By Brittany Wilkey – Employco Human Resources

With the average age of retirement slowly increasing – whether due to financial needs, personal reasons, or simply because the average lifespan is also increasing – it isn’t uncommon to see organizations employing four to five generations at the same time.  Managing and recruiting such an extensive range of age groups can be difficult, but understanding a little bit about the wants and needs of each group can help both employers and employees maintain a cohesive workplace.

The first step is to understand what defines each generation, and how those generations are formed.  Generations are grouped not only because of their age and birth year, but also based on the social and cultural events occurring during their lifetime that ends up shaping their values, concepts, and beliefs.

For instance, a person in their 50’s who has been working for several decades is unlikely to have the same perspective as someone in their early 20’s who is just entering the workforce.  Along those same lines, an individual who lived through the Vietnam War, the Watergate scandal, or the digital boom, will be influenced by those major cultural events, and those same cultural events will impact how they approach their jobs, co-workers, and the workplace in general.

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Did you know that the average time an organization provides to employees for bereavement leave is 4-7 days, though the actual grieving process can take two years or more? Grief impacts not only the employee, but also the rest of the organization, as productivity and workplace relationships can also suffer when an employee is dealing with loss.

Fortunately, there are several steps you can take to help an employee cope with the grieving process:

• As part of Employco’s group insurance, UnitedHealthcare offers participants access to their Employee Assistance Program, which can help employees receive free counseling.
• We can provide group training sessions for employees and/or your management team on how to respond when an employee is coping with loss.

Employco can also help you by going over the different options for making bereavement leave or general policy adjustments at your organization.

It has been a little over one year since Caitlyn Jenner, formerly Bruce Jenner, announced a change to her name and appearance on the cover of Vanity Fair.

With only around 0.3% – 3.0% of the U.S. adult population identified as transgender, employers may mistakenly believe that it’s not an issue worth their time. However, since the transgender population and legal compliance issues are growing, proactive employers are preparing for a transgender workforce.

Legislative Guidance:

• Transgender employee discrimination is prohibited under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act and under several state laws.
• OSHA and the Department of Labor released a “Guide to Restroom Access for Transgender Workers” that requires companies to allow their employees to use the restroom that corresponds to their gender identity.

Recommendations:

• Modify your employee handbook, policies and training to include transgender in the list of protected classes
• Engage transgender employees in an “interactive process” to discuss their preference on the use of bathrooms, name, email address, pronouns and company announcement, if any

To listen to Employco’s recent podcast on transgender equality in the workplace, please click here. Contact us for help with your employee handbook, policies or employee training.

North Carolina recently passed a law (NC HB2, colloquially known as the “Bathroom Law”) declaring that individuals must use the bathroom that corresponds with the gender written on their birth certificate, not the gender with which they identify. The DOJ informed North Carolina Governor Pat McCrory that the state’s new law violates federal law, including Title VII of the Civil Rights Act and Title IX of the Education Acts Amendment of 1972.

Past precedence has set conflicting judgments about the issue, so Gov. McCrory and the DOJ filed separate lawsuits asking the courts to clarify the law. Due to the conflicting nature of past precedence, it is likely these cases will progress to the Supreme Court for a final ruling. The ruling will directly impact the workplace, particularly policies and procedures regarding transgender employees.

For more on this topic, please contact Jason Eisenhut at jeisenhut@employco.com.