The political news of the week has all been about the impending new ‘Right to Disconnect’ law that seems certain to pass into law. The new right has been included in the second wave of the Government’s Closing Loopholes legislation which has the support of the Greens and the crossbench in the Senate and has […]
Natasha Hawker was a guest on Channel 7’s Sunrise programme today to discuss annual leave. Currently the norm and indeed minimum requirement for full time employees is four weeks of Annual Leave. Some large corporates such as IKEA and Bunnings are moving to provide five weeks. What are the pros and cons and what negative […]
This webinar, hosted by Employee Matters founder Natasha Hawker, addresses the ER Legislation Changes rolled out across Australia in 2022, 2023 and throughout 2024. The changes affect all businesses and are mandatory to implement. Topics covered in the webinar include: Respect@Work Bargaining Orders Family and Domestic Violence Leave Discrimination Pay Secrecy Flexible Work Enterprise Bargaining […]
Job interviews can be among the most nerve-wracking human experiences. From the overthinking of potential questions and anxiety over stumbling on words, they’re rarely particularly enjoyable for the interviewee. The interviewer, however, has a considerably calmer experience, walking in with knowledge of what they’re looking for and what they’re about to ask. To make things […]
An end-of-year party is the perfect way to celebrate success and reward your staff. Natasha Hawker, managing director of HR consultancy Employee Matters, points out it may also be a rare opportunity for your team to interact in person. “Work these days is more flexible and remote and there can be long periods of time […]
Did you know – interns should always get paid for an internship, unless it’s part of their studies. Natasha Hawker was consulted for this Lifehacker article which is a must read for prospective interns and businesses alike. Click Here for complete article
In the wake of the global shift towards remote work, businesses worldwide have undergone a significant transformation in their work culture. While the benefits of working from home are plentiful, it is crucial to address the health and safety aspects associated with this new mode of operation. In this blog post, we will explore and […]
It has been a busy year already for employers to manage changes in workplace regulations and events impacting business. New Annualised Hours rules for some Awards, more proposals by the government to deal with underpayments and Wage Theft and the impact of the bushfires and currently of COVID-19. But the pace does not let up […]
Do you pay your employees an “all up amount” annualised salary? For some awards there are significant changes on the way in 2020. Is your business ready? As part of the four yearly review of modern awards, the Fair Work Commission handed down a decision impacting annualised wage (salary) provision changes for certain Awards. When […]
You’re a growing business offering a competitive package with flexible working conditions and all the latest benefits, but you still find those good people, who really make a difference, hard to find. So where are they? Well, there’s no simple answer to this question, but one area that can offer some insight is the significant […]
Businesses in Australia are becoming subject to an increasing focus on incidents of wage theft. The Fair Work Amendment (Protecting Vulnerable Workers) Act of 2017 has introduced significantly higher penalties for a range of contraventions. Fines of up to $630,000 for a company and $126,000 for an individual now apply in relation to matters that […]
I bet you used to think that using Independent Contractors was easy. Essentially, they needed to be working for you for no more than 80% of the time, have an ABN and invoice you for the work, and – bingo – you had an Independent Contractor. No need to worry about PAYG, workers compensation or […]
So you have have carefully studied the arrangements you have with your independent contractors and taken some good advice to protect yourself from the argument that you may be “Sham Contracting”. You can now sit back and breathe a sigh of relief that they are responsible for all their benefits, right? Not So Fast! […]
So you’ve been doing this small business thing for a while now. You’ve got the logo, some employees and the business is streaming in… but forming a company identity is still sitting at the bottom of your pile of to do’s. Sound familiar? You’re not alone. Creating a company identity can seem overwhelming – as […]
Icare will be introducing some changes early this year with the intention that it will make the workers insurance scheme easier to use and more accessible for insurance companies, that are agents of icare, and also for businesses with workers compensation insurance. The main changes are as follows: Icare will undertake all policy and […]
You may have recently heard about the 7-Eleven debacle where a store owner was fined more than $400k (the largest penalty to date) for systematically exploiting his workers. He paid his workers as little as only $13 per hour and then falsified records in his payroll system. After being caught, he started to back-pay his […]
At the end of last week, a client rang me – she was fed up, she had had enough and needed our help. One of her employees: Had taken excessive amounts of paid and unpaid sick leave without providing any medical certificates and then claimed he was working from home while off sick Was aggressive […]
Last week, I met Carol at the Coles checkout. I asked her (while she was serving another customer) whether they sold cool bags. She did not respond – not because she was ignoring me – but she didn’t hear me. That was when I saw that she had a hearing aid (in fact a cochlear […]
So you now have your first employee or employees – congratulations! But now what? – A point to note – within the first 12 months new hires are a high risk for resignation as this is when they have limited loyalty to your business and if it is not working for them they will walk. […]
Why don’t small businesses measure their employee costs? Largely, it is because they don’t understand the formulae to use. Then there is the time required to analyse the data and make more effective decisions using it. Employees are often a ‘means to an end’, a mystery and time consuming frustration for employers. The best way […]
If you knew what I am about to share with you, before you started your business, you would probably never have started one in Australia. It is a legal minefield, fraught with significant risk of breaching several laws and fines of potentially hundreds of thousands of dollars. I promise, I’m not exaggerating. Then there are […]
Being sacked just two months into a payroll position absolutely floored a Brisbane woman. It was just like any other Monday morning when Angela Manderson walked into the office. However, she hadn’t even sat down when she was tapped on the shoulder. She was called into the bosses’ office. “I was told that I was […]
Recently, FWA ruled that Home Choice had unfairly dismissed an employee who had emailed the entire company calling his MD a name (rhyming with banker!) and stating that one of his hobbies was masturbation. Pretty extreme I would say, so why couldn’t they fire him and what can we learn from this case? Culture – […]
These simple steps in the article will help you ‘navigate’ the silly season and help to have all of your employees feel that they ‘matter’ to you. We have hit the ‘silly season’ and there is a very good reason that it is called just that. We typically eat, drink and party more enthusiastically than […]
Can you smell the whiff of confidence in the air now we are in teh new year Now the economy things seem to be looking up are you thinking about a merger or acquisition? Many SMEs decide one of the quickest ways to grow your business is to buy another one. There is a lot […]
Why would you ever want to do an exit interview? Just recently, a client of ours had a senior member of the team resign and we are assisting them with the replacement of this role. We have just conducted an independent exit interview with the employee leaving the role – you might ask ‘why?’ You […]
Why do you need to care about culture or about providing a great place to work? Maybe it might help to answer these questions first: Fancy increasing your revenue by 400%? What about improving your client’s customer service experience by three times? Do you want the majority of your employees to be high performers? Have […]
A couple of years back, the Federal Government announced that it was making changes to Guaranteed Superannuation Contributions – these changes will finally come into effect on 1 July 2013. What does this mean for me and my business? Compulsory superannuation contributions are made by employers of behalf of their employees. At the moment, the […]