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Employers may require salaried exempt employees to use accrued vacation or paid time off (PTO) for partial day absences in any increment, including increments of less than four hours, without violating the salary basis requirements for exempt status under California wage and hour law, the California Court of Appeal ruled in Rhea v. General Atomics. This puts to rest a lengthy dispute on this issue and is welcome news for many employers in California that previously adopted policies requiring employees to use vacation/PTO time for any partial day absences of any length.

Many of my posts recently have focused on the concept of Owners versus Renters in the workplace.  It is helpful to understand how to differentiate between one and the other while they are at work, but it would be even more helpful to b

By Lisa Horn (@SHRMLobbystLisa), Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), Director of Congressional Affairs and SHRM’s Workplace Flexibility Initiative

I am a dad.  It has to be the greatest accomplishment I’ve ever had, or will ever have.  My kids are on the verge of being adults now so they are doing more and more on their own.  What I’m finding is how easy it is to take a small amount of information and blow it out of proportion if you are missing context.  I’m seeing this both from them spreading their wings and having to make bigger life decisions as well as my wife and I letting them fly more.  We don’t always have context around what their decisions are, and it’s hard not to want to step in and “fix” things.

SHRM is shining a spotlight on some amazing young HR professionals!  Meet SHRM Young Professional Mario Martinucci.

Q. What inspires you as an HR professional?

A. What inspires me as an  HR professional is the opportunity to work with a lot of different and talented people at all levels of the organization. At the end of the day, if I know I made a difference for someone I can go home happy. 
 

Q. What book are you reading right now?

Someone once said that everything stops during a takeover, as people speculate on the direction of the fall of the axe. The sudden techtonic shift reminds us that companies are put together as human constructs and can quickly be remade. In this blog, I want to focus on what the HR team in particular can do to prepare.

HR Help urgently!

Do workers approach career transitions differently based on their age? For instance, do employees in their 30s experience transitions more easily than employees in their 50s?

There’s little doubt that each generation has certain strengths—and faces specific challenges—when it comes to a career transition. For HR professionals, it’s important to note how generational differences affect these transitions, and to coach and guide workers to understand one another so they can work together productively.

Baby Boomers, or ‘The Encore Generation’

A recent survey of the federal government’s chief human capital officers (CHCOs) pointed to an attitude shift among the top-level public-sector HR executives who report that they are now embracing change rather than merely preparing for its impact.

I speak with overwhelmed job seekers every week who can't seem to gain any traction in their job search. They tell me, "I'm applying for just about anything that will pay me". This, my friends, will get you nowhere. My suggestion to the job seeker is to stop the scatter-shooting and laser focus your search.

Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.

But, if you send FMLA paperwork to an employee by first class mail, then you're asking for trouble.

I'll show you why after the jump...

* * *

Did you read the lede and think to yourself, "FMLA notice? You mean there's a notice? You mean, like in our handbook right?"

Job seekers are up against multiple hurdles these days as they look for meaningful work. While poorly written job descriptions and malfunctioning career sites hinder the job search, they now must face an even higher hurdle -- the algorithm.

Most job search websites have increased the use of software that uses complex algorithms to screen and sort resumes by searching for keywords that match specific skill sets and experience. Other programs, like LinkedIn’s “Recruiter,” can help talent managers find passive candidates by searching for a specific location, title or skill.

HR professionals encouraged to evolve, anticipate and help grow leadership  

How do you tell if your current leadership development and talent management strategies will improve your bottom line over the next three years?

By looking to the past and anticipating what’s next.

So says a new study from consulting firm Development Dimensions International (DDI) and The Conference Board, which includes survey responses from more than 16,000 respondents consisting of business leaders and global human resource executives.

How to handle toxic personalities at work.

You won’t find it on a resume, but it’s one of the most important factors a worker brings to the job: personality.

Some personality types are so toxic they can poison everyone around them.

Many employers ask job applicants to check a "box" on a job application to disclose criminal history information. As of Aug. 13, 2014, San Francisco will "ban the box" for private and public employers. The city's board of supervisors earlier this year passed the Fair Chance Ordinance (FCO), which prohibits employers from inquiring into an applicant's criminal history in an employment application. Employers are also required to consider specific factors when assessing a candidate's criminal history and before taking action based on an applicant's criminal history.

Much like scientists who classify living and fossil organisms into domain, kingdom, class, family, genus and species, we in HR often do the same:

Just about everyone agrees that the U.S. job training system has functioned poorly for years, bogged down by red tape and a confusing array of programs. Millions of jobs remain unfilled, while millions of Americans cannot find work. Too often, educators and employers talk past one another when seeking solutions.

But HR and training professionals have a new tool with which to address the skills gap: It’s the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA), which became law on July 22, 2014. It replaces the antiquated Workforce Investment Act.

I recently had someone ask me this question: If an employee gets a bad performance review and doesn't agree with it, is there value in going to HR to complain?

First off, let me say that I’m a firm believer than an employee’s performance appraisal should not be a shock to them. I don’t know if, in this case, the employee expected a poor performance review or if this was a surprise. However, in my experience, when an employee came to human resources to complain about their performance review, it was usually because their review was a surprise to them. Enough said.

For quite some time, contingent staffing was primarily a gap-filler for many employers: Earn a new contract, hire “x” amount of people to do the job and cut the cord when the work was finished.

No matter how old I am, I always feel like the fall is “back to school.” As wonderful as the summer may be, the fall is a “fresh start,” a new semester of life.

So I thought this summer about what as leaders we can do to be more effective next semester in terms of our interactions with our employees. It’s not working harder or smarter. It is being more human.

I have reviewed the summer engagement surveys of many clients. Even in companies that have great results, many employees feel that the company does not care about them.

Giving workers freedom with hours inspires productivity, but can lead to burnout.

Adopting a hands-off policy about when and where employees work may be the best way to ensure they’re productive.

That’s the conclusion from new research by University of Pennsylvania professor Alexandra Michel, whose 12-year study of investment bankers found that highly educated employees are more inspired, and work longer hours, when they have autonomy over their schedules. 

On August 6, @weknownext chatted with Joe Gerstandt (@joegerstandt), about "What's Next for Diversity and Inclusion?"

In case you missed it, here are all the great tweets from the chat:

Rejecting a call to place a proposed minimum wage hike on the November ballot as a referendum item, on July 14,2014,  the San Diego City Council approved an ordinance raising the city’s minimum wage to $11.50 per hour by 2017.

The wage increase will be phased in over a three-year period. In January 2015, the minimum wage will increase to $9.75; in January 2016 it will increase to $10.50; and in January 2017 it will increase to $11.50. Thereafter, the minimum wage will increase on an annual basis as determined by a Consumer Price Index.

Analytics in the business world serve many purposes, and a survey by the American Management Association uncovered the top five reasons business leaders say analytical skills are necessary today.

Which of the following create the greatest need for analytical skills in your organization?

In the past year I have encountered thousands of HR professionals. From being a fellow attendee at a conference, to leading and planning a conference with over 500 HR professionals as attendees to speaking to placing HR professionals, I literally talk to fellow HR pro’s every day.

There is a simple answer to that question, really. 

The candidates run the current labor market, at least for large, (and growing) swath of managerial, professional, and technical roles. 

Check out this week's Chart of the Day, a look at how recruiters see the labor market - candidate driven or employer driven,  courtesy of the MRI Network's latest recruiter sentiment study, (as always, some pithy commentary from me after the chart)

Millennials, those born between 1981 and 2000, face many challenges as young professionals, including negative stereotypes and difficulty finding a job after graduation. They also are considered to be the most financially stressed age group.

We've all grown tired of generational stereotypes in the workplace. Baby Boomers are giving presentations on how to manage Millennials, Millennials are sick of being picked on, and Generation X has all but vanished. I recently read an article sighting the behavioral traits of Generation Z (now the Millennials have someone to pick on). It's all a stupid attempt to simplify human beings into manageable categories to limit our desire to transcend simplicity. People are not simple!

In a move that could have a dramatic impact on numerous businesses across the country, National Labor Relations Board General Counsel Richard Griffin announced on July 29, 2014, that his office intends to name a parent franchisor as a respondent in cases involving alleged unfair labor practices committed by franchisees, if the parties are unable to reach a settlement.  According to the General Counsel, the agency is investigating the various charges