Almost 40% of the US military is made up of National Guardsmen and Reservists. These 850,000+ service members are also your employees. While their calls to duty are in the national interest, it can be disruptive to productivity, challenging to organizational cohesion, and stressful for everyone involved. But, we HR professionals can mitigate — even gain — from these experiences using techniques already available to us.

The Department of Health and Human Services, along with other government Agencies, continues to provide guidance regarding how and when both insured and self-insured health plans can keep their "grandfathered" status. Employers may keep their existing plans, provided those plans were in place on March 23, 2010, while providing new benefits required under the reform measures. However, plans will lose this "grandfather" status if they choose to significantly cut benefits or increase out-of-pocket spending for their employees. Further, employees participating in plans that make such changes will gain new consumer protections.

One of my leadership coaching clients had a challenging week. A direct report filed a grievance against her that my client feels is completely unfounded.

Award Honors the Washington-area Business’ Best Practices in Employee Development