Top 10 Good HR Habits

We all know what it’s like when we’re busy, we opt for things that are convenient and easy access, and it’s fine in the short term – it works, fills a gap, fixes a hole, but it’s not necessarily building a strong foundation for the future. Before we know it, we’ve slipped into bad habits that are hard to reverse and sooner or later we’ll have to face the consequences. When you’re managing people, those habits can translate as incomplete records, unfinished files and rushed, poorly thought through contracts. The resulting consequences could be the minor inconvenience of time spent trying to find the right document through to much more serious contractual issues such as unenforceable terms or breach of contract.

So, if like many people, you’re inspired by a fresh New Year to take stock and make changes in your personal life, you should take the same approach with your HR admin too. Small but effective changes now can save a whole lot of pain, and money, in the future. Here’s our top 10 good HR habits you should take up this year:

1. Firstly, if January is the start of a new holiday entitlement year for your organisation, check your employees’ holiday allowance. Do you allow your employees to carry over any untaken holiday from the previous year, in which case does their entitlement reflect this? Have you accounted for the extra bank holiday this year? Do your staff receive additional leave for their length of service?
   If you need help managing holiday entitlement for your team, ask us about Breathe. Breathe is a secure cloud based HR admin system that, amongst it’s many features, offers an easy to use system for requesting and responding to leave requests and tracking employee leave.  We can offer you a free 14 day trial so you can experience the benefits for yourself.
2. Review your Employee Handbook, Policies and Procedures and employee contracts – Carry out an annual review and check nothing needs to be altered in line with best practice and your company’s ways of working. COVID-19 has affected the way we all work and the current economic climate means business needs could change at any time. In light of this, do your policies cover everything they need to?  We offer a free HR audit where we can check this for you and make recommendations to ensure your documents and policies are not just fit for purpose, but actually reflect your your business needs.  Arrange your free audit today.
3. File your paperwork straightaway – a simple action that could save a lot of time and hassle in future, not to mention helping to ensure you’re not breaching any data protection regulations by leaving personal data unsecured.  If you haven’t already, consider transferring your HR admin and employee files to an online system for improved access, security and confidentiality. BreatheHR is a great tool to manage all aspects of HR admin, including sickness & absence and performance management.
4. Start monitoring employee sickness absence more effectively.  Sickness absence can have a major impact on your team and their performance.  If you’re not keeping on top of how long and how often people are off sick, then you won’t be in a good position to deal with it and prevent it damaging your business.  Read our resource for useful information on managing sickness leave.
5. Make employee well-being and mental health a priority in your business. Check in on your team, especially when you can’t see them in person as often. Taking good care of your employees can have real positive implications for team retention and productivity.
   Offering access to an award-winning Employee Assistance Programme, such as Health Assured, one way to support your employees’ well-being. Ensuring you have a Mental Health First Aider in your workplace is another important way to show you take your employees’ mental wellbeing seriously.  Our Supervising Mental Health First Aid courses run throughout the year – book your places today.
6. Re-evaluate the employee benefits you offer. Offering a long list of benefits might seem a positive thing, particularly when you are recruiting, but do you actually offer real value? Find out which existing benefits your team actually use and ask what else they might like. Be an employer of choice with some really stand out benefits!
   If you don’t already offer an employee health plan, talk to us about Simplyhealth.
7. On the subject of recruitment, save yourself time and money this year and consider using a recruitment specialist, such as Marta here at Pure Human Resources. She can help you reach more of the best candidates and save you time in the process – all for a fixed fee so there are no hidden surprises helping you plan your recruitment budget better.
8. Identify the training needs of your employees now and this will help you work out and stick to your training budget for the year. We offer a wide variety of people management and personal development training courses throughout the year. Browse our training calendar and secure your places booked.
9. Refresh your internal communication plan. Consider how you keep your employees informed about what is going on within the business. Think about who has responsibility for internal communication, how often you need to communicate and whether what you’re communicating is engaged with, understood and valued.
   Don’t have an internal communication plan? Guess what – we can help with that too!
10. Finally, if you feel your HR provision could benefit from a bit more than a few habit changes to ensure it fits your overall business strategy, but don’t know where to start, it’s time to call in the experts!  Let us know your HR challenges and find out how we can support you with any HR needs – however big or small – get your year off to the best possible start.