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Safety/Health

Measure productivity loss when tallying up health costs

07/06/2009

Pull out your attendance records and a calculator to determine just how much productivity is suffering because of employee illness and poor health. Then find out what kinds of medical conditions are keeping employees from working at full capacity.

Send tailored e-mails to deliver actionable health info

07/06/2009

When employees hunch over keyboards all day, all the motivational posters in all the break rooms of the world won’t improve their health. Health care giant Kaiser Permanente—a leader in designing wellness programs for other organizations—wondered what it could do to get its own staff to eat better and exercise more. Thus was born an innovative e-mail campaign that delivered big results.

OSHA cites Wal-Mart for Black Friday death

07/06/2009

Black Friday had a double meaning at Wal-Mart’s Valley Stream, N.Y., store last year when temporary employee Jdimytai Damour, 34, was trampled to death by stampeding shoppers. OSHA investigated and levied the maximum permissible fine against the store, $7,000.

How can we help prevent co-worker harassment from escalating into violence?

06/26/2009

Q. One of our employees is being harassed by a co-worker, and we are concerned it may get violent. What can we do about this?

Are you ill prepared? 13 steps to stay ahead of the H1N1 virus

06/26/2009

In the wake of April’s worldwide H1N1 virus pandemic scare, now is the time to make sure your organization has an effective pandemic plan in place. Although this spring’s immediate threat seems to have abated, public health officials warn that the virus could re-emerge in the fall. There are 13 steps you can take to deal with H1N1:

OSHA warns employers to beware using fraudulent trainers for safety programs

06/22/2009

OSHA has established new requirements for trainers to become authorized to teach safety training courses in construction and other industries. Some trainers, OSHA says, are fraudulently failing to provide the appropriate training.

Minor adjustments: Complying with federal teen labor rules

06/16/2009

Your risk of running afoul of the child labor laws has increased, and penalties can be harsh. A recent government study found a surprisingly high percentage of teen employees working longer hours than federal law allows, and also in jobs deemed too dangerous by law. Now, federal and state safety investigators are more interested than ever in child labor compliance.

Labor Department seeks more funds to boost enforcement

06/08/2009

U.S. Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis’ budget request to Congress includes funds to hire nearly 1,000 new employees, 670 of whom will be investigators. The plan calls for 200 more wage-and-hour Labor investigators and 160 additional OSHA gumshoes.

Small institution tackles big premium hikes

06/05/2009

When the Lake Forest Graduate School of Management got socked with back-to-back health premium increases of 21.9% and 19% in 2004 and 2005, respectively, its HR execs knew it was up to them to help the employees get healthy.

Lawsuits on the rise: Audit your policies to prevent litigation

06/05/2009

The economy is a shambles, and employers are doing everything they can to stay in business. That includes terminations, salary and wage cuts and temporary furloughs. Nearly every one of those moves carries litigation risk. Have your company’s personnel policies and practices had a checkup lately? A comprehensive audit is one of the easiest ways to spot problems.