You made a dream come true and started a small business recently. Before hiring your first employees, you want to set them and your company up for success with solid company policies.
Project Include shares a guide for crafting the ideal company code of conduct. Use these tips to stay on the right side of employment law and help your workforce understand the behavior you expect from them.
Create comprehensive policies
You can use your company values and mission to direct your code of conduct. It makes sense to implement other company policies at the same time as the code of conduct, such as your anti-harassment, anti-discrimination, confidentiality and inclusive benefits policies. Double-check that you use consistent language not only for employees but also for customers, organizations and suppliers.
Make it visible
Your code of conduct and other policies do not do you or anyone else much good if no one sees them. Post the code on your entity’s internal site. Another reason to make the code visible is to show you value what the policy achieves and the message it sends.
Specify those covered
Consider the level of diversity you wish to bring to and see in your company, and include it in the code of conduct policy. Think about commonly excluded minority groups, and mention legally protected groups.
Include a process for reporting complaints
In case someone violates your code of conduct or another policy, let your employees know how to report complaints. For instance, who should workers bring their concerns to? What information should they include in their reports?
When your business has the right policies, you empower your employees to soar and succeed.