What is the basic purpose of documenting HR policies? It may sound strange; But yeah, some policies can really suck and can add a lot of negative value to help organizations sink. What a gruesome statement it may sound like. But this is what could happen, albeit unknowingly … unintentionally …
Certainly the idea here is to be on the lookout for them, to avoid them at all costs!
- Counting the hours is not always desirable. Strict timing may be fine for workers in manufacturing setup or working on machines; But too strict a discipline can destroy creativity, motivation and, above all, responsible behavior. If you find it too difficult to keep track of departure and much easier to count the hours, you will only get that! Just think about it. You can’t win the war for talent by treating your people like children. What are you looking for in the end? Solid performance that arises from the heart and soul, or just physical presence?
- In difficult times, unfortunately the management decides to continue with mediocre leadership … and here the negative spiral begins. These poor managers are afraid to hire the competent ones for fear of being exposed. Mediocrity cascades downhill until it covers the entire setup and good people start flying out the door. An apt saying goes like this: “If you hire people better than you, you will become a company of giants, and if you hire people worse than you, you will become a company of dwarves.” As such, you must have a very robust hiring process, whatever the situation.
- Some companies require their employees to bring proof for every damn thing, including leave of absence to attend a duel in the family. That’s the lowest you can get. If you don’t trust your people and think they will invent relatives and kill them for a few days’ pay, you are not in a position to be a leader. When an employee is in personal danger due to the death of a family member, asking for proof is nothing more than adding insult to injury. This shameful practice will certainly kick out any self-respecting employee … eventually, if not immediately.
- A very popular and well established practice is to follow a bell curve for performance reviews. It forces most employees to be in the middle band, capped at say 5 percent to be in the Excellent category. Worse than that is the balancing act on the other side, with another 5% at the bottom to be labeled poor and worthy of dismissal. Does it mean that your policies are bad enough to hire 5% of people, that they are useless? It is much easier to hide behind your sickness policies and get rid of these people than to give constructive feedback. But, imagine the demotivation and psychosis of fear that is being injected into the environment of the organization.
- It is surprising to see how some companies subscribe to the old axiom of “pound the fools and the pennies.” For expense bill reimbursements, being accurate really isn’t an issue with digital / online payments. Still, some companies may follow the rounding principle: ignore less than $ 0.50 and convert it to the next full figure for 0.51 and more. But what would you call an employer who ignores all fractions, from 0.1 to 0.99 on all invoices? Yes, depending on the number of payments, you may be saving a few dollars; But do you realize the cost you are paying for these savings? A perfect case of stinky practices!
- Employee development is extremely important and motivating. Some companies hire great consultants and their experience will lead to their employees having beautiful IDPs (individual development plans). Being experts, they can prepare a much better document compared to the employees themselves. Yes, it would be an excellent document and nothing more. Where will the property be? It will not be an exaggeration to say that superbly documented development plans without employee involvement have no more than residual value. That is if for your good luck, it is not demotivating!
It makes sense to keep the door of your organization tightly closed to avoid such practices. And if any such practice is already floating around the organization, it’s time to kick it … without delay!
