How to Draft an Effective Employee Handbook

If you are going to have employees in your new business, you need a way to guide those employees from day to day. They will need to know what to do, what they are responsible for, how to respond to certain situations, and more. And while you’ll certainly be doing plenty of direct training to get them up to speed, having a thorough employee handbook on hand will go a long way toward keeping everyone on the same page.

It might seem simple enough to sit down and write out a document that covers everything employees need to do, but you’ll quickly find that the task is actually rather intimidating. Use this post to get started in the right direction and hopefully your handbook will start to come together sooner rather than later.

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Understand the Purpose of an Employee Handbook

Before you sit down to write a single line of a workers handbook, or before you hire someone to do that work for you, it’s important to understand what you are trying to accomplish here. First and foremost, this is a communication tool that helps employees understand things like the vision and mission of the company, the expectations that apply to all employees, standard policies, and more. When a handbook is comprehensive, it should offer nearly everything an employee will need to know to stay on track throughout their employment.

There is also an element of legal defense involved with creating an employee handbook. You certainly want to stay away from any issues with discrimination or harassment, for example, so the handbook should highlight the policies you are using to prevent both of those things from occurring. You can also use the employee handbook to clarify the termination process and what employees can expect if they are going to be let go.

Ultimately, you can think of your employee handbook as the go-to document for everything to do with working in your business. If any questions come up for employees, they should be able to turn to the handbook they were provided and immediately track down the answer or some clarification. And, as we’ll talk about more later, you’ll want to be sure that this handbook stays current so it is always a valuable resource even many years into the future.

Draft a Clear Outline to Structure the Content

It’s always easier to produce a quality document when you are working from an outline. By taking some time to put a general outline in place, you can then go back later and basically “fill in the blanks” to come up with a completed handbook.

While every handbook is going to be a little bit different based on the specifics of the business in question, there is a general shape that most of these documents take. You can use the list below as a starting point for your outline – this should get you close, and you can then make the appropriate tweaks to put the final outline in the right position to start writing.

• In this opening section, you want to welcome the employee to the business, introduce the leadership team, and outline the mission and vision of the company. You can also use this section to highlight what the handbook is for and what will be found throughout the rest of the document.
• Employment policies. It’s good to place this section somewhere near the front, as it is critically important. This is where you’ll place things like information on anti-discrimination policies, equal employment opportunity, workplace conduct expectations, and more.
• Compensation and benefits. Here, you will be able to explain when paychecks are sent, what terms apply to overtime pay, how raises work, etc. There should also be information on the benefits that come with employment, such as health insurance, paid time off, sick leave, and more. You can cut down dramatically on the number of questions you receive on these topics by carefully outlining them in the employee handbook.
• Workplace policies. How do you expect employees to ask for time off? What happens if an employee misses too many days of work? These kinds of questions can be answered in a workplace policies section. These days, it’s also important for some businesses to explain their stance on remote work, as employees who work primarily on computers may want to spend some of their time working from home.
• Social media policy. Another modern concern that should be addressed in your handbook relates to social media use. Are employees permitted to represent the company online in any way? If you have social media restrictions that you want to put in place to protect your brand, now is the time to spell out those rules.
• Discipline and termination. Somewhere near the end of the handbook, outline the process for disciplining employees, as well as the termination process. You don’t want to lead off with these negative subjects, but it is important for it to be included in the handbook. You can explain how many warnings are provided before disciplinary action is taken, how employees can air grievances, and when the company may act to terminate an employee.

Place an Emphasis on Clarity

It’s important to remember that this is not a document that is written for people at the management level. Rather, it’s written for everyone who works in the company, and those individuals are likely to have a range of reading and comprehension levels. So, with that in mind, clarity is key. Don’t use complicated language or unnecessary jargon. It’s a good practice to go back through the handbook after you have written a first draft to find any opportunities to take out extra words and condense the book down to just what is necessary to get the message across.

In addition to the actual writing, formatting plays a big role in how well your employee handbook is received. Use plenty of headers and subheaders to break up the content and make it easy to scan. Most likely, your employees aren’t going to sit down and read this handbook like a novel – rather, it will be used as a reference guide to look up the information they need at the moment. Good formatting will make it easier to find that information and will make it more likely that the employees actually consult the book instead of just asking a manager for help.

One other way to make the handbook as useful, and clear, as possible is to include contact information for the relevant parties in your company. In a small business, this might mean just listing your own phone number and email address as the owner. In a larger company, you could have contact information for the human resources department where questions can be asked and complaints can be filed. Rather than needing to scramble to figure out who they can contact with a problem that isn’t solved by the content of the handbook, employees should be able to quickly pick out that information.

This is a Living Document

There is simply no chance that your original employee handbook is going to be the finished product that serves your business well for years. The nature of business – and life – is such that things are always changing and you are going to need to keep up with those changes by updating your employee handbook regularly. It won’t be as much work to update it as it is to create the original, but you’ll want to stay on top of it and avoid falling too far behind.

One of the best ways to make sure your employee handbook doesn’t fall out of date is to schedule an annual review of the document. It’s best to schedule this during a time of year that is generally quiet for the business. So, for example, if your business tends to be busiest during the spring and summer, use a time during the winter months to go over the handbook and make any changes that you deem necessary. Of course, once the updates are made, you’ll need to notify all employees of those changes, and you might even have a meeting to go over them in detail.

Building a Strong Foundation

Having a great employee manual in place can serve as one of the foundational pieces of your business. But it’s not the only thing you need in order to have a stable, smooth operation that continues to grow and thrive for years to come. If you would like to chat with Fisher Stone about the needs of your business – things like formally registering your business, filing for trademarks, and more – take a moment now to get in touch. We’d love to get to know you and your business and help you take a big step forward. Let’s get started!