Develop and Manage Your Employee Handbook

Hiring employees can be a sign of a healthy, successful business. But with business growth often comes growing pains, like the effort involved in developing and publishing your human resource policies in an employee handbook.

An effective employee handbook should:

• clearly communicate company policies;
• provide a resource for employees to reference themselves rather than having to ask management for assistance, and;
• educate employees about their benefits and rights.

What to Include

Beyond general company policies, you will likely want to include policies addressing federal and state mandated or statutory benefits, such as social security, workers compensation and unemployment insurance. Employers are also encouraged to include a Receipt of Handbook page where employees can acknowledge their receipt of the handbook with their signature, and which can be maintained by the company for future reference.

Legal Review

Employers may also wish to have their completed handbook reviewed periodically by legal counsel for compliance with applicable employment statutes and regulations. Failure to keep up with regulatory changes that impact your handbook policies may make you and your business vulnerable to costly penalties and lawsuits.