While legal analysis of surveillance in the workplace typically focuses on what employers can and can’t do, it’s also important to remember that employees, too, can endanger personal privacy rights [...]
Employee dishonesty, theft and fraud are a perennial challenge for HR directors. Here’s a template you can adapt to prevent and, if necessary, discipline employees who engage in such conduct. [...]
Closed circuit television and other surveillance equipment can help you keep your work facility safe and secure. But it can also violate the personal privacy of individuals who are monitored. [...]
With labour in short supply, HR directors face the challenge of getting maximum productivity out of the employees they have. Perhaps the greatest obstacle standing in the way of that [...]
The word “housekeeping” summons up images of maids and parents scolding kids for leaving their socks on the floor. “Sanitation” and “hygiene” sound weightier but are equally unlikely to resonate [...]
While it enables connectivity and work from remote locations, allowing employees to connect their personal cell phones, laptops, tablets and other personal mobile devices to your company’s IT systems and [...]
Remote wipe technology is a self-destruct button enabling you to keep lost, stolen or otherwise compromised smart phones, laptops, tablets and other mobile devices containing precious confidential data from falling [...]
All companies must have clearly written anti-discrimination and harassment policies to ensure compliance with human rights and OHS laws. While there’s some overlap, diversity and inclusion policies are different from [...]
Diversity in employment goes far beyond not committing discrimination. The world is made up of people of diverse races, ethnicities, religious values, personal beliefs, cultures, languages, etc. Today, increasing numbers [...]
This Workplace Transition Plan template, which is based on a model from Transgender Law Center, a California-based non-profit advocacy group, provides for managing the workplace processes that occur when an [...]
Gender expression and identity discrimination tends to be a blind spot in organizational efforts to comply with human rights laws. While general anti-discrimination policies mention these traits, they rarely address [...]
Ontario employers that use GPS, cell phone or other digital technology to monitor their workers must adopt a written policy describing the technology and how it’s used by January 1, [...]
Electronic Monitoring Policy On February 24, 2022, the provincial government announced that it intends to introduce new legislation within a few weeks that will require employers to inform their workers [...]
Age discrimination tends to be a blind spot in organizational efforts to comply with anti-discrimination laws. While general anti-discrimination policies mention age discrimination, they rarely address the topic specifically. Here’s [...]
Create a clearly worded policy reassuring employees that you won’t retaliate against them for reporting violations, exercising legal rights and engaging in other forms of protected activity. Here’s a template [...]
While there are circumstances in which questioning orders and criticizing the boss may be justified, there’s a fine line between such behaviours and outright insolence and insubordination. You need a [...]
Change in leadership is an unavoidable fact of life for all organizations. The key to ensuring a smooth transition with minimal disruption to business operations and values is to establish [...]
Accommodating employee mental health issues is even more crucial in a pandemic world In any given week, at least 500,000 Canadians are unable to work due to mental health problems. [...]
ABC Company is committed to ensuring the health, safety and well-being of all of its employees. ABC Company also recognizes that mental health is a crucial factor in employees’ overall [...]
New Ontario laws ban engaging with employees after normal working hours. A new kind of employment standard law is coming into vogue, one that gives employees the right to be [...]
Establish clear ground rules when letting employees work from home. Letting employees work remotely from home offers organizations significant benefits, like lower overhead, equipment and other costs, the capacity to [...]
You must give employees unpaid leave for jury duty. Canadian citizens have a civic duty to attend court, participate in jury selection and serve as jurors if they’re selected to [...]
Calling telecommuters back to the office can lead to constructive dismissal liability
Here’s a template of a policy providing for the immediate removal of workers who are impaired by drugs, alcohol or other substances, based on a model published by the Northwest [...]
Although courts have yet to weigh in on the issue, regulatory guidelines indicate that employers may follow the lead of some provincial governments and implement COVID-19 vaccination passport policies requiring [...]
Harassment-wise, the virtual meeting has become the digital equivalent to the holiday office party. Far from eliminating workplace harassment, telecommuting has only caused it to morph into digital forms. As [...]
A template you can use to create a new leave policy or vet your current one. Caring for an elderly parent care or other close family member who’s on the [...]
New ESA leave rights apply to COVID-19 and other infectious disease emergencies. In response to the pandemic, Ontario adopted a new Infectious Disease Emergency Leave (IDEL) covering not just the [...]
A template for creating a legally compliant COVID leave policy. Since the pandemic began, all but 2 jurisdictions (Northwest Territories and Nunavut) have revised their employment standards laws to give [...]
To ensure that key functions within the XYZ Co’s business can be conducted from employees’ homes or, other remote locations is the purpose of this statement of Policy and Procedure.
