving incentives. For instance, you can start giving out gift certificates for the employee with the most visits to the gym or went running. You can also provide employees with fitness trackers to keep them in shape and encourage them. Another competition you can start is a step competition or walking challenge. You can give out cash incentives to those who hit step targets. The goal is to keep your employees in good shape, keep them motivated, and up on their feet.

6. Pet-Friendly Office Initiative

Another way that has been proven to keep employees motivated and increase productivity is to bring in your furry, four-legged friends to the office. These are tested and proved to improve collaboration among employees. Some offices even encourage to bring pets and have pets running around the office.

Keeping your employees healthy and educating them about well-being does reduce not only absences but also boosts productivity and efficiency in employees. Even though it costs very low, this initiative from companies can go a long way in helping out employees while benefiting the company. The connection between employee wellness and productivity has already been proven and well-established. Hope this guide was able to give you some tips on how employee wellness programs can help in boosting productivity and effectivity.

6 Ways Entry-Level Engineers Can Get an Employer’s Attention

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StrategyDriven Practices for Professionals Article | 6 Ways Entry-Level Engineers Can Get an Employer's Attention | Talent Management | Resume | Cover LetterYou are about to graduate with that coveted engineering degree. It’s the ticket you were told would land you a high-paying position in that big (or rising) tech firm you’ve had your eye on. Yes, the economy appears to be humming along with many companies eager to hire. But before you prepare your resume and cover letter, there are several things you need to do to make yourself more attractive to today’s CEOs and the people that they trust to make the best hires for them.

Here are six helpful tips that will be a sure way to catch that employer’s attention:

Clean Up and Polish Your Social Media

A recent Harvard Business Review article noted that many recruitment subcontractors scour LinkedIn and other social media to find potential candidates. They’ll trace your “digital exhaust” from cookies and other user-tracking programs to learn who you are. So, ditch those college party photos you have on Instagram, Facebook, etc. Replace them with photos or videos of you working hard at that tech firm you interned with during the summer. Don’t have any intern photos? Plug in some pics of tech projects you worked on in your garage or senior lab. Use photos of you attending tech seminars and symposiums – preferably those attended by that tech firm you want to join.

It also doesn’t hurt to add a professional bio to your social media account(s). And replace college handles and URLs with those that make you look more professional. Create a brand that sets you apart – post, share, or re-tweet anything related to the industry you’re eager to enter. Follow blogs, news sources, and any other websites that represent thought leaders in the tech field you want to work in.

Network like Mad

Referrals and professional networks are 1st and 3rd in order of what CEOs consider sources of quality. People in the tech industry know that you’re young, hungry and need advice. And many are all too willing to share what they know. They remember what it was like when they tried to break in. So go to every trade show, conference seminar, and networking event you can get into. Talk to people in booths and after seminars. Ask what you can do to get into their apprenticeship, internship or mentor program.

Print out 500 “job seeker” business cards with your name, major and the job you’re looking for. Include your contact info and website if you have one. Hand these out to people you meet at trade shows, tech conferences, and seminars. They may not have an opening, but word gets around about your unique approach. And someone may just call you.

Another tactic is to attend any social/community outreach programs which the firm you’re interested in may be sponsoring. Talk to the people there and ask if you can help. People are more open at these events and the conversation tends to be more relaxed. It also builds your reputation as a caring individual; the kind that other employees like to be around. Who knows, you may end up serving food to the homeless next to the firm’s CEO. (if that happens, ditch the hard sell, but answer any questions—just make sure they remember your name. Write your last name out clearly on your “Hello, my name is” tag.)

Sell Yourself in the Cover Letter

The letter is a key element in any job search. It paints a picture that CEOs, recruiters, and hiring managers will create in their minds about the kind of person you are. Like your resume, your letter should dovetail with the firm’s needs and requirements. If you met an engineer or other tech staff member from that company at a seminar, conference or other event, namedrop that in your letter. ‘Beta test’ your letter with a career counselor or someone you know in the industry. And keep it short, no more than a page – single-spaced.

Fine Tune Your Resume

If you’re an astute tech grad, you should know how to write a resume. There are all sorts of resume writing tips and templates online. The important thing to remember is to fine-tune your resume to the needs of the tech company you’re eager to join. That means including any internships and mentor programs you’ve completed. Don’t forget to stress any senior-level projects that align with the company’s product or service.

And don’t ‘fudge’ your background—many university career counselors advise students not to be as forthcoming with their qualifications or remove entire degrees if the job posting doesn’t call for it. While this may get you the interview, it will bring up more questions that will put off hiring managers when they ask you for details during the interview.

As with your cover letter, beta test it with guidance counselors and any pros you know in the industry. You can also get a free resume evaluation at Monster’s Resume Writing Service. You’ll get detailed feedback, including a review of your resume’s appearance and content, as well as a prediction of a recruiter’s first impression.

Make Your Resume Bot Friendly

It’s a regrettable fact that many recruiters, HR managers, and other gatekeepers use applicant-tracking systems (ATS) to pre-filter resumes. These bots look for keywords and key phrases. So include verb phrases and skills written in the firm’s job description. Use both the acronym and the spelled-out form of any given title, certification, or organization. And dump the ‘career objective’ section. Bots ignore this and so do most gatekeepers. Replace it with a qualifications summary – a bullet-pointed section packed with ATS-friendly keywords that highlight your achievements, applicable skills, and internships. Use spell check and grammar-check programs to wipe your resume (and cover letter) of any mistakes.

Ace the Interview

You made the shortlist and got a face-to-face interview. At this point, the job is yours to lose. So learn all you can about the company. Scour the firm’s website. Commit to memory the company’s key current events found in the ‘news’ section. If you met any company employees at a seminar, trade show or other function, be prepared to talk about your conversation(s) you had with them.

If you don’t know the answer to a tough technical question, own up sooner rather than later. It’s much better to admit temporary ignorance than fake your way in front of a potential expert. And do ask questions. If you don’t ask anything at the end of an interview, it shows a lack of interest in the company and what your typical workday might be like.

Know your resume like the back of your hand. Be prepared to discuss how your skills and talents align with the needs of the company. By the way, you should already be familiar with the basics of interviewing – firm handshake, smile, good eye contact, and dressing a step up from the person you meet. Check out a few videos on body language as well. And do follow up promptly after the interview with a thank you email – that’s one more chance to stand out among the other in-person interviewees.

You will want to start working on these steps well before you graduate so that when that graduation ceremony comes up and you get your cap and gown, you are well on your way to landing your first dream job.

About the Author

Dr. Radu Reit is the Vice-Chair of the Marketing Committee at the Society for Information Display (SID). Display Week 2020 will be held June 7-12, 2020, in San Francisco. For more information, visit www.displayweek.org.

How to Reduce Employee Turnover Rate

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StrategyDriven Talent Management Article | How to Reduce Employee Turnover RateEmployee turnover rate refers to the number or percentage of employees who leave an organization and have to be replaced by new workers. Employee turnover is a common issue affecting both big and small firms. The problem with employee turnover is that it costs a lot of money and time to replace an employee.

According to a report by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), the average cost of replacing a single employee can be as high as $4,425. The cost of replacing an employee may include the onboarding and training expenses, severance benefits, and fees for processing technical details and documents. The figure also includes any time lost during the recruitment and onboarding process. So, how can you reduce or prevent employee turnover and avoid losing valuable time and resources?

Hire the Right People

The very first step towards avoiding a high turnover rate is hiring the right people to begin with. Create thorough hiring, recruitment, and onboarding process that sieves through the job applicants to find the most suitable candidates to work in your company.

Although skills and qualifications are important, selecting the right staff goes beyond examining academic and professional achievements. Scrutinize candidates on soft skills that would come in handy for the job position. Also, ask about the candidates’ career paths and goals to see if they align with what your company has to offer. These are excellent criteria to measure whether a candidate will be happy and satisfied with their position in the business.

Create A Flexible Work Environment

The 9-to-5 workplace regimen seems like an outdated and traditional workplace arrangement nowadays. Many employees are now looking for more flexible workplaces where they can balance their work and personal life more easily and conveniently. In fact, most employees value workplace flexibility more than other job descriptions.

Flexibility defines things like working hours, collaborations, workload, deadlines, and rules about absenteeism and reporting to work.  With modern IT solutions, you can have employees working from home, on a contract or freelancing basis, or even during odd hours. In such a case, however, you have to implement work from home policy guidelines to ensure accountability. Remember, the goal is to create a relaxed atmosphere without compromising productivity.

Offer Competitive Salaries and Benefits

One of the main reasons why people go to work is to earn money. Offering competitive salaries and benefits can help your business attract exceptional talent and retain employees. Money is a great incentive that you can use to lure employees into dedicating their time and effort to meeting the company’s goals.

You don’ even have to raise your salaries and benefits by thousands of dollars. Just take a look at what other employers in the same industry are paying their staff and raise your offering by a noticeable margin – and that should be enough to discourage competitors from poaching your employees.

Praise and Reward Exceptional Employees

Besides compensations, benefits, and salaries, you should also look into recognizing and rewarding exceptional work and employees. Recognizing your workers’ efforts and rewarding their hard work accordingly makes them feel valuable and important to the company. This gradually develops into building trust and long-lasting relationships between the employees and the employer. Plus, a fair reward and recognition system helps motivate morale and determination among the workers, which leads to higher employee satisfaction and productivity.

Many employers fail to see the importance of their employees, probably because they think they’re dispensable. However, your employees are most certainly one of the essential assets that your business has. Employees are the lifeblood of any organization that needs human input or labor, which is why they must be valued and appreciated. And although employees can be replaced, it’s a costly process, and a high turnover rate can hurt your operational costs and productivity significantly. So, work on ways of retaining your employees to avoid expensive surprises along the way.

Across The Memory Board – How To Educate Our Employees On The Best IT Practices

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StrategyDriven Talent Management Article | Employee Training | Across The Memory Board- How To Educate Our Employees On The Best IT Practices

Cybersecurity is one of those overriding concerns in modern business. As there are more data breaches making headlines affecting a wide variety of companies, it seems that nobody is exempt from cyber terrorism or crime relating to technology. This means it’s crucial for you to look at your vulnerabilities. While you can set up various types of systems to protect your company, one of the most vulnerable areas of your business isn’t a technical one, it is a human one. Your employees are prone to human error. And we’ve got to make sure that we train our employees to understand the best practices of IT. What sort of tactics and practices can help you in this situation?

Investing In Employee Training

From a technical perspective, we can outsource components to a network services company or IT specialist, so they have the responsibility, but when we look at our in house components, it’s crucial for employees to grasp cybersecurity as a maintenance issue rather than something that they learn once in a blue moon. We’ve got to remember that cyber terrorism is a constantly evolving entity, which means that we’ve got to upregulate our systems and our approach to protecting the company. While we can invest in components like software patches and outsourcing technical duties to another company, we still have to invest in the people that we see each and every day. We have got to commit to a wide variety of tactics, so our teams know what is out there and what they can do to combat it. Partly we have to invest in training, but we’ve also got to change our mindset. It’s so easy to blame the employee that opens the phishing scam attachment rather than addressing the mentality of the employees in general. This is where training becomes essential.

Working On The Best Practices

It’s so easy for us to say that password security is an essential component because everybody knows to an extent this can protect most of us from phishing scams or cyber-attacks. But getting your team to do this is an entirely different ballpark. Working on the best practices with something like changing passwords is partly to do with your employees, knowing the traits of a strong password, but also understanding the outcome of not following these processes. On a basic level, a password needs to be long with multiple characters, and it’s changed on a regular basis. But remember that in order to ensure compliance from your workers, building a reminder to change passwords through regular feedback as well as password management tools can help your employees to keep on top of these issues.

Focus On Cybersecurity Awareness

The people in the IT department may know the sorts of data breaches out there but you can’t expect your employees to follow the trends in the news. You may know which way the signs are going, but it can still prove challenging to understand how regularly these things occur. There are numerous resources that you can take advantage of that provide detailed information on the latest cybersecurity breaches, but you also need to remember that this message needs to be loud and clear. Distributing this information through your team is about consistency. If you continue to share the information on a regular basis, along with the repercussions, this puts the message across. At the same time, you don’t want to bombard your employees with too much information that they don’t bother reading it.

Integrate Cybersecurity With New Employees

The onboarding process is the perfect opportunity to introduce your employees to the best practices. If you incorporate it into your training process from day one, you are able to go over the rules but also explain the importance of these best practices. Again, it’s about reiterating how much of a threat data breaches are. You need to create clear cybersecurity guidelines through important regulatory documents but also initiate a complaints procedure should a breach occur. When your employees hear about a potential breach, you must create an environment where employees share information rather than trying to cover up their mistakes.

Implement It From The Top Down

From the perspective of the executives, communicating the need for regular training in terms of cybersecurity practices is about highlighting its effect on the bottom line. Yes, there is no shortage of news relating to data breaches, but you’ve still got to make a case for it when money is tight. Looking for an executive buy-in is about making your case clear with regards to the costs but also going in with a comprehensive plan as to how the training would be undertaken. It’s also crucial to point out the costs of a data breach. Based on experience, once you highlight how more expensive a data breach is in comparison to training and onboarding practices, it’s likely executives will opt for the latter.

Implementing Regular Drills

We test the fire alarm on a regular basis, so why don’t we incorporate data breaches? When we train employees on a new piece of software, there comes a time where we have to let them fly by themselves. Allowing them to experiment in an environment with their new skills gives you a clearer picture of the potential problems that can occur and if your employees are ready to deal with them. Testing your business with a live-fire simulation can be a massive undertaking, but you can do it through smaller simulations like spot-checking your employees to see if they know the principles of combating a phishing scam email.

As technology is such a major investment and the fact that we rely on it to do 95% of our tasks, we need to make sure that our employees know how to use it properly. Many organizations invest in sophisticated equipment but don’t have the means to operate it. When our employees need to understand how to use the equipment, we can guide them, but we’ve also got to give them knowledge of the best practices underneath. Cybersecurity is such an important issue that if we communicate it so much, our employees can switch off. But by following a few of these processes, you can start to educate everybody across the board.