Canadian HR Reporter

CanaDian hr reporTer november 3, 2014 InsIGhT 23 Sensibly preparing for Ebola virus e recent ebola outbreak should remind employers they are required to provide a workplace free from recognized haz- ards. employers need to create and implement policies and procedures to protect employees while minimizing impacts on normal business activities. In addition to having substantive business continuity plans, em- ployers should have up-to-date policies relating to workplace safety specific to the epidemic or pandemic in question. Employers' policies should be tweaked on a case-by-case basis, taking into account factors such as the manner of transmission, whether a vaccine exists and mor- tality rates. In addition to specific considerations, there are a num- ber of contentious issues that al- ways need to be addressed. Human rights discrimination An employer has to tread carefully when taking precautions such as excluding certain employees from the workplace. Measures should only be taken based on hard sci- entific facts from a credible health authority. If Ebola was to spread to Can- ada, employers should only ex- clude employees who have been to West Africa or otherwise have been exposed to patients who are contagious. During the SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) scare in 2002-03, some employers attempt- ed to exclude certain employees of Asian origin. Exclusions not based on scientific facts, directed toward a particular race, would likely constitute racial profiling, which is prohibited under Canadian hu- man rights legislation. Leaves and telecommuting During the SARS outbreak, it was unclear whether quarantined employees, or employees who only came into work sporadically, were eligible for paid or unpaid leave. Employers had to consider whether leave should qualify as emergency leave, unpaid sick leave or a temporary layoff. ere was massive confusion. Ultimately, the Ontario gov- ernment passed legislation to ad- dress emergency leave provisions for SARS-related work absences. Employment insurance regula- tions requiring medical certifi- cates were also lifted for SARS as well as the mandated waiting period before claiming benefits. Canadian employment legisla- tion allows employees to refuse work if they believe the work conditions endanger their health and well-being (except for certain workers responsible for public safety). Retaliation against these employees is strictly prohibited. Employers are required to be rea- sonable when it comes to requests made by employees for special protective equipment. e same is true with employees refusing to travel to infected areas. Employee compensation Most employers felt workers who contracted SARS should be eligi- ble for sick benefits. ere was de- bate on whether employers were required to pay those who entered quarantine as a precaution but were not actually sick. ere were also questions regarding whether employees who voluntarily quar- antined themselves due to fear of exposure were entitled to be paid. In many cases, employers elect- ed to pay employees in all three categories, regardless of legal obligations. Medical certificates It may be impractical to require a medical certificate to justify a leave of absence or benefits. For example, access to hospitals may be limited, clinics may be over- whelmed and the availability of tests may be challenged. Employ- ers may need to establish alter- native means of proof, including questionnaires or telephone inter- views, to validate absences. Employee privacy e privacy of health-related in- formation is well-established in Canada. Employers are in a quan- dary, however, when they become aware an employee has been or may be infected — or exposed. In general, while the individual has a right to privacy, the state may temporarily suspend this right in the case of serious public health risks. A related question is whether an employer can require an employee who is asymptomat- ic to undergo a physical exam. e answer appears to be yes, for the same reasons expressed above. As to when exactly the public good overshadows individual pri- vacy rights, the answer must be determined case by case. Disability coverage Perhaps surprisingly, quarantines are not always covered in short- term disability (STD) plans. Plans are strictly interpreted so they often fall outside the scope of the plan. In the absence of coverage, employers have often stepped into the lurch and extended STD cov- erage to quarantined employees. An employee who suffers an in- jury or illness in the course of her employment is entitled to work- ers' compensation coverage, in- cluding medical care and income replacement. is generally cov- ers employees who are exposed not only in their home province but also while travelling. Duty to provide a safe workplace So, does an employer increase its liability by providing health ad- vice to employees in the form of a policy, or is the employer better off not having a policy? Failing to provide a contagious illness policy likely exposes an employer to greater risk of violat- ing its duty to provide a safe work- place, or arguably to a class-action suit for negligence. Best practice is to make health advisories avail- able to employees sans interpreta- tion, and to provide updates. Contagious illness policies need to be all-encompassing. It may be prudent for employers to have a generic template ready and a specific policy created and imple- mented on a case-by-case basis. Renato Pontello is legal counsel to So- lantro Semiconductor in Ottawa. He can be reached at renatopontello@aol. com. is article originally appeared in Canadian Lawyer, a sister publica- tion to Canadian HR Reporter. renato pontello Guest Commentary Advantages to integrated HRMS Question: My organization uses payroll and hr from one of the big payroll pro- cessing firms. we also use specialized performance management software. now we are thinking about applicant tracking and maybe a learning man- agement system as well, and we would like to have employees and manag- ers access the data. we are looking at specialized systems but it has been suggested we should get one comprehensive system. are there advantages to one integrated hr system? answer: An organization's needs for information management systems evolve, usually in a de- layed parallel with the growth of the organization; growth in size, complexity and over time. HR (and usually management as a whole) tires of merely having a data bucket and begins to want more information, and then more integrated information. e ten- dency is to acquire targeted func- tional systems — applicant track- ing, for example — to meet a very specific problem. And many HR organizations go through an evolution in computer systems. ey begin with a payroll service and as HR needs develop, they get various HR functional- ities from the same vendor and use Word or Excel files to com- pensate for missing pieces. There is no order to the ac- quisition of these systems; it is a response to whatever the organi- zation's hot spot may be. It could be staffing issues that generate the purchase of an applicant manage- ment system. So, what happens? Whether the hot spot is resolved or not, the or- ganization tends to move on, with the rationale: "We recognized a problem, we acted to resolve it, it is better (though not as good as we needed) but, instead of continuing to work on it, we have a more im- mediate problem." And that could be a training is- sue that triggers buying a learning management system. Or the deci- sion to begin a more formal per- formance appraisal process leads to licensing a performance man- agement system. And through all of those system additions, payroll continues to use the existing pay- roll provider. The problem with this ap- proach is it touches on periodic functional/operational hot spots instead of considering the hu- man resource management in- formation needs of the entire organization. Yes, there are ter- rific specialty software products out there, and functional HR staff (like staffing or training) want the best tool they can get to help them solve their problems. So what's wrong with that? Lots. HR data should be managed in an integrated manner. It should be collected once, as close to source as possible, and then managed to ensure it is made available as re- quired within a strong framework that ensures privacy and security. If it is not, imagine the chaos that will lead to a lot of duplication and critical gaps. What are the busi- ness risks of bad, missing or con- tradictory data? How does that happen when your organization is operating multiple HR systems, each tar- geting a different functional area? ere will be considerable data duplication that raises the awk- ward question of which data is right, wrong or most current. IT can manage the technical inter- faces of one system to another, to another, to another — but the cost of staying on top of several soft- ware packages, all with their own schedules for updates and bug fixes and testing, is far more ex- pensive than you might imagine. Worse, it is not just the technol- ogy that has to be managed. e data should be managed in an in- tegrated manner. Who is respon- sible for that? e functional sub- ject matter experts (SMEs). And who are the SMEs? Well, staffing would be the primary SME for a staffing system, but the data needs to integrate with each of the learning/performance/benefits/ compensation/health and safety/ labour relations systems. Oh, and with the payroll system too. Do all of these systems define each data element the same way? What does "shift" mean? Or "work day"? Or "a date"? And all of those functional links have to be tested by the SMEs. en there are those endless blame-pointing emails/phone calls/meetings where one ven- dor's customer support hotline points at another vendor's prod- uct as the culprit, and so on. One vendor means one tech- nological approach. It means one planned set of updates/bug fixes/ new version releases. It means a common data dictionary. It means one database (or at least it should). It means one set of security rules/ profiles for users. It means one help desk. It means one contract and service-level agreement in- stead of three or five or more. en why don't organizations jump into buying integrated HR systems such as a human resource management system (HRMS)? Acquiring it all costs more than getting pieces one bit at a time. It takes more co-ordination and co- operation (and may mean a loss of control). Many people worry it means they will be forced to compromise their requirements for other functional areas. It will take longer to select a new system. It will take longer and be compli- cated to implement it. (I'm sure there are more reasons.) Let's consider these objections: It costs more than a piece at a time: True. But add up the cost of all the pieces and, more importantly, the costs of func- tional and technical management (interfaces) and support and the larger investment will pay off. If the organization can't afford it, there are creative solutions. It requires more co-ordi- nation/co-operation and less control: Yes. But you should be managing the data in a co-ordi- nated fashion anyway. Control? It shouldn't be about that. Data and information should an organiza- tion-wide asset. It forces you to compromise: Maybe, but doubtful. Most good, integrated HRMS offer all of the functionality to be found in spe- cialty functional packages. And if something really needed isn't there, the vendor can add it. It requires more time to se- lect: Yes, again. But what a great opportunity — to sit together and consider the integration of the data and information require- ments of HR (and payroll and time management). And it will take a lot less effort than working to re- solve systems and data conflicts arising from multiple systems. It requires more time and effort to implement: Yup. And worth every dollar and minute. If a critical business deadline requires some piece first, work it out. In summary, unless the orga- nization has serious cash flow issues, take the integrated route. e final result will cost less and offer far more in integrated data and reliable, actionable informa- tion about your HR. Ian Turnbull is managing director of Laird & Greer Management Group in Toronto, specializing in HR, payroll and time system selection and man- agement. He is the author of the HR Manager's Guide to Managing Infor- mation Systems (Carswell 2014). He can be reached at iturnbull@laird andgreer.com or (416) 618-0052. Ian Turnbull Toughest hr Question

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