We’ve posted our first poll on the right side of this blog. We’re wondering if you’ve implemented policies regarding social media in the workplace. Just a simple yes or no question for the time being. We will be pulling together thoughts and discussing social media’s place in the workplace, since its still new to many people and business owners.
Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category
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Welcome to our newest Director
Pivotal has been working with clients in British Columbia and Alberta for a couple years now, and recently we needed to hire a new HR Director to assist in the West. So please leave a comment and say hello to Sarah Chapman. A Vancouver native, Sarah comes to Pivotal with 8 years of HR experience, and apparently a psychotic cat. (I’ll let her tell that story sometime.)
We’re keeping her quite busy, but hope she’ll find some time to get in a little blogging as well.
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Workplace Violence – New Legislation May be Coming Soon
ONTARIO GOVERNMENT INTRODUCES BILL 168
(The Occupational Health & Safety Amendment Act)On April 20, 2009, the Ontario Government introduced Bill 168, Occupational Health and Safety Amendment Act (Violence and Harassment in the Workplace), 2009. If passed, Bill 168 would impose new obligations on employers in respect to harassment and violence in the workplace. Employers will be required to develop workplace violence and harassment policies, assess the risk of violence in its workplace, address domestic violence issues, and alert co-workers to any person with a violent history.
We have compiled notes on the proposed legislation to keep you informed on how it might affect your workplace and internal health & safety policies.
WHAT IS “WORKPLACE VIOLENCE” AND “WORKPLACE HARASSMENT”
Bill 168 defines “workplace harassment” as engaging in a course of vexatious comment or conduct against a worker in a workplace, which is known or ought reasonably to be known to be unwelcome. “Workplace violence” means the exercise of physical force by a person, or an attempt to exercise physical force against a worker in a workplace, which could cause physical injury to the worker.You will notice the definition of “workplace violence” does not make any reference to psychological harm, unlike Bill 29, which was previously introduced. Also important to note is the definition of “workplace harassment is very broad in comparison to the definition of “harassment” as defined in the Human Rights Code.
POLICIES RELATED TO WORKPLACE VIOLENCE AND HARASSMENT
The Bill requires employers to prepare a written policy with respect to workplace violence and workplace harassment. The policies must be posted (and reviewed annually) and employees must receive training on these policies. Different requirements would apply to workplaces of five or fewer employees.ASSESSING THE RISKS OF VIOLENCE IN THE WORKPLACE
The Bill requires an employer to assess the risk of workplace violence in their specific workplace taking into account the nature of the workplace, conditions of work and the type of work performed.The risk assessment must also factor in both common risks at other similar workplaces and risks specific to the employer’s workplace. A copy of the risk assessment and its results would need to be provided to the joint health and safety committee or health and safety representative. Employers, who are not obligated to have a committee or representative, must advise employees on how to obtain copies of the assessment and its results and it must be provided to workers on request.
DOMESTIC VIOLENCE ISSUES
The Bill requires an employer to “take every precaution reasonable in the circumstances for the protection of the worker if:- a domestic violence situation would likely expose a worker to physical injury in the workplace and,
- the employer becomes aware or ought to reasonably be aware of the situation.
DISCLOSING PERSONS WITH A HISTORY OF VIOLENCE
The most sensitive aspect of the Bill is the requirement to provide information, including personal information, to an employee about a person with “a history of violent behavior” provided the following applies:- the worker can be expected to encounter the person in the course of his or her work; and
- the risk of workplace violence is likely to expose the worker to physical injury.
The above applies only to situations where disclosing the information is reasonably necessary to protect workers from physical injury. A specific definition of what constitutes “a history of violent behavior” is not provided. The employer would need to devise a notification process for persons with a history of violence (including suppliers, customers, patients, etc.) so workers who may encounter the person are aware of the risks. Clearly, disclosing this type of personal information about an employee (or other person) may cause an employer to inadvertently violate other laws (i.e. privacy, human rights, etc.).
WORK REFUSAL (in relation to the threat of workplace violence)
The Bill permits a worker to refuse to work where there is sufficient reason to believe workplace violence is likely to endanger the employee. The Act currently prohibits certain workers such as police officers, firefighters, correctional officers and hospital employees from refusing work when the unsafe condition is inherent in the work or is a normal condition of employment. The standard work refusal process would be followed (i.e. investigation of work refusal, visit from MOL inspector where required, etc.)REPORTING OBLIGATIONS
The Bill requires an employer to report and provide specific information of the workplace violence incident to the joint health and safety committee within four days of its occurrence.IMPLEMENTING A WORKPLACE VIOLENCE PREVENTION PROGRAM
An employer will be required to develop and maintain a program to implement the workplace violence policy. The program must include measures and procedures:- to control the risks identified in the risk assessment or reassessment;
- to summon immediate assistance when workplace violence occurs or is
- likely to occur including when a threat of workplace violence is made;
- for workers to report incidents or threats of workplace violence to the
- employer or supervisor;
- to investigate and deal with incidents, complaints or threats of workplace
- violence; and any further elements required by regulation.
IMPORTANT POINTS TO CONSIDER
The Government is clearly taking an increased interest in the very real problem of workplace violence and harassment and therefore it is fairly likely some version of Bill 168 will be passed into law in the near future. In preparation, employers may want to take steps to do the following:- review their current policies and procedures as they relate to harassment and workplace violence and update accordingly
- consider areas of concern and triggers for violence in your workplace and take steps to rectify these issues now
- include these items in your joint occupational health & safety meetings to get the members talking about risks in your workplace
- include workplace violence and harassment training in your new hire orientation process
Pivotal will keep you updated on the progress of Bill 168 and how it can affect your workplace. Let us know if you have any questions in the meantime.
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My First Webinar… (2)
I would agree with all of Michelle’s comments. This was a first for met too and I found it very exciting to participate in both the creation and the delivery of this webinar. Observing the logistical back end processes was interesting as well.
In terms of the webinar content itself, I must admit that I had a few concerns about how we were going to create a presentation that would engage an audience with broad viewpoints, different experiences and unique business needs. However, I think we managed to deliver just enough meaningful information without putting our audience to sleep (my personal fear). It is quite challenging because, as Michelle mentioned, you don’t have the benefit of gauging the impact of your presentation via the body language of your audience. You just have to trust that they are engaged and not making various versions of the “this is utterly ridiculous garbage” face on the other side of the VOIP interface.
The turn out wasn’t as good as we had hoped and that was a bit of a let down for me, considering the effort we put into this project and the respectable number of folks who originally registered to participate. I believe we need to find some way of encourage actual turn out, but I’m not sure what that “thing” is. I’ll leave that to our Marketing guru.
From our own observations and some feedback we received from some participants, we learned that there are a few do’s and don’ts from a technical perspective, to keep in mind when you’re hosting one of these things:
DO:
- Do an on-line practice session for your webinar. Have trusted colleagues and/or friends sign in and observe as the audience will during the real webinar. Solicit and incorporate their feedback into the presentation as necessary. This is essential, as this is when you find out that a particular slide doesn’t work to emphasis your point, or you need some additional script to make a point, or there is an awkward transition from one presenter or section to another. DO NOT skip this step.
- Be mindful of when you are on “live” at the start and end of each webinar; it’s easy to forget that people are signed in and listening as you joke around with your colleagues who are physically in the room with you; never forget the image that you want to relay to your audience.
- Speak directly and clearly into the microphone; if your audience cannot hear you, then what is the point, really?
- Select the quietest space/room you can find to host your webinar. Any noise outside the room, such as conversation, laughing, or construction (in our case) is amplified during the webinar and detracts from the overall professionalism of your presentation.
- Script your presentation, BUT, try not to sound as if you are reading. This is challenging for most of us, as there is a certain amount of pressure and nervousness that accompanies a “live” presentation. There is a delicate balance of professionalism (credibility) and pleasant general conversational approach that you want to strive for. I think ultimately that it takes lots of practice to get there.
- Plant some questions if you have a Q&A session in your presentation. This will give you a chance to showcase your subject matter expertise, and may trigger additional related questions from your audience.
DON’T:
- Put too much information on your slides. Like any good presentation, the visual part is intended to reinforce and illustrate key concepts – not to relay all of the content of the presentation. Maybe it’s just me, but how many people can read a slide full of text AND listen to someone talking at the same time…. I certainly am not that talented.
- Read your slides. Except for quotations. People can read them for themselves. Plus, if all you do is read your slides, then you are not bringing any real value to the audience outside of the visual presentation. What they want to hear is your view and your personal experience with the subject matter presented. Otherwise, it’s just a slide show.
- Try to wing it, unless you are very, very good at improvisation. If you are, then perhaps you should be part of Second City or some other facet of the entertainment industry.
- Focus your content on theory only. People want real information and real ideas that they can use themselves to improve their own situation.
I’m sure that there are more do’s and don’ts that webinar experts would enumerate for you. These are the key learnings that I took away from this experience, for what’s it’s worth.
I know the next time we do this, it will be that much better. And I’m looking forward to the next time for sure.
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My First Webinar…
Well I can officially put another notch on my learning belt, I just completed my first webinar “Rightsizing your Company for Maximum Profitability in Any Economy” and it was a terrific learning experience. Thanks to my partner in crime Shari Cooper and of course our colleague Marian McGuire who helped us tremendously on the backend development. Shari and I were able to create a comprehensive and thorough presentation on the topic at hand and for me it was a great opportunity to work with someone I had not had the chance to in the past.
Although I’ve trained quite a bit throughout my career it was very different developing the content from scratch and then delivering to a faceless group through the internet. One aspect I enjoyed the most was developing the case study. It was exciting for me to be able to demonstrate how theory applies to a real life client situation.
All in all, it was an excellent learning experience and I look forward to developing our next webinar! A special thanks to Erik and Alison for assisting Shari and I with the actual delivery of the webinar on April 7th.
Just another demonstration of what a fabulous team Pivotal is!
-Michelle Athurs
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Upcoming Webinars
Well now that we got the first webinar done and over with, doing more doesn’t seem so ominous. So a couple people on the HR team are busily prepping our next: “Right-Sizing for Profitability in ANY Economy.” Should be interesting, feel free to register and join us April 7th – we’ll also be doing some open forum discussion following the presentation.
And to support our colleagues in the Staffing Solutions group, they are presenting a webinar on “Joint Health & Safety Committees, Ensuring it Protects your Bottom Line.” This is their second go at webinars, their first was pretty good and well attended, so you can expect this one will be pretty good. Register for either the March 25th or April 8th dates.
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Benefits of Effective HR in a Recession
The team put together the following presentation for a webinar. Thought we’d share it with the world now. It was a lot of work but in the end quite rewarding learning how to do a webinar. Looking forward to doing it again in April. Let us know what you think.
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50 Best Employers to Work for in Canada
The newest listing of the 50 Best Employers to Work for in Canada has been posted, and its a good list. Of particular interest is this synopsis of how the top five did it - it seems to all come down to communication, teamwork and mutual-respect between management and employees.
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