Flexible Work Options
(LONDON, England) Businesses can work through heat waves more easily by offering employees flexible work options, an accounting firm claims.
Business productivity can be adversely affected by too-hot temperatures, which produce stress, dehydration and general fatigue — not to mention absenteeism. With temperatures soaring to record heights in Europe this summer, U.K. accounting firm PKF says businesses could learn from employers in countries where sky-high temperatures are the norm. In order to boost productivity and motivation, firms should give employees dress-down days, longer lunch breaks, or the opportunity to come in and leave earlier when the heat gets too much. With the instant communication technology available today, people can also work from home — or from poolside.
Smaller firms have a greater advantage here, PKF says, since staff members often know how to do more than one job and can cover for each other when people want some time off.
“It’s time the U.K. looked at the example set by businesses abroad and let the stiff upper lip mentality melt a little in the sunshine,” says Martyn Potter, human resources consultant at PKF. “Everyone appreciates consideration and flexibility from their employers, particularly under extraordinary circumstances.”
PKF recommends that employers consult workers to find out their individual needs, then sculpt the fairest possible working conditions to meet those needs. Employers could also think ahead: give workers the option to work extra hours during the winter in order to take more holidays in the summer. This would actually benefit businesses that slow down during the summer months.
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Obliged to Accept
The plaintiff was dismissed and offered six months' working notice or she could leave earlier and accept 50% of the balance remaining. She wrote a letter in response, detailing the contribution she believed she could still make to the company.
After two months, she chose to accept two months' severance. She left early in order to take some computer courses.
While still working there, she was offered a position at $24,000 per year, doing the same thing, which she declined because she did not want to accept $8,000 less than her previous salary. She did not want to forego the computer training which she had undertaken and the new job did not have any chance of advancement.
The court found that accord and satisfaction required there to be an agreement, which is a finding of fact which can be implied from the circumstances.
In this case, the offer was made in writing and the plaintiff continued her employment for two months and then accepted the final termination cheque. The court noted that "the acceptance of termination pay may not necessarily imply agreement."
In this case, she worked for two months and then requested she be paid the option of 50% of her remaining salary. That was evidence of acceptance.
Finally, the court said she was required by way of mitigation to accept the new position. It was not reasonable for her to reject the offer on the basis of her desire to take the computer retraining course, because she could have taken similar courses at night. Furthermore, if she had been given 10 months' notice of termination, which the court considers the appropriate amount, she would have been obliged to have upgraded her skills outside of regular working hours.
Therefore, her damages were reduced by the amount of salary she would have earned if she had accepted the position.
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Woman Paid Less
The Saskatchewan Human Rights Commission found that a lumber store contravened the province's Labour Standards Act by paying a female employee less than a male colleague for performing similar work.
The woman started working part-time at the store in at an hourly wage of $6. Two years later, she asked for a raise and her rate went up to $7 an hour. The next year, a male employee was hired full-time, starting at $10. The following year, the woman was laid off because, she was told, business slowed down.
Section 17 of the Labour Standards Act prohibits paying male and female employees differently when they are performing similar work. The commission found that these two employees were doing basically the same work. They worked in the same area and reported to the same supervisors. They both provided customer service, priced and shelved stock, did computer price checking and adjusting, and ordered stock.
The woman did more work on the computer, but also very occasionally helped out in the yard and even drove a forklift. The man sometimes helped out in the lumber yard and did janitorial duties if asked to do so. The woman trained the man on how to use the computer, among other duties, and their supervisor found that the man "was not a quick study and it took him a while to get the hang of the work," in the commission's words.
The commission found that there was "overwhelming" evidence that about two-thirds of the woman's and man's work "was not just similar, it was identical" and that the differences were not consequential. Indeed, the commission stated, the woman would only need to show "a substantial likeness" between her job and the duties of her male co-worker in order to satisfy the Act.
Nine months after firing the woman, the lumber store owners asked selected customers to fill out questionnaires rating the performances of both the woman and man, trying to show that he was more enthused about his job than she was. The commission determined that the evidence was not relevant, since the law pertains to whether jobs require a similar degree of skill, effort and responsibility--not whether certain employees gave similar effort.
Section 17 permits only two defences. Women and men performing similar work can be paid differently based on seniority or merit if such formal systems existed in the workplace prior to giving different pay rates. In this case, it was the woman with seniority, and the commission found that there was no seniority system used in the store.
The commission rejected the store's arguments that it paid more to the man--and felt lucky to get him for only $10 an hour--because he had greater enthusiasm for the job and several years' previous experience in the lumber store business.
The store did not prove that it had a merit system in operation that rewarded the man for his effort and enthusiasm. The store argued that it had an ill-defined merit system that justified higher pay for the man. The commission said that argument was weakened because the man's starting wage was higher than the woman's. Merit systems, the commission said, start employees in the same position at the same wage and then increase the pay rate for some employees based on regular performance evaluations.
The man's previous work experience can't justify a higher starting salary, the commission said. Only if his job involved a different degree of skill (which could be obtained by different or lengthier experience) would his prior experience have any relevance.
The commission ordered the lumber store to pay the woman $4,754.86 as compensation for the wages (including holiday pay) that she lost due to the equal pay violation. The commission also awarded her interest of $544.56 and $2,500 for injury to self-respect.
The lumber store appealed the hurt feelings award and won. The Court of Queen's Bench set aside the $2,500 award since the woman's lawyer did not ask for damages, and the commission said nothing about hurt feelings during the proceedings and did not give the store the chance to respond to the issue of injury to self-respect.
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Workplace Stress
(OTTAWA) Reduce stress, workload, and work time to improve work-life balance, the Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC) says.
PSAC recently issued a report entitled Karoshi, which is the Japanese term used to describe the increase in the number of workers stricken with heart disease as a result of heightened pressure and excessive working hours. The report states that, after more than 15 years of increased pressure to work more quickly and put in longer hours, Canadians are stressed out, overworked, and tired.
Information from Statistics Canada’s 1998 General Social Survey indicates as much — 35% of Canadian workers said they were stressed as a result of too much work and too many work hours, compared with 27.5% in 1991.
Causes of workplace stress, according to the PSAC report, include an overload or underload of work; the pace, variety, and meaningfulness of the work; not enough or too many work hours; the inability to make your own decisions about your job or specific tasks; the physical environment, such as noise and air quality; isolation (emotional or physical); role conflict (conflicting job demands or multiple supervisors); and role ambiguity (lack of clarity about responsibilities and expectations). Other factors to consider are the level of responsibility, under- or over-promotion, job insecurity, career development opportunities, overall job satisfaction, interpersonal work relationships, and the organizational structure and climate, for example, participation in decision making, management style, and communication patterns.
“In addition to work-related stress factors, there are other stress factors arising from, for example, the need to care for elderly persons and provide high-quality care for children,” the report says. “What is more, with the aging of the population and an increase in the number of single-parent families, more and more Canadians find themselves alone in taking care of children and sick or aging parents, which accentuates the stress those workers feel.”
Not surprisingly, professionals and managers feel the highest stress levels; almost 50% of workers in both these groups reported that they are stressed, according to Statistics Canada data for 1998. Similarly, more than 40% of Statistics Canada survey respondents working in education, health, and social services said they were stressed. Stress levels were also high in government, with 35% of workers feeling stressed.
PSAC says a partial solution to negative workplace stress is improved management of workload and time, which would ease tensions in the workplace and off the job. “A workplace where we feel in control of our workload and have the flexibility to organize our schedules, and a workplace that facilitates work-life balance will help to reduce the stress from work and work-life conflicts,” the report says. Among the report’s suggestions to improve workplace stress are shortening the work week; expanding the definition of full-time employee; reducing or eliminating overtime, particularly unpaid overtime; and allowing voluntary reduction in hours by workers experiencing conflict between work and family life.
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Co-op Training
(OAKVILLE, Ont.) Employers will have access to more apprentices with a higher level of training under Ontario’s new co-op training program.
The Ontario government recently announced $2 million in funding for the new Co-op Diploma Apprenticeship Program, which will provide both apprenticeship certification and a college diploma in less time than it would generally take a student to complete both programs back-to-back. Apprenticeship training is done in the workplace where an apprentice learns first-hand from experienced skilled workers.
“A more highly skilled workforce is critical to Ontario’s economic growth,” says Dianne Cunningham, minister of Training, Colleges and Universities. “By combining a college diploma with apprenticeship training, we are giving students a new opportunity to earn skills that lead to high-paying jobs.”
The province has issued a call for proposals to colleges to develop curricula under the new model for the cook and precision machining and tooling trades. The initiative will later expand to other skilled trades. Training sites will be chosen through a formal selection process to take place this fall.
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Pension Agreement
The Royal Bank of Canada has reached a tentative settlement of a pension dispute with Royal Trust employees. To read this article, please Click Here.
False Harassment Claims
A judge found that a woman made false harassment claims because her employer wouldn't give her a letter of reference... To read this article, please Click Here.
School Board Retaliated
A school board retaliated against an educator for filing a human rights complaint, a board of inquiry found. To read this article, please Click Here.
Insurance Industry
The home, auto, and business insurance industry is recovering slowly but will remain weak for at least a year. To read this article, please Click Here.
Quebec Employment
Quebec created nearly half of all new jobs in Canada in the first six months of 2002. To read this article, please Click Here.
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