SALT LAKE CITY – Under the leadership of Governor Gary R. Herbert, first as Lt. Governor and now as Governor, the State of Utah has climbed to the top spot in Forbes Magazine’s annual ranking of “The Best States for Business and Careers.”

Utah ranks No. 1 in the report, released Wednesday, bumping Virginia from its four-year reign in the top spot. Among the factors that placed the Beehive State at the top are:

• Annual economic expansion of 3.5% over the past five years
• Annual total employment increase of 1.5%
• Annual increase in household income of 5%
• Decrease of corporate tax rate from 7% to 5%
• Energy costs that are 35% below the national average

“While magazine rankings do not tell the whole story, they certainly create a narrative that shows Utah has all the elements that make us a successful place to start or expand a business and a desirable location to live and raise a family,” Governor Herbert said. “Several years ago, we made a conscious decision to make economic development a priority. We have since consistently climbed in the rankings and, in the past year, our leadership pushed Utah to the top of the list.”

Forbes’ “Best States” ranking measures six categories for business: costs, labor supply, regulatory environment, current economic climate, growth prospects and quality of life.

Utah’s rankings in those categories are:

• Business Costs: 8
• Labor Supply: 5
• Regulatory Environment: 6
• Economic Climate: 1
• Growth Prospects: 20
• Quality of Life: 18

In announcing this year’s results, Forbes noted that while states across the nation have suffered as a result of the national economic downturn, some states, like Utah, have weathered the downturn better than others. The magazine notes: “But some areas are doing better than others, and for many of them, it isn’t an accident. Who’s doing the best job when it comes to fostering growth? Utah.”

“This recognition shows that not only is the State of Utah open for business, it shows that our businesses can compete anywhere in the nation and the world,” said Jason Perry, Governor Herbert’s chief of staff and former executive director of the Governor’s Office of Economic Development.

After selecting Perry to serve as his chief of staff, the Governor appointed Spencer Eccles in September 2009 to serve as GOED’s new executive director. Both appointments served as proof of the Governor’s commitment to economic development in the State.

“The Governor’s directive to me was to continue to make Utah a state where businesses not only wanted to be, but a state where they needed to be,” Eccles said. “We have succeeded in ensuring that Utah has a pro-business environment and an unparalleled quality of life. We will continue to support our existing Utah companies while attracting others to the State.”

Under Governor Herbert’s leadership, the State has announced major expansions of Utah businesses and the relocation of other notable companies to the Beehive State. Forbes notes the many businesses, such as Goldman Sachs, Oracle, eBay and Adobe, which recently acquired Utah’s own Omniture, have recognized the benefits of operating in Utah. Other homegrown companies like Merit Medical, Nelson Laboratories and Sun Products (formerly Huish) have expanded with the assistance of the State and local
communities.

Along with Eccles, GOED operates under the leadership of Derek Miller and Josh Romney, also appointed by Governor Herbert in September 2009 to serve as an economic ambassador to Utah. Together, the Governor’s Office and GOED have forged partnerships between the Utah Legislature, local governments, education and the private sector through initiatives such as the Economic Development Corporation of Utah, USTAR and the Utah Cluster Acceleration Partnership.

“This is a great day for the State of Utah, but I also understand there are still businesses and families in the State that continue to struggle as we emerge from the national recession,” Governor Herbert said. “As Governor, my promise to all Utahns is that I will continue to foster economic growth throughout the State. Expanding our tax base is the single best way to fully fund public education and to pay for other critical state services such as public safety and human services.”

Over the past year, the State has seen the addition of 19,000 new jobs and, as noted by Forbes, now showing positive job growth. Also, preliminary data indicate that statewide sales tax collections are significantly up over this time last year and the State is expected to see revenue growth for the first time in several years – all encouraging factors that point to economic growth in Utah.

The full Forbes article in available online at www.forbes.com/2010/10/13/best-states-forbusiness-business-beltway-best-states.html.

Congratulations to Parallel HR Solutions and our employees for our recognition as an Emerging Elite Company for the Mountain West Capital Network‘s “Utah 100″!

Congratulations to all employees at Parallel HR for receiving the award as a “Top 25 Under 5″ Company at UVEF’s 2010 event! We are so proud and thankful for all the hard work and effort that has been put forth by our TEAM! We look forward to continuing to grow and provide the best Client Services in the Staffing Industry.

Check out the links below:
UVEF Top 25 Under 5
Utah’s Fastest-Growing Startups Recognized

Our team of experts fields real-life everyday questions from HR managers and gives practical answers that can be applied by any HR pro in the same situation. Today’s question: We got a report about an employee’s drug-related arrest. What action should we take?

Question:
We learned through a local newspaper that one of our employees was arrested recently for DUI and drug possession. We’re concerned about workplace safety and other issues — his manager said there were suspicions that the employee had used drugs on the job.

What do we do now?

Answer:
Conduct an independent investigation, recommends employment-law attorney Roy Ginsburg.

First, talk to the employee about what happened. If you want to verify his version of the events, you could also get a copy of the police report.

Once you have the facts straight, speak with the employee and let him know you think he has a problem and that you want to help.

If he’s defensive, noncommittal or defiant, those are red flags. You might want to go to the next step, such as requiring that he take a drug test.

Often, when an employer gets sued, the first thing a company’s lawyer says is, “Let’s see your employee handbook.” If it’s old and unrevised, the next thing the lawyer often says is, “We have a problem.”

Outdated policies or the failure to properly inform employees about new policies can be a big black mark against employers defending themselves against a bias charge. So there’s no better way to kick off the New Year — in a business sense — than by making sure your handbook is up to date. The top-priority items to check:

• New FMLA regulations. The U.S.  Department of Labor has revised the Family and Medical Leave Act regulations a couple of times in the last year. Further, the DOL requires employers provide each employee a notice of their updated FMLA rights in a handbook or a handout at the time of hire. Failure to do so will be the first area attacked in a lawsuit over FMLA leave.
• Genetic Discrimination. The recently passed Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act prohibits discrimination on the basis of an employee’s genetic information. What follows is that your employee handbook should include genetic information among the “protected” traits that have EEO status.
• Privacy and electronic devices. Employees may have privacy expectations in their use of company computers and other devices, such as PDAs. Still, courts have ruled generally that employers can monitor and limit computer and electronic-device usage for improper activities such as accessing “adult” materials, inappropriate e-mails, or outside business use, as well as strains on bandwidth. The handbook is one effective way to serve notice about company  monitoring policies and employee restrictions on use.
• Social Networking. Facebook, Twitter and similar sites have become part of our culture — and our workplaces. More and more companies are instituting policies regarding limits to access of such sites during work time and what employees may disclose about their workplace. Such policies should be part of your handbook.

E-mails are more often being viewed by judges as evidence in employment law cases. Managers should change their e-mailing habits accordingly.

In addition to the official performance review, a court may look at e-mails related to a fired employee’s performance. That could be both good and bad for companies.

If the content of the e-mails is consistent with the company’s decision to fire the employee, a court might look at that favorable. But if a manager repeatedly praised the employee through e-mail, that’s a different story.

The best bet? Managers should understand that e-mail creates a permanent record and that they shouldn’t write anything they wouldn’t want to print out and keep in the employee’s personnel file.

One way to improve employees’ understanding of the benefits you provide them with:

Plan to meet with them one-on-one a few more times than usual this year.

Nearly 90% of company execs think one-on-one meetings between a benefits counselor and each employee would significantly improve workers’ understanding of their benefits, found a recent Colonial Life survey.

In addition, 92% of employers feel it’s very important to their business for employees to understand and appreciate their benefits.

Only 1 in 4 to increase efforts

But what’s surprising is that only 27% of businesses plan to increase benefits communication, found a separate Watson Wyatt study.

So conducting more face-to-face meetings between Benefits and individual employees could be a great way to set your company apart.

Does your company provide employees with cell phones or smartphones to use for business calls? If so, you may need to watch out for a big security concern.

A recent UK survey of companies and institutions revealed that 79% of employees conduct confidential conversations by cell phone, and 51% do so on a daily basis. However, only 18% of companies had security software in place on their phones.

Even businesses that carefully secure other communications may be unaware of the issue. Most people are used to making calls from standard, wired telephones, where security isn’t that big of an issue (unless the police or the FBI are wiretapping you). But cell phone signals can be picked up far more easily.

Cell phone service providers do provide some encryption with their services, but it is highly vulnerable.

What this means for your business is that such critical details as sales discounts, planned bids and sales leads, which are often discussed via cell phone, might fall into your rivals’ hands.

Problems could stem from a lack of communication between IT and management. If IT isn’t aware of what sort of calls are being made on the company-owned equipment, they may neglect to take proper security measures.

It’s important for IT to know what company-issued phones are being used for. That way, they can increase protection on the phone, if necessary.

Congress and President Obama have floated several ideas for creating jobs. Some of the ideas that probably will be funded are aimed at specific industries.

What’s not on Congress’ agenda yet: The president’s proposal to give tax credits to small businesses that hire new employees. None of the current proposals on Capitol Hill have that component. House Democratic leaders did pass a $100 billion job-creation bill, but the tax credit for hiring wasn’t in there.

What is in the bill and coming from the White House:

• The president will announce plans to provide $5 billion more in tax credits for makers of wind, solar, electric-vehicle and other renewable-energy products. The president’s plan is to get the ball rolling for “green” industries and then attract $15 billion in private investment — and create jobs in the industry.
• The U.S. House’s bill contains money for infrastructure projects, water projects, affordable-housing construction and renovation, and school construction and renovation.

In any case, the Senate won’t consider or vote on the House bill — or a bill to give tax credits for hiring — until some time after the first of the year.

The differences between the employee retirement benefits offered by large companies and those offered by small and mid-size companies are shrinking rapidly.

A recent Watson Wyatt study found 55% of companies in the Fortune 100 only offer their employees defined contribution (DC) plans — 401(k), etc. — as opposed to traditional defined benefit (DB) plans — like closed or frozen pension plans.

That’s a big jump from having 46% of employers who only offered DC plans a couple of years ago — and it marks the first time that a majority of Fortune 100 companies are only offering DC plans.

The study also found that an increasing number of Fortune 100 employers are offering hybrid pension plans — account-based cash balance plans, etc. — instead of traditional DB plans.

What are your peers’ plans for adding new technologies next year?

Due to increased budgets, most companies plan to make their HR tech operations more efficient in 2010, rather than making new purchases, according to a recent survey by the International Association for Human Resource Information Management (IHRIM). Of the companies surveyed:

• 26% plan to “optimize currently implemented systems”
• 24% will implement previously purchased modules, and
• 19% will try to consolidate multiple systems under one vendor.

The good news: For most companies, the HR tech budget won’t go down. More than half of respondents said they’re spending will remain the same, 30% said it will increase, and 19% expect a decrease.

Among companies who will increase spending, they said they plan to invest more in:

• performance management systems (31.1%)
• business intelligence software (22.4%)
• e-recruiting and applicant tracking (21.3%)
• core HR management systems (20%), and
• onboarding programs (20%).

When HR manager Theresa Lane wanted to find out what employees liked and didn’t like about HR’s policies, she decided to do a survey. Problem: People weren’t responding — until she figured out an irresistible, and inexpensive, hook.

Her story:

Whenever we made changes in benefits and HR policies, we liked to get employee feedback to ensure everyone was on board with our ideas.

The typical way of doing that was to send out an employee survey and then tally and analyze the responses.

Problem: Before you can tally and analyze the responses, you have to have some responses. People either just weren’t filling out the surveys or were taking forever to get them back to us.

It was frustrating, but we understood that employees were busy and kept putting the surveys on the back burner. We had to give them a good reason to respond.

Let’s do a good deed
We got an idea when one of our employees talked about taking up a workplace collection for a local charity.

Our suggestion: The company will make a small donation to the charity for every completed employee survey.

That gave us a champion for the cause – the person who was collecting for the charity and would “talk up” taking part in the surveys – and gave employees another reason to complete and return their surveys to us.

And it worked. We got back more surveys than we’d ever gotten before, giving us valuable info on which to base decisions. Plus, we did a good deed by donating to the charity.

(Theresa Lane, HR manager, Cutler, ME)

While many companies are reluctant to completely ban social networking sites in the workplace, there are some steps employers can take to minimize legal risks.

The primary dangers of employees using the sites include:

• legal issues, such as defamation and harassment
• the leaking of confidential information, and
• damage to the company’s reputation.

One solution many companies have found to be effective: Let employees know they’re being monitored.

It’s not enough to have employees sign off a policy when they’re hired — experts say firms should send periodic reminders to employees to refresh their memories of the policy and the company’s monitoring practices.

It won’t stop all personal Web use — and it must be combined with a serious and consistent enforcement of the policy — but it should dissuade employees from using the Web inappropriately while at work.

A recent court case illustrates one more quirk to be aware of when classifying employees as exempt or nonexempt under the Fair Labor Standards Act.

A loan underwriter for a New York bank sued under the FLSA, saying he should be paid for the overtime he regularly worked.

His employer argued that he qualified as exempt, since he was an “administrative” employee.

Under the FLSA, an employee qualifies for the administrative exemption if he or she does work that’s “directly related to management policies or general business operations” and “regularly exercises discretion and independent judgment.”

No discretion involved
The man claimed he reviewed loan applications using the bank’s Credit Guide – a detailed document setting strict parameters for lending. He simply followed procedures to come up with a yes-or-no decision. No discretion was exercised.

The judge sided with the employee. The man was engaged in the “production” of loans – the fundamental product offered by the bank. Thus, he wasn’t an exempt employee.

Cite: Davis v. J.P. Morgan Chase

Managers in your company may have had problems with employees focused on fantasy football leagues during time they should’ve spent working. But have any been fired just for belonging to a fantasy league?

That’s what happened to four Fidelity Investments employees recently. Management intercepted an e-mail discussing the activity, investigated and fired employees who had organized the pools.

You see, competing in a fantasy football league for money ($20, in this case) is technically gambling, which is technically illegal in most places.

Fidelity also has its own policy against gambling in the workplace. Cameron Pettigrew, one of the employees who was fired, was aware of the policy, but claimed it was never strictly enforced, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram reports. He said he knew of several managers and execs who also played fantasy football.

In addition to the legality, the company said it also prohibits fantasy football because it’s a distraction. One recent study estimates a nationwide productivity loss of $275 to $435 million for each week of the football season.

But, many claim, it’s just one of many distractions — a list that includes social networking and holiday shopping. And we’d bet not many employees have been fired just for having a Facebook account.

Whatever your company’s policy, one thing’s clear: It needs to be enforced consistently. Letting execs do something that rank-and-file can’t sends the wrong message to employees (and, with a company of Fidelity’s stature, could send that message to the rest of the world, too).

What’s your opinion? Should Fidelity have fired the fantasy footballers? Let us know in the comments section below.

Has your company taken this necessary step to ensure it’s not paying a penny more than it needs to for health care? If not, you could be wasting some serious cash.

The move all companies will want to make: conducting a dependent eligibility audit. It’ll ensure everyone you’re paying for is still eligible for coverage.

The last thing any company can afford to do these days is foot the bill for folks who are no longer entitled to receive your health benefits.

The payoff is there for the taking: Companies that conduct dependent audits see an immediate 3%-10% drop in dependent care expenses, found Aon Consulting in its new Benefits and Talent Survey.

Worrying about competition for talent probably isn’t your biggest concern right now. But it’s coming, especially in some industries and for some job titles.

The U.S. Labor Department released its report on 10-year projections for job and industry growth. Here’s what’s in the report.

First, as just about everyone knows, the manufacturing sector will continue to drop, even after a loss of about two million jobs in the sector over the last year, and they are unlikely to return.

Total employment is expected to rise in the next 10 years by 15.3 million, or 10.1%. That’s better than the 7.4% increase in the most recent 10-year period, but the numbers can be deceiving, since the recession dragged down the numbers so badly in the most recent 10-year period. Plus, we’re starting a low point in employment, so there’s a lot of room for growth.

Construction. The number of jobs will rise by 1.3 million, but even with the increase, there will be a percentage decrease when compared with the job market as a whole.

The service sector. Expect 96% of job growth to come out of this sector in the next 10 years — in particular in professional and business services, and health care and social assistance. Jobs in health care, which grew even during the recession, will skyrocket.

Which positions will see the most growth? The Labor Department projects increases of:

• 72% for biomedical engineers
• 53% for systems and data analysts
• 50% for home health aides
• 41% for financial examiners

If employees send text messages on the company’s dime, the company should be able to monitor them, right? Maybe not, according to recent court decisions.

An employer gave cell phones to a group of employees so they could communicate via text messages. The contract with the wireless provider said the company would be charged an overage fee if any phone sent more than a certain number of words in a given month. Employees had to reimburse the company for those charges.

After one employee went over his limit four times, the company obtained copies of his messages from the wireless provider. The transcripts revealed the employee was sending a lot of personal messages — in fact, many of them were sexually explicit.

The employee was disciplined, but sued, claiming his privacy was violated when the vendor provided — and the company read — his personal messages.

A jury ruled in favor of the company, before an appeals court reversed the decision. The reason: The messages weren’t the company’s property because they were stored by a third-party vendor (unlike company e-mail, which is often held on the company’s own network).

Now, the Supreme Court has agreed to hear the case. We’ll keep you posted on the outcome.

Cite: Quon v. Arch Wireless

This time of year, accidents are just waiting to happen. The most likely to put a dent in your workers’ comp and disability bill? 

Slip and fall accidents.

The causes are easy to spot:

• Icy or snowy sidewalks, steps, etc.
• It’s dark when employees leave, so there’s less viability when employees are heading home, and
• Wet floors — either from the water and mud that gets dragged in on workers’ shoes or from trying to clean salt tracked in from outside walkways.

But preventing these seriously expensive injuries takes some stick-to-itiveness. Here are some ways HR and benefits pros can help make sure they don’t run up high medical bills:

• Make sure someone (preferably your facilities manager) conducts a safety survey regularly, both within and outside your facility to identify hazardous areas
• Have the person any problems immediately, and
• Keep a paper trail of all inspections and corrections to prove your company made a good faith effort to correct hazards — which will help avoid a lawsuit if someone got hurt.

You know the saying about looking a gift horse in the mouth. Just be careful you don’t end up looking like the other end of the horse.

This comes from the folks at the Emily Post Institute. As you might imagine, they specialize in, among other things, the etiquette of gift-giving at work — what’s appropriate, inappropriate and disastrous. So, here’s a test to see if you’re up on the latest from the Institute (answers at the bottom):

1. Which of the following is considered an inappropriate gift to someone at work?

a. Perfume

b. Jewelry.

c. Lingerie

d. Alcohol

e. All of the above

2. You’re invited to an after-work holiday party at your boss’ home. An inappropriate gift to bring would be –

a. Chocolates

b. Wine

c. A poinsettia plant

d. All of the above are appropriate.

3. True or false: Giving your boss a gift in the workplace is appropriate.

4. You’re a man in a workplace in which everyone exchanges gifts. It’s OK to give a woman a gift certificate to Victoria’s Secret. True or false.

5. In a workplace in which everyone exchanges gifts, it’s inappropriate to give a dictionary to a new employee whose first language is not English. True or false.

Answers

1. e. Just about any gift of that type is considered too personal for someone who’s a work colleague.

2. b. Generally, alcohol is considered an inappropriate gift, especially for the boss.

3. False. Workplace gifts for the boss, given individually, are considered inappropriate, since such gift-giving can appear to be an attempt to curry favoritism. However, it’s OK for a group to chip in for a gift for the boss.

4. False. Again, gifts that are of a personal nature generally are out of bounds. Plus, they might send the wrong message.

5. True. Any gift that potentially serves to underscore a worker’s fault or shortcoming is inappropriate — even if given in the spirit of trying to help.