By Kelly Jackson
Jan. 20, 2011
When it comes to compliance issues, employers’ cups run over with ever-increasing challenges. First off, there’s health care reform, which promises a tangle of new regulations to track and comply with. Added to that is the promise of increased enforcement. The U.S. Secretary of Labor, Hilda Solis, recently added 250 new investigators to the Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour division, a staff increase of one-third. (The Department of Labor is the agency responsible for enforcing the Fair Labor Standards Act, a law that establishes minimum wage, overtime pay, recordkeeping and youth employment standards affecting employees in the private sector and in federal, state and local governments.)
And the DOL isn’t the only agency stepping up enforcement of workplace regulations. OSHA announced similar plans. Between fines, penalties and rising employee claims (the Wall Street Journal recently reported a staggering 60 percent increase in EEOC claims filed in early 2010), employers are faced with serious threats to their organization’s bottom line.
In my work as an HR consultant, I encounter hundreds of business owners and leaders. The concern that crosses every industry and all businesses is compliance. Because it’s such a pervasive issue, I want to share a simple framework that anyone can use for taming the compliance beast.
Create a Compliance Checklist
Start off by establishing your compliance baseline. It’s important to know the major compliance areas, and what your business needs to do to meet the requirements. Compile a list of all the laws and regulations that your business must comply with, the compliance requirements, and then review your own practices and records.
Beyond the government agencies themselves, following are some sources of compliance information. Business organizations, industry professional groups, and some of your vendors, such as your business insurance provider and benefits broker, provide information on new laws as a value added service.
Because the list can be lengthy and different regulations apply to different types and sizes of business, it may be less expensive and time consuming to start with a compliance audit. A compliance audit is conducted by an HR professional who performs a thorough evaluation of your business’ human resource practices and recordkeeping against legal requirements and advises you on areas where your business is out of compliance.