Canadian HR Reporter

CANADIAN HR REPORTER April 3, 2017 INSIGHT 19 Do workers have to take laptops home? Employers should set boundaries to avoid any potential overtime claims Question: Can an employer require all em- ployees to take their laptop computers home with them every day so they always have access to their work in case they're unable to come in? Answer: It is now commonplace for employees to have access to their work email on smartphones and other devices, allowing them to be "connected at all times." While these devices make it con- venient for employees to work al- most anywhere, it can be diffi cult to set boundaries regarding when the workday truly ends. e same concerns arise when asking an employee to bring other work devices home with them, such as a laptop. Asking an em- ployee to take her work laptop home each day is not, in itself, problematic. However, employers must be very careful to clearly de- fi ne their expectations — particu- larly regarding availability to work outside of regular hours — or they may be exposed to signifi cant le- gal liability and additional costs. For example, the Ontario Em- ployment Standards Act, 2000 (ESA) stipulates that any employ- ee who is not a manager, super- visor or in another exempt posi- tion is entitled to overtime pay for hours worked in a week that exceed 44 hours. If an employee is continuing to work outside of regular hours, he may quickly become entitled to significant amounts of overtime pay. In this case, an employer may have no way to track the over- time hours being worked by the employee. If the employee sub- sequently makes a claim for over- time, the employer would have little or no ability to refute the alle- gations (though email records can be quite helpful in this context). Additionally, an employee who is consistently working in the evenings or on weekends may not be getting the required hours free from work, and may be working well in excess of the daily or weekly limits established by employment standards legis- lation. When employees do not have proper rest periods between workdays or at the end of a work week, they are more likely to be- come overwhelmed or drained. Furthermore, the stress and pressure of having to be constant- ly available can have a signifi cant negative impact on an employee's emotional, mental and physical health and, in the worst case, give rise to claims of harassment or a toxic work environment. To combat these risks, employ- ers — especially those that want employees to have access to de- vices and laptops outside of regu- lar working hours — should have workplace policies in place that clearly set out limits and expec- tations with respect to working outside of regular hours, or away from the workplace. And, of course, they should en- sure all managers are aware of the policy; a policy that says employ- ees are not to check email after 6 p.m. is meaningless if a supervi- sor routinely emails subordinates in the evening and expects a response. Stuart Rudner is a founding partner of Rudner MacDonald, a Toronto- based employment law fi rm. He is the author of You're Fired: Just Cause for Dismissal in Canada, published by Carswell, a omson Reuters busi- ness. He can be reached at srudner@ rudnermacdonald.com. is article was co-written by Brittany Taylor, an associate at Rudner MacDonald. Stuart Rudner TOUgHeST HR QUeSTiON The stress and pressure of having to be available can have a negative impact on employees' mental health. Do workers have to take laptops home? Employers should set boundaries to avoid any potential overtime claims The never-ending debate about HR Moving from traditional HR to 'employee experience thinking' will be a challenge e never-ending debate about the future of human resources continues to take major twists and turns, with companies all over the world opting to introduce employee experience approaches as a tonic for engagement, talent and productivity challenges and as the primary long- term method to produce leading organizations. So why exactly have organiza- tions such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Airbnb, Cisco, Ralph Lauren, Nike, Orange, GE and Adobe started to move away from traditional HR and embraced this "workplace as an experience" movement? And why are so many others also pio- neering and championing employ- ee experience rather than HR? is debate is not new within HR. It seems as though there has been an epic rap battle between the two sides. en, of course, there are the observers in the middle, who are simply waiting for a seminal mo- ment or announcement of who won before they quickly go about implementing the next model as soon as they have attended the relevant conference or workshop. Others, though, don't wait. ey get on with creating a brand of HR suited to and built within their business and context, and it makes a huge diff erence to busi- ness performance. is is refl ected across the busi- ness world. While HR is being el- evated to the top table at some or- ganizations — the CEO's number- two person in some cases — other companies are downgrading HR to an administration function, with organizational development in its own right taking the strate- gic spot or being fused with HR in some fashion. Training and learning and de- velopment also come into play in what is a mixed bag of approaches. e range of titles, services and functions varies, but it is all chip- ping away at the same challenge. In recent years, the ideas pre- sented by Ram Charan, business advisor and author, in his 2014 proposal on splitting HR, and the subsequent response by Josh Ber- sin, founder and principal at Bersin by Deloitte, partially indicate what has been playing out in the profes- sion for way too long — although both colleagues present good and valid points. In his 2015 article "People Be- fore Strategy: A New Role for the CHRO," Charan returned with Dominic Barton, global manag- ing director of McKinsey & Co., and Dennis Carey, of Korn/Ferry International, to present a view that re-evaluates the chief HR role. ere continues to be fi erce resistance to established models of HR, which adds some weight to the argument HR needs rebrand- ing and a renewed focus. Quite frankly, the debate has tended to be circular. What's more interesting, though, is the extent to which it has been — and con- tinues to be — driven from within the profession, which has only made the very real gripes against HR stronger. Does this suggest an identity crisis within HR? Perhaps, but maybe the field is also getting restless, as our many practitio- ners and colleagues know they are ready to play more instrumental roles within organizations in what is quickly becoming a more mean- ingful economy. The best HR leaders I know have been labelled as mavericks at one time or another, because they build something that goes against the norm, they challenge the status quo, and they extend well beyond the perceived limita- tions of their function. ey bring meaning to the workplace and it runs through everything that af- fects people. e other thing they do have is a clear mandate from the top to create the best employee ex- perience possible, which is a big advantage, as Laszlo Bock (for- mer vice-president of people op- erations at Google), Libby Sartain (former vice-president of people at Yahoo/Southwest Airlines), and others such as Airbnb's glob- al head of employee experience, Mark Levy, would vouch for. I'm an optimist but I'm cer- tainly not alone in thinking that HR and organizations are on the verge of a major moment in their history together. In fact, it's hap- pening already. As a timely example, I co-host- ed a development session for HR and experience professionals in London, U.K., recently with Levy. His approach combines the tradi- tional HR functions of recruiting and talent development with mar- keting, real estate, facilities, social responsibility and communica- tions. His view is that "organizing around the end-to-end employee journey is the best way to provide an integrated and thoughtful ap- proach to all aspects of your team." at's quite a platform, but that's not the HR success story here. What is clear is that this move quite visibly positions the em- ployee experience as critical to the business. is is absolutely right, in my view, and gives practitioners the confi dence and belief to know HR is no longer a support func- tion within the business because the employee experience, to a large extent, is the business. I can see the repercussions now in how we develop, grow and ac- credit HR people within our pro- fession. It is the employee experi- ence that is the clear winner, and as an HR guy, I like what this says about the future workplace once other sectors start catching up. And they will. ere is no question the transi- tion from HR to employee experi- ence thinking will be a challenge for companies. Instead of asking why they are changing their focus, I think the bigger question is: Why it is taking so long for employers to act on the basic truth that it is employees who deliver the value to customers and keep them com- ing back for more? But not every company sees it that way. And not every compa- ny has a CEO like Brian Chesky (Airbnb), Larry Page (Alphabet), Jeff Weiner (LinkedIn) or Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook), all of whom are enjoying through-the- roof approval ratings alongside top employer rankings, largely delivered by people-centric ap- proaches and wholehearted support of creating leading, for- ward-thinking and progressive workplaces. at people thing? ey take it very seriously because in this econ- omy, they both want to and have to. It is critical to their success. It's not all about the tech fi rms, and employee experience is not all about perks, which is a recurring theme when citing great work- places and their impact on pro- ductivity and performance. It's actually about creating meaning- ful experiences within work and meaningful organizations. at being said, how easy would it be for you to follow these organi- zations in creating a function dedi- cated to the employee experience that brings together multiple func- tions (or silos, if they are starting to hinder collective progress) that all play a major organizational role, in order to align them all and drive your business forward? If you're at the top of the pile, it's easy, right? If you're an HR prac- titioner or a middle manager, it's potentially not so easy, as you'll need to work your ideas up and across the chain. Focusing on the employee experience appears to be common sense but it isn't com- monly applied, and even where it is, there are inevitable challenges within the status quo. Is it easy to refocus HR on the whole employee experience? Maybe, maybe not. But for the HR profession and organizations in general, the journey is going to be well worth it. Ben Whitter is the CEO and Founder of the World Employee Experience Institute. For more information, visit www.benwhitter.com or www. worldeeinstitute.com. e never-ending debate about the future of human resources continues to take major twists and turns, with companies all over the world opting to introduce employee experience approaches as a tonic for engagement, talent and productivity challenges and as the primary long- term method to produce leading Ben Whitter GUeST COMMeNTaRY HR and organizations are verging on a major moment in their history together.

• Cover