Caregiver discrimination: the next frontier in suits? – In a 2020 study, the Center for WorkLife Law in San Francisco found that lawsuits by caregivers have increased 400% over the last 10 years. Such suits are also referred to as “family-responsibility discrimination.” The study found that the majority of such suits revolve around pregnancy and maternity leave (67%), but other issues such as elder care, caring for sick children, caring for a sick spouse, time off for fathers of newborns or newly adopted children, and caring for family members with disabilities can also be a catalyst for a suit. Jared Shelly of Human Resource Executive covers the topic of how unfair treatment of workers with family responsibilities can lead to costly lawsuits.
Crafting positive recruitment messages – At HR Observations, Michael Haberman notes a trend that some employers are refusing to hire the long-term unemployed – including some that actually include “need not apply” notices in job ads. Yikes, that appears to be a pretty ham-fisted approach to recruiting the best candidates. Would you want to work at a company that puts such a mean-spirited message out there in these tough times? Haberman offers several reasons why this is a bad idea, along with concrete suggestions for asserting your needs and screening out unqualified applicants in a more positive way.
We have met the enemy, and he is in our social networks… Steve Boese points to a dastardly new plot to lure your highest performing employees away. No wait, he’s talking about that valuable social networking tool, LinkedIn. Hmmm. It looks like it’s a desert topping AND a floor wax… head on over to Fistful or Talent to learn more about how LinkedIn’s new career planning and visualization tool might pose another challenge to retaining your key employees: Fear and Loathing on LinkedIn.
And in other social networking news… Twitter hits 1 billion queries per day. Search guru Danny Sullivan talks about the implications of this growth as well as the new search technology that Twitter is unveiling. Whether your organization is Twittering or not, you can’t ignore the billion-query elephant in the room.
Benchmarks for women – The number of U.S. women with six-figure incomes is rising at a much faster pace than it is for men: “Nationwide, about one in 18 women working full time earned $100,000 or more in 2009, a jump of 14 percent over two years, according to new census figures. In contrast, one in seven men made that much, up just 4 percent.” While that’s a welcome benchmark of progress, many women’s groups say that the wage gap persists, and point to the fact that only 3% of the Fortune 500 CEOs are women. A recent report from the Government Accountability Office shows that there are still too few women in management.
Finding the right occ docs – The American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine (ACOEM) joined forces with the International Association of Industrial Accident Boards and Commissions (IAIABC) to produce an 11-page “best practice” summary: A Guide to High-Value Physician Services in Workers’ Compensation – How to find the best available care for your injured workers. It includes some of the best thinking and contributions from a diverse group of workers’ compensation system stakeholders, including employers, insurers, policymakers, and physicians.
The high cost of obesity – Speaking of workers’ comp, Yvonne Guibert of
The power of visualization – In recent years there’s been a lot of talk about infographics and creative data visualization used in communications, no doubt due to the expanded capabilities of web-based information display. Here’s one fascinating example from the BBC: Dimensions interprets current and historic events in a human scale by overlaying them onto a map of where you are. Powerful stuff. When presenting important information to your employees, particularly in complex areas like benefit comparisons, it might be helpful to explore some infographic resources to get ideas for effective communications.
Learning from nature – Ndubuisi Ekekwe talks about leadership lessons we can learn from ants at the Harvard Business Review blogs.
Quick takes
- 10 weird jobs that pay really well
- 9 things you don’t want to have to admit in court
- Survey: Employers’ health care costs to rise 8.2% in 2011
- A graphic guide to Facebook portraits
- Business travel: Choosing a seat on a plane is more than just about legroom
- Medical Identity Theft: a freight train coming our way
- Does your company website comply with the ADA?