We were officially discussing this post, My Co-Worker Gave Me a $1000 Present, but I also shared a story from my days when I was laying people off.

We laid off an executive. True layoff–he’d done nothing wrong–his position had been eliminated. He’d been with the company a long time and was highly paid (his salary was more than twice my full-time equivalent salary and I was well compensated), and he was entitled to at least a year’s worth of severance. (It could have been more–it’s been a while.) All he had to do was sign the general release and he’d get his severance. Easy-peasy.

Now, of course, the general release meant you couldn’t sue for most things so most of the time when people didn’t sign it was because they were suing. My job share partner and I  would follow up with anyone who didn’t sign. We followed up with him, and he still hadn’t signed, so we turned it over to our boss, the in-house attorney.

She followed up with him and came back to us and said that he wasn’t signing because he was so independently wealthy that this much severance would just be a tax headache.

Ahhh, the problems of the wealthy. (Incidentally, that wealth wasn’t from his job. I mean, he was well paid, but not THAT well paid.)

Reader Glenn asked me if I followed up with everyone who didn’t sign, and the answer was yes. I did. Which is saying something because I hate phone calls so so so much. But here’s why:

1. My main goal was to help people move on with their lives. Honestly. Getting laid off really sucks and sometimes it puts you into a state of depression where you can’t do anything. I didn’t want anyone to miss a deadline and miss out on their severance, which could be financially devastating. Sometimes people just needed a reminder to get their release in so that they could receive their severance.
2. My secondary goal was to protect the company from lawsuits. Yes, this probably should have been my primary goal, but it wasn’t. If someone hadn’t signed because they wanted to sue, I wanted to know as soon as possible so so that we could resolve any concerns they had. Sometimes this was as simple as verifying what would be said in a reference check. (We actually had what would be said in the paperwork, but people don’t always read it all.) Sometimes they had a real concern that we would turn over to the HR business partner to help resolve. Sometimes this resulted in a slight change to their release so that they could get their severance and move on with their lives. Every once in a great while it resulted in conferences between our attorney and their attorney, but not one of the over 4000 people I helped lay off ever took us to court.
3. My tertiary goal was to get everything done and checked off so it wouldn’t show up as a task to do in my database. That would drive me insane.

Now, most people signed within a couple of days and we had no problems. The severance packages the company gave were generous and fair and the general release was straightforward and didn’t have any tricky things in it. We wrote it to make it as understandable as possible for the average person, although we encouraged everyone to take the release to their own attorney before signing.

While layoffs are devastating and terrible for most people (but not all), I’m proud of the work I did in this job. I worked for a great company with great people and we really did care about helping people get on their feet. Almost all of them had new jobs before their extended health care benefits ran out, so our methods worked.

The take away from this is that I truly believe, when you’re dealing with a layoff, you should focus on helping the person land a new job and make a new start. It’s certainly not a legal obligation, but I feel like, when all possible, it’s a moral one.

The post Why I Always Followed up with People Who Didn’t Sign Severance Papers (General Releases) appeared first on Improve Your HR.

Actually, everyone leaves the corridor at around 3:30 to 4:00pm daily. I am the only one left and yes I have left sometimes 10-15 minutes earlier than my shift ends which is at 5:30, but my supervisor asked that I take leave for the time I left early, which I declined because on my I am “EXEMPT.” She then docked 1.75 hours of annual leave. Can she do this?

Yep. She absolutely can. You were taking time off. And employees have zero expectation of privacy at the office. Although, I doubt that your supervisor is reviewing the security footage every night in the hopes of catching you leave early.

Now, let’s talk about the shoulds here and what I suspect is really going on. Everyone else leaves by 4:00 and you’re supposed to be there until 5:30. I’m guessing this is because your boss needs to have someone at the office until 5:30 and it’s you. That’s your job.

Being exempt doesn’t mean you aren’t subject to schedules. Think about it from the view of a grocery store manager. A manager always has to be on staff so of course you have to schedule. One manager can’t just say, “Hey, I’m exempt! I’m leaving!” She has to get someone to cover for her.

Now, your supervisor gets a gold star for not attempting to dock your pay, as that is illegal. She may or may not get a gold star for getting mad at you for leaving 15 minutes early from time to time. That depends on several things–if coverage is important, if you’re a high performer, if you are regularly working less than the expected amount, and if she’s talked to you about this before. Legally, none of this matters. A boss can determine working hours, even for an exempt employee. But, if you are a high performer and coverage isn’t critical, then your boss is a weenie. Yes, she’s a weenie even if you regularly put in less than 40 hours as long as you’re accomplishing everything at a very high level.

Now, of course, if you are regularly finishing your work long before 40 hours is up, you need to report this to your boss along with a list of suggestions for how you can expand your role.

So, what should you do? Apologize to your boss. Work the hours that she expects you to work, and if you need to leave early some day, ask her permission. No, I don’t think managers should have their vacation time docked for leaving 15 minutes early, but since you were trying to sneak out, that makes a difference.

The post Exempt: That Word Does Not Mean What You Think It Means appeared first on Improve Your HR.