Sunday 3/29/09. 2 hours. Completed work on the last two policies: Sick Leave (suggested changes to Mary Jane’s work) and Hiring and Staffing (integrating segments on Employment of Minors and Employment of Relatives, plus minor editorial changes to other sections). Transferred all policy documents to a flash drive to take to tomorrow’s final on-site meeting.
March 29, 2009
March 26, 2009
Off-Site: Policies Polishing
Thursday 3/26/09. 2 hours. Devoted some time to formatting and organizing the policies Mary Jane copied to my flash drive on 3/24. I now have all the policies and just have a couple more to edit to complete the project. I also began work on my project report.
March 23, 2009
Off-Site: Policy Writing
Monday 3/23/09. 3 hours. Continued rewriting the Administrative Leave and Progressive Discipline policies. Also tweaked the Emergency Closure policy.
March 22, 2009
Off-Site: More Policy Research
Sunday 3/22/09. 3 hours. Mary Jane and I established early in the policy evaluation state that it was not necessary to have one since we wrote in the manual’s introduction that the library conforms to all federal/state/local laws. I read in an online HR journal that an Equal Opportunity statement is an essential protection for an employer. I researched and crafted a new Equal Opportunity Statement that is far more inclusive than the original policy that addressed employment only. The new policy also directs staff to the federal EEOC Web site for more detailed information.
March 15, 2009
Off-Site: Clean-Up Day
Sunday 3/15/09. 2 hours. This was a clean-up and organization day for me.
- Organized paper files in preparation for building my practicum notebook.
- Read and made notes on policies that Mary Jane rewrote and gave to me for review.
- Reformatted policies that I wrote to conform to the new DCDL standard. The original personnel policies manual was hobbled together from forms, memos and other documents created by many people over 12 years and needed a facelift.
March 11, 2009
Off-Site: Policy Writing
Wednesday 3/11/09. 3.5 hours. I spent time at home researching the Administrative Leave, OPERS, Harassment and the Progressive Discipline policies.
I’m very pleased with the changes to the personnel policies manual. The reorganization has made the manual much more user-friendly and current. Example: the old Sexual Harassment policy has been replaced with a Harassment policy I wrote that reflects the trend to create a single policy that addresses all kinds of discriminatory harassment. The language sets harassment apart from simple conflict resolution (which I also rewrote) by encouraging employees who feel they’ve been harassed to report it immediately to any supervisor by phone, in person, email, snail mail, whatever way they feel comfortable.
I feel that I’m making a permanent contribution to the effective administration of my hometown library system – no small feat for a practicum student.
March 8, 2009
Off-Site: More Writing and Research
Saturday and Sunday 3/7 and 3/8/09. 6.5 hours. I began work on a new policy, Harassment. The old policy named Sexual Harassment didn’t address the broad range of harassment recognized in the workplace today. I pulled great sample text from multiple sources including Met Life, the FCC Website and the State of Ohio.
The best ideas on harassment policy, stolen from Metropolitan Life (thanks to my wife from Met’s official policy statements): stipulate that staff can report harassment to anyone at the supervisor level or above that they’re comfortable going to. I also borrowed Met’s language about using any channel to report the harassment including phone, in person, written (paper or e-mail) or any other method. This reinforces the importance of immediate reporting by placing the fewest restrictions on the process. I also used a Employee Responsibilities and Library Responsibilities format that was useful when I wrote the FMLA policy.
I also returned to the Leaving Employment, Military Leave and OPERS policies for further refinement. I e-mailed the Leaving Employment draft to Mary Jane for her comments.
March 6, 2009
Off-Site: Research and Writing At Home
Friday 3/6/09. 4 hours. I spent the afternoon combining retirement, layoffs, termination and death into a single “Leaving Employment” policy. Checked over the OPERS Web site for retirement information.
March 1, 2009
Off-Site: More Research
Sunday 3/1/09. 3 hours. I conducted research for DCDL’s firearms policy and military leave of absence policy. Spent a good deal of the three hours on the Ohio Revised and Administrative Code Web site and the Attorney General’s Concealed Carry Web site. The AG site is well organized and useful to ordinary citizens seeking information about concealed carry. The ORC site isn’t search friendly but the info’s all there – if you can find it.
February 16, 2009
Off-Site: Started Revising More Policies
Monday 2/16/09. 4 hours. I began working on the Dismissal and Suspension policies which Mary Jane assigned to me. I also broke down other unassigned policies, including Punctuality and Absence Due To Weather, which I think make more sense turning into three policies. I’ll talk with Mary Jane about these policies, as well as review the Conflict Resolution Procedure I reconstructed, on Thursday 2/19.4
