Your staff handbook

At Rus­sell & Rus­sell we can advise busi­ness own­ers in the Lanark­shire area on many of the issues you face. Here are some point­ers for what should be in your staff hand­book…

Lengthy employ­ment con­tracts, con­tain­ing a huge amount of detailed infor­ma­tion about terms and con­di­tions, enti­tle­ments and pro­ce­dures, are increas­ing­ly being replaced by short spe­cif­ic con­tracts and staff hand­books con­tain­ing all the details of the mat­ters apply­ing to the whole work­force.

This sim­pli­fied arrange­ment can be to the advan­tage of both employ­er and employ­ee — here, we look at the rea­sons for prepar­ing an employ­ee hand­book, and some of the things you should put in it.

Why should I have one?

A hand­book is an effec­tive way of com­mu­ni­cat­ing infor­ma­tion about your com­pa­ny. It is good prac­tice to be able to offer new staff a well writ­ten, com­pre­hen­sive guide to your com­pa­ny’s rules, pro­ce­dures and employ­ment poli­cies.  Not only does this pro­mote good staff rela­tions but it can also act as a train­ing aid and save man­age­ment time, because employ­ees know where to look for rel­e­vant infor­ma­tion rather than hav­ing to ask.

You can also use the hand­book to ful­fill your oblig­a­tion to sup­ply writ­ten infor­ma­tion about basic terms and con­di­tions of employ­ment, although if you do this, it is essen­tial to make clear which parts of the hand­book are con­trac­tu­al. If items con­tained in the hand­book form part of a con­tract of employ­ment, ref­er­ence to the hand­book should be made in the state­ment signed by the employ­ee.

What should be in it?

A good staff hand­book might con­tain the fol­low­ing ele­ments:

Com­pa­ny infor­ma­tion

This might include an expla­na­tion of the nature of the busi­ness, its objec­tives and his­to­ry. You could also add a wel­com­ing note to new staff from the Man­ag­ing Direc­tor.

Terms and con­di­tions of employ­ment

Include infor­ma­tion about salaries, hours of work, over­time, hol­i­days, sick­ness, com­pa­ny cars, fringe ben­e­fits, parental leave and pen­sion plans.

Dis­ci­pli­nary pro­ce­dures

Explain the com­pa­ny’s poli­cies on time keep­ing, dress, inter­net use, smok­ing, dis­crim­i­na­tion and so on. Describe pro­ce­dures for dis­ci­pline and for employ­ee griev­ances.

Gen­er­al and spe­cif­ic com­pa­ny poli­cies

As well as explain­ing your stance on gen­er­al issues such as health and safe­ty, data pro­tec­tion and train­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties, include a guide to your spe­cif­ic do’s and don’ts in areas like park­ing and employ­ee’s per­son­al use of com­pa­ny equip­ment.

If you are in the Lanark­shire area and are look­ing for sup­port and advice from a team of pro­fes­sion­al accoun­tants and busi­ness advis­ers, con­tact Rus­sell & Rus­sell.