Are you a small business owner with tax questions? The IRS offers a great resource to answer all of your inquires and help take the confusion out of starting a business, filing your taxes, adding employees, and much more. They even offer webinars on a variety of business related topics. Check it out today here: Small Business and Self-Employed Tax Center
Tag: employees
PPP Loan Forgiveness
In the midst of Covid, many small businesses turned to Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loans. These loans were meant to be forgiven and many will not have to be repaid. In order to qualify for loan forgiveness, companies must follow certain guidelines. Employee numbers as well as their compensation levels must have been maintained and at least 60% of the PPP money should have gone toward payroll costs. Keeping good records while distributing the money is very important as this will help when completing the paperwork required to apply for loan forgiveness. For more details, read, How to get your PPP loan forgiven from the Los Angeles Times.
Employees vs Shareholders
Many workers have been laid off or furloughed since the beginning of the Corona virus pandemic. As companies close stores, curtail production and shed employees, some are continuing to pay shareholders. Even though this may be a “bigger” picture issue, the optics of these business practices is not likely to win support. The Washington Post reports that Caterpillar, Levi Strauss, and Stanley Black and Decker have all chosen shareholders over employees. Deciding who will bear the brunt of the current economic climate is tough, but should it be the workers?
U.S. companies cut thousands of workers while continuing to reward shareholders during pandemic
Team Building 101
After interviewing over 500 business leaders, managing director of Merryck & Co and author, Adam Bryant compiled this detailed list of the best practices for creating and maintaining a strong and productive team. Start with a plan, set the rules of the road and work to foster a culture of communication and respect that goes both ways.
How to Build a Successful Team
Empowered Employees
Looking for ways to inspire and jumpstart your team? Turns out that micromanaging can actually stall the process and failure to delegate leaves employees feeling powerless. For more great tips on how to help your employees achieve their fullest and to give you less stress as a manager, check out this article from Forbes Community Voice, 10 Ways You Can Start Empowering Your Employees.
Talk, Talk
Every been tempted to confide in one of your team members about a work issue, or felt it necessary to share the personal problems of another employee with the group? According to Liz Ryan for Forbes, this is never a good idea. Ten Things to Never, Ever Tell Your Employees offers a straightforward look at best practices for management and communication in the workplace. Everyone is human, but when functioning as a manager, it’s important to remember that guarding yourself and your employees should be your first priority.Employee Manipulation?
After a string of issues involving both customer and driver dissatisfaction, Uber has vowed to make new investments into the driver experience. But even as they talk about changes, the company is still engaged in a massive behavioral experiment in order to entice drivers to work more and longer hours, at times in less lucrative areas.
Noam Schreiber for the New York Times thinks that, “By mastering their workers’ mental circuitry, Uber and the like may be taking the economy back toward a pre-New Deal era when businesses had enormous power over workers and few checks on their ability to exploit it.” Read more here: How Uber Uses Psychological Tricks to Push Its Drivers’ Buttons
Overtime and Fair Pay
Ever sat at work on a weekend or late in the evening wondering why you didn’t qualify for overtime? Salary threshold rules have not been adjusted for inflation since 1975 and currently reflect a maximum amount of $23,660 per year. The new proposed changes to the law would raise this limit to $47,476 per year, allowing a larger segment of the salaried population to qualify for paid overtime. As this legislation is coming at the end of President Obama’s term, it remains to be seen how it will fare with a new administration, but for the moment this is one more step toward fair pay for a whole new set of employees.
Making Overtime Fair Again
Industry Standard Paid Leave
If you are/were a working mother, how long was your maternity leave? Did your spouse also receive any time off after your child’s birth? Although some companies have been offering parental leave for many years, it’s nothing like what is happening at Netflix who is now becoming an industry leader for offering any new parents paid leave during the entire first year of their child’s life. Sound amazing and a little crazy? Well, it’s based on research showing that employees who are not worried about home life are more efficient and productive. Imagine being able to have your cake and eat it too.