• Develop a clear and concise written policy against sexual and other harassment. Don’t attempt to write this on your own. A good labor attorney or human resources consultant will be sure that your policy is up-to-date and comprehensive.

• Roll out your harassment policy at a mandatory employee meeting and emphasize your commitment to eliminate such behavior in your organization.

• Conduct employee trainings that clearly explain the prohibited behaviors and the penalties that will result if they occur.

• Conduct supervisor trainings stressing the need to be vigilant in recognizing and stopping harassment.

You’ll need to be sensitive to the “bear traps” that frequently ensnare even the most well-intentioned business owner. These can be avoided by:

• Realizing and emphasizing in your trainings that sexual harassment isn’t limited to the way men treat women. All too often, the concept of “same-gender sexual harassment” isn’t explained and your employees (and supervisors!) may be left with the idea that as long as we’re all of the same gender, anything goes! But in 1998 the United States Supreme Court (Oncale vs. Sundowner Offshore Services) ruled that the humiliating behaviors that Joseph Oncale suffered at the hands of his fellow male employees wasn’t “just male horseplay” as the men and their supervisors claimed, but was indeed same-gender sexual harassment.

• Educating your supervisors to realize that smiling faces aren’t the determining factor. Victims often laugh along with their tormentors to mask the embarrassment and degradation they truly feel. Supervisors must step in and squelch the behavior regardless of the levity in the room. Many a court case has been lost because a supervisor “failed to take action.”

• By addressing allegations of harassment in a timely fashion. Postponing your investigation for days or weeks makes it appear that you are minimizing the situation. Most employers invoke the “two-hour” rule; i.e., if a formal allegation of abuse or harassment comes to your attention, take steps to initiate an investigation within two hours.

• Realizing that your employees can suffer harassment at the hands of customers and vendors as well as from co-workers. Even your best customer must be told to desist when they have crossed the line. Remember that when vendors or clinicians are performing work at your facility, protecting them from harassment while on-site becomes your responsibility!

• Ensure that victims and witnesses are protected from retaliation and intimidation during and after your investigation

By taking the necessary steps to prevent sexual and other harassment in your workplace, you’ll not only save time, money and your business’s reputation – you’ll also demonstrate to your employees that their dignity, self-respect and security is important to you.

• 24 hour, 365 day per year direct access to counseling and referrals by masters and doctoral level professional counselors via a toll-free telephonic service
• A countrywide network of professional counselors who are readily accessible within minutes of your employees' homes and job sites.
• Between three and six cost-free outpatient visits per distinct presenting problem.
• Cost-free coverage that extends to members of the immediate family, life partners, and dependent children up to 23 years of age.
• Drug-free workplace programs that include components for both supervisors and employees, and that include awareness programs, consultation, and supervisor training.
• Legal consultations for any legal issues unrelated to work.
• Financial counseling including debt restructuring, credit problems, and financial and retirement planning.
• A work-life component that addresses childcare, eldercare, and other family challenges that can affect job performance and productivity.
• Supervisory trainings in compliance issues such as EEOC rules, workplace sexual harassment, workplace violence prevention, etc.
• On-line trainings and compliance information for supervisors.
• On-line information and help for employee members.
• Crisis management programs that include workplace violence awareness and prevention training.
• On-site post-traumatic stress assistance and debriefings.
• Monthly statistical utilization reports.
• Employee awareness materials, including initial orientation materials, website access, and monthly EAP newsletters.
• An administrative referral process for effectively correcting job-related behaviors.
• Supervisory consultations to discuss the best practice approaches to employee behaviors and group dynamics.
• A "hold harmless" clause that completely shields the employer from any and all charges stemming from EAP actions or referrals.
• A comprehensive quality assurance program.
• Privacy and confidentiality standards, including compliance with the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA).

• Check the credentials and experience of principals and professional staff. Are the counselors trained and credentialed? Do they hold advanced degrees?
• Make sure that experienced counselors will be staffing the phone line and accessible.
• Check the knowledge and experience specifically related to workers compensation and disability issues.
• Learn the scope of the program’s network — what services will be provided directly by staff (internal) versus services contracted to outside firms?
• Ask for references from current clients and check for any satisfaction surveys. Ask about client retention rates.

While many were stunned by Seau's death, some had seen troubling signs in Seau's behavior in recent years... an arrest for domestic abuse, an accident where his car went over a cliff.

This inevitably raises the question of head injuries, concussions, and traumatic brain injury. These injuries often do not come into full evidence until years after the helmet is retired. The progression includes anger, stress, relationship problems, memory loss, personality change and dementia.

"Dr. Robert Cantu, of Boston University’s Center for the Study of Traumatic Encephalopathy, raised the possibility that Seau might be suffering from the disease during an interview with the Buffalo News a year ago, after the retired player’s car accident. Now, the sport of football must find out for sure. Seau may well have spared his brain for that purpose."

Both Seau and Duerson are dramatic examples calling attention to a problem. Many other retired players have lesser known problems playing out in depression, substance abuse, life-threatening weight problems, and the ravages of old injuries. Certainly, player safety is something that the sport and we as a society need to examine.

Seau's death is a public example of the the tragedy of suicide and the pain that it inflicts on survivors. Every day, about 89 people commit suicide, and few of those deaths command headlines. Suicide is common among people who are clinically depressed - an issue we discussed recently in our post about Mike Wallace's battle with depression leading to a suicide attempt. Depression is treatable and treatment is quite effective, but it often requires intervention by a loved one for the person to get help.

You don't have to play professional sports to suffer a traumatic brain injuries. Many of our military returning from Iraq and Afghanistan have TBI; car crash and fall victims often suffer TBI. For more on preventing, treating and living with traumatic brain injury, see Brainline - here's a handy topic list, which includes sports injuries.

See also:
The secret men won't admit
Celebrity suicides highlight the heavy toll of depression

A special focus of the month is also on raising the awareness of trauma and how, left untreated, it can have a devastating impact on physical, emotional, and mental well-being. Trauma can be defined as having lived through threatening events or Witnessing terrible things happening to others. It might include any of the following:

• Interpersonal violence – such as abuse, rape, domestic violence, and bullying
• Social violence — such as war, terrorism, and living under oppressive political regimes
• Natural disasters and accidents — such as hurricanes, floods, earthquakes, tornadoes, and auto crashes
• Serving in combat
• Chronic social stressors – such as racism, sexism, poverty, humiliation and cultural dislocation
• Childhood trauma - including physical, emotional and sexual abuse; emotional and physical neglect; a parent who’s an alcoholic or addicted to other drugs; a mother who’s been battered; a family member in prison or diagnosed with mental illness; and a loss of a parent through divorce or abandonment

Download tool kits for Do More for 1in4 or Healing Trauma's Invisible Wounds.

Women's Health Week
May 13-19 marks Women's Health Week, when women are urged to take care of themselves. So often, women are the caretakers and may put their own well being on the back burner. During this week, women are urged to:

• Visit a health care professional to receive regular checkups and preventive screenings
• Get active and eat healthy
• Pay attention to mental health, including getting enough sleep and managing stress
• Avoid unhealthy behaviors, such as smoking and not wearing a seat belt or bicycle helmet

May 14th is designated as National Women's Checkup Day for early detection of heart disease, diabetes, cancer, mental health illnesses, sexually transmitted infections, and other conditions.

Other May health observances
Some of the other areas of health and wellness that are observed in the month of May below. There are many more health observances in May, but we focused on ones that have tools or information that could be used in your wellness programs.

All month:

• Arthritis Awareness Month
• Better Hearing & Speech Month
• Healthy Vision Month
• Lupus Awareness Month
• Melanoma/Skin Cancer Detection and Prevention Month

Specific days or weeks:
May 18: HIV Vaccine Awareness Day
May 19: Hepatitis Testing Day
may 21-27: Recreational Water Illness and Injury Prevention Week
May 27 to June 2: National Hurricane Preparedness Week
May 30: National Senior Fitness Day
May 31: World No Tobacco Day

New study on the cost of obesity - Obesity now accounts for 21% of healthcare costs - a new Cornell University study finds that obesity costs more than twice what had been previously thought, raising the cost of treating nearly any medical condition: "An obese person incurs medical costs that are $2,741 higher (in 2005 dollars) than if they were not obese, according to the newest study. Nationwide, that translates into $190.2 billion per year, or 20.6 percent of national health expenditures."

Obesity discrimination - Victoria Hospital in Texas instituted a recent policy stating they won't hire very obese workers. Evil HR Lady Suzanne Lucas asks whether it is okay to discriminate against obese workers, offering five reasons why such a policy is misguided. The hospital is basing its hiring guidelines on the Body mass Index and Lucas points out that many health professionals consider the BMI a faulty health metric.

Workplace violence - Recent research by AlliedBarton Services reveals that as many as 1 in 2 U.S. employees report having been exposed to workplace violence. These events included open hostility, abusive language or threats; 28% of responding workers workers reported a violent event or one that can lead to violence happened to them at their current place of employment or they have been personally affected this type of event, and overall, 12% reported witnessing, hearing about or being aware of an incidence of significant physical harm to another person, with 5% having had this happen to them or having been personally affected by this type of incident. The survey also revealed that employers appear reluctant to take aggressive actions when violence occurs. Only 53% took disciplinary actions in response to the reported violence, and even fewer implemented training for employees or supervisors, made changes to the physical environment or revised company policy.
Related: Violence in the workplace often happens on a continuum and the tone is often set at the top. See HR Bartender's post, How To Tell If Your Boss Is a Bully or Just Tough.

Age discrimination - Susan M. Heathfield of About.com Human Resources notes that age discrimination lawsuits are up over 18% - the fastest rising of any lawsuit. People over the age of 40 who have been displaced in the current tough job market have a difficult time finding new work. She asks Do You Discriminate Against Older Workers - Even Subtly?, issuing a reminder that "age discrimination is illegal at any phase of the employment relationship including job postings, job descriptions, interviews, hiring, salaries, job assignments, merit increases, performance management and evaluation, training, disciplinary actions, promotions, demotions, benefits, employment termination, and layoffs." For strategies older job seekers can implement to help expedite a job search, see job search tips for older workers

How to talk to someone who is facing bad news - At KevinMD, physician Kate Land writes about how to handle a conversation when the news is bad. When someone we know faces bad news, the tendency for many well-meaning people is to respond with their own story. That is perhaps better than other all-too-human tendencies, like taking flight or avoidance, or minimizing the event. She suggests we learn to keep things simple and learn to be comfortable with a moment of silence. She also points to an excellent article by Bruce Feiler about Six Things You Should Never Say to a Friend (or Relative or Colleague) Who’s Sick. And Four Things You Can Always Say.

Effective motivation - CEO Greg Lederman notes that the all-too-common carrot-and-stick pathway to motivating employee performance is inefficient, costly, and does not produce the desired results. In What Really Motivates People at Work, he suggests three strategic and simple ways to manage behavior. that will help to increase employee engagement, strengthen the work culture and improve the experience provided to customers.

The high cost of bullying - A New Jersey school will pay $4.2 million in settlement fees for failing to comply with a state anti-bullying law. The school was sued after a middle school student was paralyzed by a punch from another student. The student had repeatedly complained of being bullied. In addition, the perpetrating student had other instances of violent behavior, but this had not been documented or dealt with by the school. While this case represents a settlement rather than a court judgement, it points to the high potential cost that bullying can represent, both in a human toll and an expense to the educational institution.

Cool Tool - Next time you plan a trip, give Google flights a try. Whether you have a specific destination with dates in mind or not, Flight Search can help you quickly find the best options for your trip, including a tool to help you find the cheapest flight and best duration options when you have flexible travel dates. Learn more about this service on the Google Flights support and FAQ page.

More news of note

• What Benefits Are Best Employers Offering?
• The New Workplace Trend: Goof Off to Get Ahead
• 5 Disasters All Leaders Should Experience
• Impact of a Web-Based Worksite Health Promotion Program on Absenteeism
• How to Run a Successful Project
• Creating a safety culture: Prioritizing health & safety yields results
• What Every CEO Needs to Know About HR
• What CEOs Hate About HR People

The big news here isn't the blooper. It's that some employers think using email is an appropriate way to fire people. Call us old-school, but we don't think an important matter like a job termination should be handled by email, phone call, or letter. Unless there are extraordinary and unavoidable circumstances, firing should be a face-to-face meeting -- employees deserve that courtesy. Yet virtual firings do happen, and they happen at all levels of the organization.

In our role as an EAP, we find ourselves working with managers and employees when terminations and downsizings occur. There is no easy way to fire someone, but here's our recommended best practices to ensure that affected employees are afforded the maximum in fairness and dignity.

First, if the termination is based on performance, make sure that the employee has been adequately warned, that warnings have been well documented, and that the employee has been given ample opportunity to rectify the situation. Many employers conduct an administrative referral to their EAP at this stage. Done properly, an administrative referral will resolve and head off more than half of all performance-based terminations. If the termination is part of a downsizing, there should be an announcement ahead of time that layoffs are planned.

If termination is the only solution, whether for performance or for general business reasons, the following steps will prove helpful:

• Schedule the termination meeting early in the day, and during the week; avoid terminating employees right before a holiday or a weekend.
• Have all paperwork ready. The final paycheck and all severance and benefit information need to be delivered at the termination meeting.
• The employee's manager and a representative from HR should attend so that you are able to cover all issues and questions.
• Be brief. Be compassionate. Allow the employee to vent his or her feelings, but do not engage in a negotiation or argument. Plan in advance what you are going to say and choose your words carefully.
• Extend every reasonable courtesy to the employee. Give the person an opportunity to say goodbye to coworkers. Should the employee become angry or abusive, don't get upset, simply escort the worker from the building.
• After all questions are answered and all paperwork completed, wish the person well and help them assemble their belongings and leave.

Firing someone is always a difficult task, but following these basic rules will help it go better. We don't advocate e-mail as a good termination strategy!

But that is not to say that employers aren't mining social media to evaluate job candidates, indeed they are. An article by Gloria Goodale in The Christian Science Monitor talks about other perfectly legal ways that employers access social media profiles, making it "not only unnecessary but unwise for companies to ask for social media passwords."

The article offers this commentary:

“Once you ask for this kind of access, then you are on notice for anything that you might find,” says Todd Taylor, an attorney with Moore & Van Allen who specializes in communication technology. “I would advise against going after information that isn’t already public for the simple reason that if you see something and you don’t act on it, you have the potential issue of a negligent hire down the road.”

But just how are employers actually using Facebook in screening job candidates? In a survey of 2,000 hiring managers and human resource professionals, nearly 37% of the respondents say they use social networking sites to research and screen job candidates. Another 11% said they plan to start, while 15% said that their company prohibits the practice. The survey on the use of social media in hiring practices was conducted by Harris Interactive for CareerBuilder.

Of the social sites, Facebook ranked the highest, at 65%, followed closely by LinkedIn at 63%. Twitter came in at 16%, and other sites at 17%. IT was the industry that relied on social networks the most heavily (52%) and healthcare the least heavily (28%).

34% of those surveyed found material that factored into a decision not to hire a candidate.Some of the most common findings that led to such a decision included:

• Candidate posted provocative/inappropriate photos/info – 49%
• There was info about candidate drinking or using drugs – 45%
• Candidate had poor communication skills – 35%
• Candidate bad mouthed previous employer – 33%
• Candidate made discriminatory comments related to race, gender, religion, etc. – 28%
• Candidate lied about qualifications – 22%

For some of the potential pitfalls and legal minefields, see our prior post Tips for using Facebook (and other social media) in the hiring process. We also recommend the social media posts from two of our favorite employment law blogs: Ohio Employer's Law Blog and Connecticut Employment Law Blog

The Legal Imperative
Depending on the work you perform, you may have reporting obligations under the law. In fact, since the Penn State scandal, several states have or are looking to strengthen reporting obligations. In most states, the following professions have legal obligations to report child maltreatment: social workers, teachers and other school personnel, physicians and other health-care workers, mental health professionals, child care providers, medical examiners or coroners, and law enforcement officers. Other states expand the mandatory reporting obligations to commercial film or photograph processors, substance abuse counselors, probation or parole officers, domestic violence workers, animal control or humane officers, court-appointed special advocates, and clergy.

In more than a third of all states, reporting requirements extend to any person who suspects child abuse or neglect is required to report. See Mandatory Reporters of Child Abuse and Neglect: Summary of State Laws. This is a good guide, but because several state laws are currently under scrutiny, you may want to check with state authorities too.

The Moral Imperative
Regardless of legal obligations, all of us as a society have a moral imperative to protect children. Employers can play a key role in curbing child abuse and domestic violence. HR managers and supervisors are often in a position to spot signs of domestic violence and can often play a critical role in directing the employee to help through referrals to an EAP or other community resource. In the past, the "none of my business" type of thinking often prevailed, but today employers know that problems at home rarely stay at home.

What can an employer do? The following are steps that employers can take to address child abuse:

• Know your state law and your reporting requirements
• Participate in national and local prevention and education efforts
• Donate to a local community prevention organization or sponsor a fundraising activity
• Educate employees about recognizing and reporting child abuse
• Sponsor parenting skills workshops as part of health fairs
• Offer seminars in stress reduction and anger management
• Use your Employee Assistance Program as a resource
• Be a family-friendly employer (see suggestions below)

The Child First Advocacy Center of Vermont offers 10 Things You Can Do To Prevent Child Abuse, steps that any adult or organization can take to support children.

A Coordinated Response to Child Abuse and Neglect: The Foundation for Practice offers primary, secondary, and tertiary prevention approaches that communities can and should take. Among the recommendations for various sectors of society, here are the recommendations for employers:

As the number of parents working outside the home continues to grow, the need increases for workplace policies that support family functioning and promote the prevention of child maltreatment. Family-focused initiatives for the workplace include:

• Flexible work schedules and other "family friendly" policies that help employees to balance the demands of their work and parental commitments;
• Parental leave policies that reduce stress on new parents and help facilitate positive attachments between parents and their infants;
• Employer-supported child care;
• Family-oriented policies that support healthy and humane working conditions and ensure adequate family income;
• Employee assistance programs that can provide information on reducing stress.

Roughly 5% of the population experiences a major depression characterized by helplessness, hopelessness despondency, sleep disturbance, and the inability to enjoy anything. It is described as "the most awful feeling, worse than cancer" and it is frequently accompanied by suicide attempts, a significant aspect of the disease.

The interview segment stresses how vitally important it is for families and close friends to intervene and urge the person who is suffering to get treatment and help. Often, the person who suffers from depression does not have the wherewithal, interest or energy to cope. By the same token, Mary Wallace speaks about the out-of-control feelings, the guilt, and the isolation that a spouse might feel, and stresses that it is important for a family member of a person suffering from depression to also get help.

The key takeaway is whether it is you or a loved one suffering: get help. Depression is treatable and treatment is quite effective, but it often requires the agency of a spouse, friend or family member to intervene. Wallace talks about the incredible feeling of relief from pain when medication took effect. His episodes were in 1982, and he lived 30 years of happy, productive life after getting help.

One of the other important takeaways is to intervene. Many people, like Wallace's physician, have a tendency either to denial "You're OK" or to thinking they can shame ("don't be selfish") or jolly ("come on, cheer up") the person out of it, when that just adds to the burden of hopelessness the person experiences. As supervisors and people managers, if you see someone with a behavioral and performance change, you don't need to diagnose it or treat it -- and you shouldn't try -- you simply need to urge the employee to get help through the EAP.

Learn more:

• Signs of depression
• Depression screening
• Some facts about suicide and depression (PDF)
• National Suicide and Prevention Hotline: Are you in crisis? Call 1-800-273-TALK
• Quickly Treating Employee Depression Helps Workers
• Workplace Tools: The Depression Calculator
• The Secret Men Won't Admit

Did you watch it? Good for you, you show an awesome capacity for leadership! Ta-dah!

How common is employee theft? A pair of articles that recently passed our desk offers some perspective on scope:

Are Your Employees Stealing From You?

"Steven Wolf, the Executive Director at Capstone Advisory Group, says employee theft can involve more than just stolen physical equipment. He has dealt with cases of misappropriated funds, duplicate payments, kickbacks, and re-selling inventory owned by the company.

“The Association of Certified Fraud Examiners (ACFE) estimates that the typical business will lose an average of six percent of revenues from employee theft,” says Wolf, who advises companies to devote more funds to combatting theft in the workplace and developing policies. Employee theft, he says, accounts for one-third of all bankruptcies, according to the US Chamber of Commerce."

Employee theft costs retailers more than shoplifting, organized crime

"Thefts by employees accounted for about 45 percent of retail losses in 2010, according to the National Retail Security Survey. Shoplifting and organized retail crime made up about 31 percent of inventory shrinkage, the accounting term for loss of products between the point of purchase from a supplier and point of sale.

Administrative error accounted for 14 percent of shrinkage, vendor fraud accounted for 4 percent and the remaining 6 percent was attributed to “unknown” error. The shrinkage rate in 2010 was 1.49 percent."

Plugging the hole in the bucket: Preventing theft
We turn to a variety of experts to offer strategies for deterrence.

In writing about how employers are often blind to employee theft, business consultants Mary Goodman and Rich Russakoff offer the following tips:

• Expect it. As Oscar Wilde said, "I can resist anything but temptation." People are human. We're sure your employees are likeable people, but no one is above reproach.
• Make it clear you have a zero-tolerance policy. Whether or not you prosecute criminally is one thing. Continuity of employment will absolutely guarantee continuity of theft. Even more so, it will lower the bar (or open the vault) for every one else in the organization.
• Put in place internal and external checks and balances. Always have a second set of eyes -- both inside and outside the company -- checking your numbers.
• Know your margins. We can't stress this enough. Know what your margins should be, and if they're shrinking, find out why.

In Human Resource Executive, employment law attorneys discuss HR's role in curbing employee theft. They suggest that the first line of defense is at hiring and conducting background checks. They also discuss the importance of an employer creating "a perception of detection" - and offer suggestions of controls that can be put in place, from policies to audits, job rotations, and employee education.

In discussing the topic of employee theft during the holiday season a few years back. post on the topic of theft, John Hyman of Ohio Employer's Law Blog offered a sensible five-point attack for deterring employee theft. You should red the entire plan, it is simple and direct - but we offer the broad bullet points here:

• Communicate: Employees need to know that theft of any nature and in any amount simply will not be tolerated.
• Investigate: Proper investigation requires having the tools in place to detect theft or fraud and acting swiftly when misconduct is discovered.
• Document: Once a theft is detected, a company has to act swiftly to complete a full investigation. This investigation includes interviewing any potential witnesses and gathering all necessary documents to support to a case against the employee.
• Terminate: No other form or discipline should be an option. Theft is a serious offense. It represents a total breakdown of trust between a company and an employee.
• Litigate: Employers have two choices – filing a civil lawsuit to recover the stolen funds or property, or seeking criminal prosecution ... litigation will not be appropriate in all cases of employee theft.

In a prior post here on HR Web Cafe, we discussed one employer's creative solution to deterring theft, which included such strategies as building an "equipment lending library" and offering amnesty programs.

In that post, we noted that:

Our experience shows time and again that employers who communicate often and well with their employees and who work diligently to maintain a healthy work culture experience fewer workplace behavioral problems than their mistrusting, suspicious counterparts. Keep things in perspective. Dishonest employees are in the minority so don't cast a pall of suspicion over everyone. Set the policy and the expectation, ensure that risk control measures are in place, and be fair and consistent in the way policies are enforced.

Many companies are embracing the change. A survey by Citrix last year found that bring-your-own-device is quickly becoming an accepted business practice, with 25% of both large and small employers worldwide supporting the use of personal devices for business purposes, and many are reporting jumps in productivity associated with use of these devices. But dual-use devices are not without their problems and risks. According to the survey:

• More than 67 percent of survey participants reported that they don’t have any policies, procedures or IT systems in place to manage the use of personal devices for business purposes.
• Less than half of U.S. firms (46 percent) are aware of all the devices their staff are using for business purposes.
• 32 percent of firms are most concerned over the security implications of allowing application and document downloads on personal devices
• 23 percent are concerned over personal devices trying to get remote access to the corporate network.

Security is an enormous issue, particularly for any firms that have customer data privacy and security issues related to HIPAA or financial data. The average data breach costs a company $7.2 million, or $214 per breached record.

We have met the enemy and he is us
Many companies deploy substantial security resources to guard against hackers but are inadvertently leaving the back door unlocked. In a recent survey of IT managers, 72% of respondents said that careless employees have been a greater security threat than hackers.

Top factors IT pros cited include:

• 62% - Lack of employee awareness about security policies
• 61% - Insecure web browsing
• 59% - Insecure Wi-Fi- connectivity
• 58 % - Lost or stolen mobile devices with corporate data
• 57% - Installation of corrupt apps
• 53% - Lack of security patches from service providers

ZoneAlarm has a good infographic - excerpt below - which breaks down some of the numbers and stats on securing today's mobile workforce.

Risk management: Best practices
This is not likely to be an issue that lessens in significance over time. Employers need to understand the risk and the exposure, and need to take steps to mitigate the risk. These steps will include a combination of well-crafted policies, safe computing training for employees, and technology solutions. Here's a toolkit of good articles to get you started.

HR Hero offers a series of posts from employment law attorney Taylor Chapman around the issue of dual-use devices. In her first post, BYOD - When Employees Bring Their Own Devices to Work, she discusses the trend of employees the real-world concerns associated with the practice, and different approaches employers can take to policies. In Managing the Risk of Employee Use of Personal Technology, she discusses the legality of accessing employees’ personal devices and how employers can mitigate the security risk that comes when employees use their own technology at work.

Roger Cheng of the Wall St Journal covered the topic about a year ago in his article How the smartest companies are letting employees use their personal gadgets to do their jobs. He offers approaches that several companies are using, from policies requiring the use of locks, an agreement that the device will be wiped if lost or stolen, the ability to wall off data, and virtualization.

Here are a few of the more unusual experiences recounted:

• Candidate put the interviewer on hold during a phone interview. When she came back on the line, she told the interviewer she had a date set up for Friday.
• When a candidate interviewing for a security position wasn’t hired on the spot, he graffitied the building.
• Candidate wore a Boy Scout uniform and never told interviewers why.
• Candidate was arrested by federal authorities during the interview when a background check revealed the person had an outstanding warrant.
• On the way to the interview, candidate passed, cut-off, and flipped middle finger to driver who happened to be the interviewer.
• Candidate referred to himself in the third person.
• Candidate took off shoes during interview.
• Candidate asked for a sip of the interviewer’s coffee.

Related -
Ten Dumb Things Said During Job Interviews
Candidates Most Unusual Interview Mistakes, 2011
Employers Reveal Candidates’ Most Unusual Job Interview Behavior, 2010

Seemingly every day, states are issuing new reports about this rapidly escalating problem:

• Overdose deaths are now the top cause of accidental deaths in Ohio. "In 2010, 1,544 Ohioans died from “unintentional drug poisoning” (overdose). That’s more than four a day, up from less than one a day in 1999."
• Drug overdoses now kill more Oklahomans than motor vehicle accidents — an average of two per day.. The state "...was ranked the No. 1 state in the nation in prescription painkiller abuse last year. They underscore a new reality for law enforcement authorities, health care professionals and public policymakers."
• Prescription drug dependence is deemed epidemic in East Central Indiana - Since 2009, the drugs have contributed to more than 75 deaths in Delaware and Henry counties alone.
• Florida is cracking down on pill mills - "Last year [2010], seven people died in Florida each day from prescription drug overdoses, a nearly 8 percent increase from 2009. This is far more than the number who died from illegal drugs, and the figure is not expected to drop much this year."
• Report: Kentucky sixth in nation for overdose deaths. ""The last couple of years overdose deaths have outpaced motor vehicle accidents as the leading cause of accidental death in Kentucky."

A Centers for Disease Control Report -- Saving Lives and Protecting People: Prevention of Prescription Painkiller Overdoses -- paints a grim national picture. Overdoses of prescription painkillers have more than tripled in the past 20 years, leading to 14,800 deaths in the United States in 2008. Emergency department visits for prescription painkiller abuse or misuse have doubled in the past 5 years to nearly half a million.

What's causing this alarming epidemic? The Ohio report cited above says that part of the reason is that we are "swimming in opiates in all forms" and points to several factors: a shift in the philosophy toward pain management, the huge volume of direct marketing of drugs to consumers, the increase in avaialable varieties of opiod pain killers on the market, and the funneling of prescription pain killers for non-prescription use.

The Work Comp Connection
At least part of the problem may be one that you as an employer are financing. In workers comp, narcotics now account for about $1.4 billion, or a quarter of the annual drug spend. First, there is the increased reliance on narcotics. Workers with musculo-skeletal injuries are being treated with opiates once reserved for cancer patients. This might be partly attributable to the fact that drugs are generally reimbursed at a higher rate under workers comp than under group health. And there are few user disincentives to curb abuse under workers comp. Under group health, an insured is paying part or all of prescription drug costs, but under workers comp, the employer foots the entire bill. Finally, the payer - which is you (usually through your insurer or TPA) - is all too often asleep at the wheel. Physician prescribing must be carefully monitored.

At Managed Care Matters, industry expert Joe Paduda offers a post about how much opioids will really cost you. He suggests steps that payers must take:

Payers must work with their PBMs (Pharmacy Benefit Mangers) to dramatically reduce their exposure. This requires both parties to:

a) identify long-term users,

b) mine their data to determine which claimants may be abusing/misusing/diverting and involve SIU where appropriate,

c) channel appropriate claimants to addiction screening, allocate the resources necessary for weaning and recovery and recognize this will include behavioral therapy will find they can.

Se also: Workers Compensation Prescription Drug Study: 2010 Update from NCCI.

ESI Employee Assistance Program can help address employees with substance abuse issues - whether problems stem from illicit or prescribed drugs, or any combination of drugs and alcohol abuse. We also offer Drug Free Workplace and D.O.T. compliance programs.

Most disgruntled employees will simply dust off their resumes and take their leave at the first opportunity. This will generally be a quiet affair because most people are eager to move on with their lives in a positive fashion and with little drama. The Steven Slaters of the world are a rare occurrence.

The real worry for you, the employer, may lie in the malevolent rogue employee lingering in your midst who has plans to wreak some degree of havoc, whether for reasons of revenge, resentment, or potential (larcenous) profit. With powerful and concealable data storage devices and the ability to disseminate communications instantly through texting and email, rogue employees are technology-enabled in an unprecedented way.

In an article entitled Worker-Departure Disaster Waiting to Happen in CFO magazine, John Reed Stark terms these employees "bad leavers" and defines them as "... disgruntled employees who "leave" a company on "bad" terms and cause deliberate harm before or after they exit, typically in clandestine fashion." Such an employee might attempt to destroy, alter or steal information and a company must be prepared to detect, assess, and react quickly.

Stark discusses the need for employers to have established exit protocols, which would include the creation of an IT environment "conducive to locating the proverbial 'smoking gun.'" It may also be essential to bring in independent forensics experts to preserve and safeguard evidence that might be needed in litigation.

The National Association of State Chief Information Officers published a brief on Insider Security Threats (PDF). The report includes a discussion of malicious employees, as well as other internal security vulnerabilities, such as inattentive, complacent or untrained employees, and contractors and outsourced services. They classify the overtly malicious threats as:

• The IT Expert with a Hacker Mentality
• The Dissatisfied or Disgruntled Employee
• The Terminated or Demoted Employee
• The Fraudster Motivated by Financial Gain
• The Employee Who Wants Unauthorized Access to Information

The article discusses various security measures for dealing with each threat, including those that might address a "bad leaver," which we excerpt below:

What’s in Their Background? Background checks of all job candidates, including interns and contractors, can identify those with a record of acting out inappropriately or using questionable judgment and could prevent their hiring in the first place. A credit and financial background check can help to identify job candidates in financial difficulty. They could have an incentive to use IT to defraud the state, especially if a position has financial responsibilities or access to financial IT systems.

Vigilance Pays Off: Management should be aware of the signs of a disgruntled employee who could cause damage with or to state IT resources.

Open Communication Channels with Management: A reporting system for employees who witness or know of a disgruntled employee with ill-intended plans can serve as an early-warning system to management. In addition, allowing employees an official channel for the expression of grievances may prevent them from taking their anger out behind management’s back.

Watch Them: For problem employees, managers may consider coordinating with state IT staff to monitor their access to email, the Internet and state IT systems.

The Value of Audits: Regular and ongoing audits may identify ill-intended behaviors of employees that management may not immediately recognize as disgruntled. Audits can include the review of access, activity and facilities logs.

The Exit Strategy: Employees who resign or are terminated may take one last swipe at their employer through sabotage or data theft. A formal and thorough exit process can prevent such occurrences. This includes cutting off access privileges before an employee is terminated or immediately after an employee resigns if the employee appears to be disgruntled and escorting an employee out of the office.

As with most things in life, a good offense is better than a good defense. Employers should be alert for changes in behavior to identify a potential disgruntled employee early. Signs might include a lack of motivation, a breakdown in communications, and a decline in performance. Training managers and supervisors in how to identify and act on changes in performance and behavior before they become problematic can allow for positive communication and intervention.