The Department of Labor (DOL) is the federal leader in encouraging government management training in human resources (HR) policy, process and procedure construction. Due dilligence is required for HR policies and related procedures pertaining to safety, accessibility, representation and anything that applies to companies receiving federal money.

Policies and procedures that do not reflect actual skills and worker relationships often fail because they are created by a manager in a vacuum. Including all managerial stakeholders (CEO, chief financial officer, program manager, supervisor, employees) in the feedback loop will ensure a better process. Hiring an outside analyst who has no stake in the outcome is often the best way to get a clear statement of corporate will.

Completing a positive audit is a best practice for ensuring that all procedures have been reviewed. The audit process for procedures remains the same whether it involves safety, information technology (IT), accounting or security. Companies need to ask themselves if they have a set of policies governing procedures, a process that governs how procedures are created and a record that the company actually follows goverment-required policies, processes and procedures. A positive audit is that record.

Definitions

• A policy is a statement of purpose.
• A process is how a company develops procedures from stated policies.
• A procedure is a step-by-step instruction on related work in accordance with a policy.

Company Responsibility

A Corporate Executive Board white paper details a process for creating and managing HR policies. It details the role of the central policy group, prioritization and creation of policies and enforcement and review of existing policies. The combination of a central authority connecting to all the stakeholders and a guarantee of employee feedback helps contracting companies gain buy-in from both managerial authorities and all employees.

Employee Responsibility

Employees will feel less bound to a policy if they are left out of the review. They need to give feedback to all policy groups because any change may directly affect their jobs. An example would be if a disabled employee discovers a direct federal policy violation when a new building is being erected with no easy wheelchair access. Although the employee's supervisor is not responsible for the problem, the employee should still follow every HR chain of command until a solution has been reached. The procedure for the employee HR complaint follows the set policy in federal regulations (Section 508). A policy auditor will see the complaint and its resolution and report back to the central policy group.

Policy Development Tips

Considering the responsibilities previously stated, what does it mean to have a good policy and procedure and to pass a government audit of that procedure? One example from federal government IT policy is that the originator of a code cannot be its reviewer and an auditor cannot be the originator or the reviewer. This requirement means that three separate people with three separate signatures are needed to pass a review process.

A security procedure needs to follow a similar course. The person who initially enters a new employee into the database cannot be the person who verifies the information nor the person who cross-references the electronic signatures into a common file to ensure a secure audit trail.

The Positive Audit

A positive audit is a complete documentation of what a procedure should look like if all known procedures are followed. It is often a single piece of paper with all the necessary signatures. Even a negative audit, such as the previously mentioned 508 complaint, shows good governance if an auditor can look at the document, see that a given procedure was followed to its logical conclusion; the appropriate departments were notified, consulted and documented in the procedural discussion and that a procedure was changed to address the need.

Policy and Procedure Auditing

An independent policy auditor assures that policies and procedures follow federal contracting guidelines, current complaints to the HR department are initially addressed from a policy standpoint and that procedures are rewritten to fix the problem. As the DOL has promulgated many procedures that cover all employers using federal money, a well-trained HR workforce kept up-to-date with policy development is required. A corporate best practice is to ensure an independent auditor meets with the central policy group on an annual basis, receives permission to interview all managers and reports a list of findings to be resolved. The bottom line on auditing is that every single policy needs to be reviewed internally. Catching procedural flaws before the procedures are set and audited by an outsider is a more desirable outcome..

Useful Links

Corporate Executive Board: Creating and Managing HR Policies
http://hr-management.hr.toolbox.com/research/creating-and-managing-hr-policies-10169?sp=cm

How Do Internal Auditors Add Value? Characteristics Common to Top-Rated Audit Shops Help to Shed Light on the Nebulous Concept of Adding Value
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m4153/is_1_60/ai_98009241/