Statutory benefits:

As I watch the debate over health care reform it is interesting to see the polarity. Those who see Congress’s actions as an important step on an order of magnitude with Social Security and the Civil Rights Act, and others who see it as symbolic of a rapid descent into socialism led by a liberal Democratic administration. As someone who has been involved with health care for almost thirty years I se.... Read more

We work a good chunk of our lives. Eight—or likely more—hours of our day are committed to working. It’s a necessity—perhaps an evil necessity—that we have to work in order to make a living. And as employees or managers, no matter which department, I think everyone wants a better work environment. Unless you’re one of the lucky employees at Pixar or a Pixar-type company, m.... Read more

“Our economy faces unprecedented challenges, so we are responding with unprecedented action.” said President Bush in a September 19 address to our nation. Every day we hear on the news or read online or in the paper that something new is going down in our economy. Within the past three weeks alone we have watched our financial market tailspin. Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy, the U.S. gover.... Read more

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) permits “assistance eligible individuals” to pay reduced premiums and provides additional election opportunities for health benefits under the Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act (COBRA). These individuals will pay only 35 percent of the COBRA premium; 65 percent is paid by the employer (or Plan) and then reimbursed through .... Read more

Attracting and retaining healthcare professionals is one of the greatest challenges facing the healthcare industry today. Healthcare providers, on both the for-profit and not-for-profit sides of the industry, face the challenges of increasing employee satisfaction and retention while controlling and whenever possible, reducing associated costs—a difficult task in today’s economic environment..... Read more

  Are you dreaming of an exotic vacation to Tahiti, Switzerland or Jamaica? Are you ready to put down your computer, blackberry and rolodex and just take a few needed days off? Are you saying to yourself, yes, I’d love to do that….but I can’t because I have too much work, my team needs me, I’ll lose my job…. This is the $1 million question: Do we work to live, or .... Read more

We are reminded daily that each of us should be investing in our future. To that end, I decided to take a few refresher courses in investing. While I will still look to models for guidance, knowledge of fundamental investment theories will help me make better choices. A commitment to leadership should be a company’s investment in the future. Leaders come from all walks of life. An employee who.... Read more

Because Drucker’s students at Claremont Graduate School (now the Peter F. Drucker and Masatoshi Ito Graduate School of Management at Claremont Graduate University) were all executives, all of our classes were at night and we would break mid-class to eat dinner with our professors at the faculty club.One evening I was sitting at a table for six with faculty. I was in the middle on one side of a rectang.... Read more

A recent KPMG study (“The Morning After” 2006) confirms our worst fears. Differences in style of how organizations create their results—often framed as culture—are the source of most merger and acquisition disappointments. And yet, the decision to grow the organization via a merger or acquisition (M&A) is regularly made without the proactive involvement of human resources. The hu.... Read more

When it comes to developing and analyzing metrics it is helpful to view them from two perspectives: macro and micro. The basic difference between two is this: Macro-level metrics are the overall organization or cross-functional metrics used to drive strategy; and micro-level metrics are those measures that support the improvement and management of a particular project, program or initiative.Macro MetricsMac.... Read more

I have always been turned off by the concept of the “internal customer.” In my business I tried to lead my people to understand and remember daily that we all have one, and only one, common customer—the one who writes the checks to pay for our services. Each of our efforts must be collectively focused on putting all the little pieces together, from each department, every day, to make custo.... Read more

Turbulent economic times require most organization to put future growth plans on hold and implement initiatives that will immediately affect the bottom-line. North Broward Hospital, along with many other healthcare facilities, is a highly regulatory organization that must follow compliance initiatives. It

Onboarding? On-Boarding? OnBoarding? On Boarding? For as many ways as you can spell it, there were folks at Canadian Pacific who had different ideas as to what onboarding (that’s the spelling we finally decided on) meant. When I was first asked to lead a project to bring back a corporate onboarding program, I did my research and asked every person I could whom I thought was involved, or could .... Read more

McDonald’s Canada is not just an excellent brand. The company also recognizes its number one resource—it’s people. Len Jillard has seen this first hand. When he joined McDonald’s Canada as the Senior Vice President of People Resources and Chief People Officer in 2005, he brought with him a wealth of knowledge that he developed from working through all levels of McDonald’s ma.... Read more

Human resources is no longer regarded as a cost center or back-end activity compiled of passive administrative and operational duties such as compensation, benefits and compliance. Instead, human resources is now considered an important strategic partner in developing goals aligned to a company’s overall business objective. The human resources department is a leader that links the company’s oper.... Read more

You’ve been with your company for two or three years—gone to the picnics, schmoozed your manager, won employee of the month, been on the holiday party planning committee and see yourself retiring with your company. It’s a regular Thursday afternoon—and you get laid off. You never saw it coming. Even though you’ve been a loyal kool-aid drinking employee for the last.... Read more

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA), which was signed into law by President Barack Obama, provides the opportunity for eligible individuals to pay reduced premiums and gives additional election opportunities for health insurance coverage under the Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act (COBRA). The essence of what is being referred to as the COBRA subsidy is that eligible indiv.... Read more

Michelle's Law, otherwise known as H. R. 2851, was enacted to ensure that dependent college students, who have medical coverage as dependents of their parents, do not lose their health insurance coverage if they need to take a medical leave of absence. When such medical leave of absence would result in the student losing status as a full-time student, the student would typically be required to elect COBRA C.... Read more

As companies continue to search for ways to cut costs, there is still a need to acquire talent to leverage organizational success. And in doing so, many companies are now rehiring former, or "alumni," employees because it is beneficial in reducing new-hire costs.Organizations have seen overhead cost savings in recruiting, training and technology by hiring alumni employees. There are redu.... Read more

It seems as if everybody is freezing their pension plans. Suppose you take a contrarian view. Does it make sense for you to continue your pension plan? If a plan is desirable, how should you make it manageable for the long haul and avoid a freeze? Employers have been freezing their pension plans for two main reasons, namely a) rising plan costs and b) volatility/unpredictably of plan costs. “C.... Read more