A new year inevitably brings new opportunities. Businesses grow, strategic plans are implemented, and prospects are hopefully converting to clients and customers. You’ve set out goals for 2025, and now you’re firmly putting the plans in place to reach those goals.
Unfortunately, the reality as an employer is that it’s often the things that you miss that can become your unexpected expenses. You may think that you still have all of your employment law pieces sorted out from when you started the business. Much like your business, though, the law also grows and changes over time.
The contracts and policies that you had in place from the day you started are likely now stale and dated without constant updates, and they’re no longer offering your business the same protection that they once had. Want to really make sure that you’re set up for a secure future? Here are the employment law pieces of your business that need another look going into 2025.
Employment Contracts
If you had good legal counsel when you started your business, they may have helped to prepare some template employment contracts for you, or contracts that you used for your initial hires. If you’re anything like most employers, you’ve been using those same templates for years with little adjustment.
Consider this your cue to stop.
When it comes to employment contracts, the law can be a bit of a moving target. The main goal for employers is to draft a contract which keeps their rights intact, and ideally limits what they may owe an employee on termination without notice. The law does not limit this amount automatically; it must be done clearly in writing.
The challenge for employers is that the legal requirements for what these clauses need to say keeps changing. What may have passed muster one year may not work in the next. A regular review from your lawyer can ensure that your contracts are in line with the latest legal standards, and thus likely to survive a court challenge if necessary.
Exit Packages
If you’ve been lucky enough not to have to let many employees go, you may have a standardized exit package that you’ve used for past terminations. Perhaps you’ve been lucky, and those employees accepted your offer without any complaint.
That does not mean that the same package will work every time – in fact far from it. Your exit packages should be customized each and every time you need to let someone go. A lawyer can help you review that employee’s contract, as well as the current legal standards, to help you craft an attractive package that doesn’t break your bank any more than necessary.
The other counterpart to that package is a release, where an employee, in exchange for extra funds, forfeits their right to sue or make any claims against you. These documents are crucial, and need to be written and tendered properly in order to be legally binding.
Harassment Policies and Procedures
Yes, your workplace is required by law to have a policy on workplace bullying and harassment. You are also required, by law, to review that policy every year. Yet having an effective policy in place in your workplace is only one portion of what you need to do to stay compliant with the law.
Along with your workplace bullying and harassment policies, take the time to make sure that you have a solid reporting structure in place, and a framework for how investigations will be conducted. Having a policy on display in the corner of a bulletin board somewhere is only the bare minimum, and does little to promote compliance.
Do your employees know where to turn when they’re experiencing harassment? Do you have a comprehensive reporting structure in place, including a second designated person available if the primary person is the alleged harasser? Do you have a fair and impartial investigation process in place? Are employees aware of what takes place during a harassment investigation?
Don’t get caught unprepared. If you do become aware of a harassment allegation in the workplace, and you’re scrambling as to how to respond, you’re already behind the 8-ball. Treating harassment allegations improperly can be a costly mistake, so knowing what to do before trouble strikes can help protect your bottom line.
Policy Manual
The lockdowns of 2020 and 2021 were the first wake-up call for most employers that their policy manuals were out-of-date. Sick leave policies and remote work policies became paramount, and mask-wearing, social distancing, and vaccination policies became normalized. Employers of all sizes quickly scrambled to try and keep up.
However, just because the worst of the pandemic is in the rear-view mirror, policies still need to be updated on a regular basis. Employers of certain sizes are routinely required to create new policies, such as electronic monitoring policies, or right to disconnect policies. Other policies that may once have been beneficial may now be obsolete.
Use the new year as an opportunity to review your policies, and make sure that they accurately reflect your workplace. Policies should not only make sense, but they need to be followed rigorously in order to be effective. You cannot punish one employee for something that their colleague is allowed to get away with without consequence. Review your policies with fresh eyes, and speak with your legal counsel about making changes.
Legislative Changes
Along with new required policies, the Ontario government is frequently making incremental changes to workplace law that you as an employer need to know about. This may mean changes in job-protected leaves, changes to the minimum wage, changes to job posting requirements, etc.
These changes may be small, but they require employers to follow along closely in order to stay compliant with the law. The Ministry of Labour has the power to investigate workplaces, and a lack of compliance leaves employers potentially liable for significant fines. Worse still, if an employee matter goes to Court and an employer is found to be non-compliant, the penalties may be even more significant.
Final Thoughts
There may be a lot to process here, but you do not need to go through this alone. No one expects you to be the experts in employment law; that’s why you work with an employment lawyer. At Scocco Law we speak employment law, and our job is to make the law make sense for you.
By staying connected on a routine basis, we can make sure that you stay compliant and can work to avoid any problems before they happen. When it comes to employment law, an ounce of prevention really is worth a pound of cure. Let’s talk about the issues you can work on today to avoid headaches tomorrow. Contact our office to set up a consultation
