Sabrina

Welcome back to the HR Connection. My name is Sabrina Baker. I am your host, along with Marie Rolston, who'll be joining me in just a second. You know, we realize that our audience is made up of HR departments of one, small HR teams, or individuals who have no idea what they're supposed to be doing in HR because their day job is actually marketing or finance or something else. And so we want to make sure our content resonates with all of those people. So today we are talking about a very tactical topic: documentation, what it is, why it's important, and how we split it into certain buckets to be able to make sure that we are documenting all of the things that can protect our clients' businesses. Let's get into it. Marie, a few weeks ago on LinkedIn, I put a post out that said it was kind of lamenting about why small businesses wait so long to put HR in place. Like, why is it that they wait until something breaks? We've talked about that before on the podcast. They it's not something they initially start with. They wait until something's broken, and then they decide they're going to put HR in place. And I had someone comment something that I thought was really profound, and it really sets us up for what we want to talk about today. And what they said, and I'm kind of paraphrasing, is that the reason small business leaders don't put HR in place is because HR feels like documentation, and they did not start a business to do documentation, to do paperwork. And I thought that was really profound. I felt it deep in my soul because certainly, as a business owner, I don't ever want to do paperwork and pass that off to our operations manager as much as I possibly can. Um, I don't want to have so much structure in our business that we can't be agile, that we can't, um, move. And when you document things, it feels then very solid. It feels like you can't change it. It feels like you can't pivot. And so I get it. I get the resistance to documentation. It is not something that is fun. It's not something that is sexy. It's not something that you can be creative with sometimes. It's kind of boring. It's kind of it's very administrative. But the reality is that it is such an important part of people processes. And I would argue not just people processes, but definitely people processes. And so in this episode, I know we want to talk about documentation. We want to talk about the types of documentation, give some tips and tricks and things that we do. And I'm going to let you lead most of that because you are in the thick of this every day. But I thought that was such an important setup, um, for that resistance, right? If listeners are having that resistance from their CEO, it's because they didn't get in business to do this. They didn't get in business to fill out paperwork. So where do you want to take this?

Marie

Yeah, yeah. So I'm just going to piggyback right off of you. So we you've already started to reframe what documentation actually is. So I'm just going to keep going with that. You ready?

Sabrina

Ready.

 

Marie

Okay. So you've like you've already kind of said, so a lot of times when people hear the word documentation, they're thinking about that paperwork, right? They're hearing admin. They are thinking that this is just something that's going to take all of the time away from the real work that they're doing. Um, and just like you, I also get it. I really do. Um, but I want to share how I try to think about documentation instead. When it comes to documentation, I think of this as protection. So it is something that protects your employees. Uh, it's something that protects your business. And really, it's protecting us as the HR people or you as a business owner who's trying to do the right thing. So think about it this way. Uh, every time as an HR person, every single time we have a performance conversation and we're not writing it down, um, or we have a complaint that gets raised and you're handling it just kind of on the fly, uh, or even like a an accommodation request that you're just kind of dealing with it in the moment, these are all examples of situations that will come back later. Uh, and when they do come back, it's and there's no record of what's happening, and you're kind of just left with this, like, he said, she said situation. Um, these are all going to be very expensive problems. And I mean, legally, financially, um, and even in terms of trust when we think about how your people are going to be impacted by that. So I think all in all, when I say documentation, uh, I'm definitely not talking about bureaucracy, but I am talking about having receipts. And if there's anything that we know in HR, we want our receipts. Okay. So now that we framed what documentation actually is, let's talk about it, what it includes. Because I do think that one of the reasons documentation feels really overwhelming to people is that it it's because people are just imagining this massive system that they have to build from scratch. And that's just not really how it works. So there are really just a few buckets. I'm going to give you three, um, that need to exist when it comes to documentation. And when you break it down in this way, it really does feel a lot more manageable. So the first bucket is going to be policy documentation. This is going to be your handbook, uh, your written policies, your standard procedures, SOPs, you know, the stuff that really tells people how things work at your organization before a situation comes up. The second is going to be employment documentation. So, uh, offer letters, job descriptions, all of that paperwork that lives inside an employee's file and establishes the terms of the employment relationship. And then the third is going to be performance documentation. And this is the one that I really want to spend the most time on today because it's the one that tends to have the biggest gaps overall. Um, and so these are going to be things like feedback conversation, um, corrective action, PIPs. Uh, anytime you are addressing a performance issue, um, you need to make sure that it's all written down.

Sabrina

Okay, good. So I think breaking it down into types then makes it easier to manage, right? Easier to think about. Because when you look at the breadth of HR, you can be like, "Oh my gosh, there's so much documentation that we actually need." But really putting it into the buckets then helps you categorize it into really what is like crucial and going to be legal and detrimental to the business if you don't have it. And then what are those things that are just supporting and can really help with your flow? So talk to us now about what you think actually needs to be documented. Like, what are those non-negotiables inside those buckets?

 

Marie

Okay, yeah. So let me talk through four non-negotiables around documentation. Um, these are the things that if, uh, you're not documenting them, you're actually creating more legal exposure for your organization than anything else. Okay. Number one, any this is going to be any performance conversation that you're having. And I mean any conversation. Uh, if you are having a quick check-in where you're talking to someone about attendance issues, uh, maybe it's a coaching conversation about someone's attitude, um, or even a formal corrective action, all of it needs to be written down and recorded. Um, when you are sitting down to write out this written record, you're going to want to note who was in the room. Uh, you're going to want to note what was said during that conversation, uh, what the expectations are going forward, and then what happens if it doesn't improve. Number two is going to be accommodation requests. So think ADA accommodations, religious accommodations, uh, pregnancy-related accommodations. Uh, the interactive process, it has to be documented. And I mean every single step of it. So when you are documenting something like this, you're going to want to note what was requested. Uh, you're going to want to note what was discussed, what was approved or denied, and why. Um, and really, that's because if any of this ever were to be challenged, you need to be able to show your work. Number three is going to be leave. So leaves of absence. Uh, this includes FMLA, state leave, any kind of protective leave, really. Uh, and when you're documenting something like this, you need to note, uh, when it was requested, when it was approved, what the employee was told, uh, when they were expected back from that leave. Uh, and you can put all of this, like, in a letter that you deliver to the employee, um, when you communicate whether it was approved or denied. When it comes to leave, this is one of the most litigated areas in employment law. And a lot of that litigation comes down to whether or not the employer followed the right process and documented it. And then number four is going to be complaints. So anytime an employee raises an issue, whether it's formal or informal, it needs to be documented. Uh, in this kind of documentation, again, you're going to want to note what they said, when they said it, what you did about it, even if it seems minor, uh, especially if it seems minor. When you think about these four things, the rule of thumb that I keep coming back to is that if it mattered enough to act on it, it mattered enough to write it down. Um, so if you did something about it, document it. If you said something about it, document it. If you decided not to act on it and why, document that too.

Sabrina

I think that's such a good list. Um, absolutely non-negotiables that those things should be documented. You know, when I think about court cases, when I think about depositions that I've been involved in in my career, both when I was in-house and as a consultant, when I think about, uh, clients telling me lawsuits they've gone through and what happened in those, so often things can come down to a he said, she said. Um, and you've got, you know, the employer saying one thing, you've got the employee saying another. And without any documentation, without any proof, the court is going to side with the employee every single time, especially in a state like California. And so that documentation, while it can feel daunting for us to say, document everything, um, the reality is that if you don't, you're you as the employer who is being held liable, you're already on the losing end. So you have to do everything you can possibly do to try to help your case. And you coming with that documentation, being able to show, here are all of the steps we took, here's what happened, here's how the review process went, here's why we denied something that aligns with our policy, all of those pieces of documentation are just going to be able to help you do that. I think about documentation as one of those things that's you it's almost like insurance, right? You have it, you pay for it all the time by actually doing it, by actually filling out documentation. And then you don't need it. You may not need it. But when you do, you are so thankful that you have it because in the times when you need it are really could be really crucial times for the business.

 

Marie

Okay. So now that we've kind of talked about what needs to be documented and why that's important, let's take some time to actually talk about how to do it. Um, because I know that some of y'all are listening to this and you're like, "Marie, Sabrina, I hear you, but I'm one person and I have so much to do. How am I actually supposed to build out this habit?" So again, I have four tips to share with you. Uh, the first is going to be document in real time. This could be a note taker that is recording your conversations in person or virtual, but figure out a way that it makes sense to document in real time. Um, and I know that this one sounds obvious, but it really is so much harder to document after the fact than just doing it in the moment or right when the conversation ends. When you tend to wait on writing these things down, the conversation gets fuzzy, uh, details, they get lost, you forget exactly what was said or who said it. So if you really can just take two minutes right after that conversation just to jot down those key points, uh, the date, who was there, what was discussed, what was decided, you really are so much better off than just trying to reconstruct that conversation three weeks later when it actually blows up and turns into something real.

Sabrina

Yeah, I think because what we know to be true is that you'll say, "I'll do it later," and then you don't because other things happen. And so to your point, then it's two weeks later and you're trying to remember what was said and you you think you remember it, but our brains play tricks on us and our and and we as we age, certainly we don't have the memories that we used to. And so documenting in real time, I think, is the best thing you can do, even if it's just a few things, like the most important points. You can flesh it out later if you need to, but just to bullet out like the most important points so that you get those down and then you can you can come back to it. But trying to wait and say, "Oh, I'll remember," I know from experience, you absolutely will not.

 

Marie

Yeah, you absolutely are not going to remember. But also, I always think of, uh, something that you talk about in your leadership training, and that is the fact that we only retain about 25% of our conversations anyways. So if we are leaving those meetings with 25%, which is probably the really important things, and then we wait two to three weeks later, we're only going to get 25% of that 25%. So help yourself out. Document in real time. The second thing is is going to be templates. So please, please use templates. And this is not because it makes documentation feel more corporate or more structured, but it's really because that template is what's going to give you a consistent format that holds up over time. So this means that every single manager at your organization, um, they are capturing the same information or the same kind of information when something happens. It means when you pull up a file six months from now, you know exactly what you're looking at. Uh, and if you ever need to use that documentation in a legal situation, consistency is also going to matter a lot in that one. I'll say this too. If you are an HR department of one, building a small library of templates is going to be one of the most impactful things that you can do. And I think about things like a performance conversation template, uh, a corrective action template, an accommodation request log, and a complaint intake form. Uh, you don't need 50 templates, uh, in your organization, but these four templates are going to be really good, um, really good templates that cover situations that come up most often in organizations. And what's nice is that if you're listening to this now, make sure to go back to our website because we're going to give those templates to you so you don't even have to take the time to build them yourselves.

Sabrina

Yeah, we obviously, we have standardized templates that we've been using for years. What we find when we come into clients is this is not something they have. They don't even have offer letter templates. They don't have any kind of standardized templates. And so introducing these early, uh, makes it so much easier on you and everybody else to be able to, as you said, capture the same information, make sure you're documenting things the same way. Um, helps you like the I think about the the, uh, complaint intake form. It helps you ask the right questions. You know, make sure you're capturing the right information because sometimes you're doing this quickly and you're on the fly and it can be really difficult to remember the things you need to ask or all the things you need to know. And you don't want to have to keep coming back to that. So, um, having those standardized templates that have all the information you need on them together is going to just make it to where you don't have to stop what you're doing and think about anything because it's all on the form for you and you can just all fill it out.

Marie

Yep, exactly. Okay, Sabrina. So the third tip is going to be around where does it live? So and this is a real conversation that we have to have because so much documentation just ends up in someone's email inbox, uh, on your desktop, in your own personal drive, um, nowhere that is actually impactful or or helpful when you actually need to find that documentation. So let's be real. Email is not a documentation system. So whether you are using an HRIS or a shared drive or physical files or whatever your setup is, documentation needs to live somewhere that is findable, organized, and not dependent on one person's inbox. But a caveat here, let I want to make clear, email is a great way to share documentation. So if you're sitting and you are meeting with an employee, send them a follow-up email, but then you have to make sure that email gets saved in their file somewhere. That's the key there. Use email to your advantage when clearly communicating, um, or following up on conversations that have been had, but then you have to make sure to save that email somewhere. Otherwise, it's just going to get lost in your inbox.

 

Sabrina

Yeah. So I have a quick story. A few years ago, this is back when I was by myself, I had a client who called me because they had an employee who sued who was suing them for retaliation, retaliatory termination. And they had had tons of conversations with this employee in email and never documented anything outside of email. And so in discovery, the employee's lawyer had asked, of course, for documentation. And this CEO had to spend days going through all of their email, trying to find the documentation of the things that they had said to this person. They didn't even keep their email organized. So some of the documents, some of the conversations they thought they had had been deleted and they were gone. And they, at the end of the day, had maybe two documents, two emails that showed what they were trying to to prove. Uh, and it wasn't enough. And they thought that because they had emailed, it would always just be there or whatever, but they had lost so much conversation with this employee and they had no additional documentation outside of it. So I think we rely on email heavily to be documentation. And absolutely, you can use it to make sure that you and employee, you and whoever are on the same page with whatever you're talking about, but it absolutely has to then get moved or be organized or somewhere so that if you have to call it back, it's so much easier for you to find.

Marie

And I'll say this too. So when something that I like to do when we are onboarding new employees and we're creating that employee file, I go ahead and I just make little buckets within their employee file for those four types of documents that we need to have, right? So it's like, of course, you're going to have like your employment information in there, like your offer letter, your I-9, but then I make little buckets for performance, for accommodations, for leave, for complaints, just so that right off the bat, there are homes within those employee files, um, to store this kind of documentation or just to store documentation in and of itself. Okay. So the fourth thing, and and this is the one that I feel the most strong strongly about, is that it's not just HR's job to document. So managers 100% need to be documenting as well. Um, and really most of them don't. And it's not because they're bad managers by any means, but it's definitely because no one has ever taught them that documentation is a part of their job. Um, so many times, probably on a daily basis, I talk to managers and when I ask them about their documentation process, they respond to me by saying, "Marie, that's an HR thing. That's not our job." Um, and I very quickly tell them it is not just an HR thing. It is a management thing that HR supports.

 

Sabrina

Yeah. You know, the thing that the thing about leaders is they don't realize, especially for things like harassment, they can be held liable. They can be called in. So their notes are going to be called into or lack thereof. Their proof is going to be called into question as well. Um, so training them that documentation is something that they should be doing is really crucial to, again, finding capacity within yourselves. Like we talk a lot about training leaders as an HR department of one or small business HR person because you've got to find capacity within your own tasks. And so training, the more that leaders can do, the more they should do to give you that capacity and documentation that is coming directly from them because they're the ones that had the conversation or they're the ones where the thing happened and they were they saw it happen. That's going to be so much more impactful in court in a legal situation than something that you heard and then wrote about. Uh, so it's about really explaining about their liability in this, their ownership in this, and how it is a risk management, not only for the organization, but for them as individuals.

Marie

Yeah, yeah. And just to keep going with that, it really is one of the most valuable things that an HR manager can do. Um, so once you have your templates in place, give them to your managers, uh, walk them through what to capture and and when, uh, make it as easy as possible. Because again, when that situation escalates and it ends up on your desk, the first question that we're all going to ask as HR professionals is, what did you document?

Sabrina

All right. So really good stuff. Really quick episode today. I think it's important on the podcast, Marie, that we do this from time to time where we most of our stuff is more of this like aspirational stuff. How do you influence from the middle? How do you gain capacity when you've got to do everything and be everything for everybody? But the reality is that we know that what small business HR practitioners are facing every day is stuff like this. It's stuff like documentation. You're in the thick of it all the time too. And so I think it's good for us to sometimes just do these quick little hits of, let me give you a practical tip for some tactical things that we know you're facing every single day. So if you had to wrap it up and give our listeners a takeaway, what would that be?

Marie

Sabrina, if there's one takeaway that I want our listeners to walk away with today, it's that building a documentation habit doesn't have to start with a perfect system. It really just has to start with doing it once and then again, and then it becomes just a thing that you do all the time.

 

Sabrina

Yeah. It just becomes a habit, right? It's just something that is built into your process. And then you realize that it's something you're going to have to do for eternity or as long as you are in your HR job for sure. All right. Really good stuff. So before we head out, I want to give you a few, uh, different ways to connect with us. If you are enjoying this podcast and you are not subscribed, please do so. Um, again, every week we have episodes that are speaking solely to that group in the one to 500 HR space, one of 500 employee space. Um, so please subscribe to this. We are also on the HR Happy Hour Media Network, which we are very proud to be, uh, part of their platform. We release episodes there monthly. We had our first one last week, February 20th, and they will have another one in March. Those are exclusive episodes. We also have a YouTube channel. So this is, um, a YouTube channel that is me speaking CEO to CEO. And why we think that is helpful is that sometimes we know you don't always have your CEO's ear in the way that you want it. Um, and maybe if they could hear from another CEO who's building the things that we're talking about in this podcast, that's building a business where HR is very relevant and HR is very forward thinking in the build of the business, uh, that maybe that could help you get, uh, the ear that you need or get them to pay attention a little bit more. So lots of different ways to connect with us. As always, if you're not connected to Marie or I on LinkedIn, you can do that. We will accept, uh, anybody inside of a small business, any HR leaders inside of a small business. And last but not least, coming up in April, officially our first HR department of one cohort is launching. The page is live. You can go online right now. That link will be all of the links will be in our show notes, but you can go and find out what we're going to be doing in the cohort, uh, the things that we're going to be talking about. We will have an episode all about that coming up, uh, probably next week so that you can really see if this is going to be a fit for you and something that you want to be a part of. It's a small, intimate group that I'm super excited about. So that is officially launching April 7th, but registration is live now. So you definitely have to see there. Marie, really great job today laying this out for us. Thanks so much. I'll see you next time. 

 

Marie

See you next time.