When the 4th of July fell on a Wednesday last year, I remember a commentator half-jokingly suggest that we celebrate Independence Day on a set day each year (something like the first Monday or Friday of July). After all we celebrate Thanksgiving, Memorial Day, and Labor Day on “set” days. I guess he just didn’t like getting stuck with a random day off in the middle of the week.

Of course, tomorrow we will celebrate Independence Day on its actual day, and it just happens to fall on a Friday giving many Americans a nice three-day weekend. I think the 4th should always be celebrated on, well, the 4th. And rest easy knowing we can celebrate a three-day weekend for the next three years.

Happy 4th, and remember our troops serving overseas, their families, and those who have paid the ultimate sacrifice for our freedom.

Below is the music video for Lee Greenwood’s “God Bless The USA.” It is not only one of my favorite patriotic tunes, but favorite songs overall.

The New York Times had this story on their blog yesterday about the details on how unions plan to spend dues on political candidates for the election season. The article focused specifically on the two-million member Service Employees International Union (or the SEIU). The amount they are planning on spending- $85 million.

For those who are interested:

The union’s secretary-treasurer Anna Burger said the S.E.I.U. would devote money and staff to Colorado, North Carolina and Virginia. The union’s strategy appears to dovetail with the Obama campaign’s plans to compete in those states, all three of which President Bush won in 2004.

At a strategy briefing last week, campaign manager David Plouffe said “we think we’re in a very strong position” in North Carolina and Virginia and he indicated Mr. Obama would not be ceding the mountain West to Senator John McCain either. Mr. Obama chose the University of Colorado in Colorado Springs as the venue to talk up his national service agenda on Wednesday.

While 100% of employee dues will go to Democrat Barack Obama, nearly 2 out of 5 union members will vote for John McCain (if trends from the 2004 presidential election hold true). And, if you live in a forced unionism state, you have no say in the matter.

It looks like Starbucks will be doing some cutting back very shortly. According to reports, the company plans to close as many as 600 stores. The majority of those stores are ones that have been opened in the past year and a half. The closings will affect about 12,000 employees (or seven percent of the workforce) in one way or another.

A number of those workers will be able to move to other facilities, but obviously not all will be that lucky. The article says it is planning on paying out about $8 million in severance packages.

While a portion of the downturn can be accredited to an economic downturn (who isn’t blaming the economy for everything today?), part of the problem is Starbucks saturation of the market and taking business away from themselves. When a new store opens up close to another Starbucks, revenue may drop between 25 and 30 percent at the old store.

Apparently, Starbucks has just now realized that their customers do not need a store on every corner and can actually make a left hand turn to get their coffee. Either that or people don’t like it when a gallon of gas costs more than their frappuccino.

On a serious note, store closings and layoffs are a major issue and can affect your company in ways you couldn’t imagine. Starbucks has a great public image as far as being a “hip” place to work with excellent benefits, cool atmosphere, etc. Stay honest with workers about their future, what the status of their store is as soon as you know, and what their options may be.

Employees will take straightforward bad news better than you may think.

…So says work done by a number of researchers who looked at eleven studies that were published between 1994 and 2006. The report is featured on WebMD.

The programs varied in that some offered one-on-one counseling, while some offered a health assessment, and others may have featured an on-site exercise program. Still, others may have featured a combination of those benefits while some may have offered something completely different.

The programs that seemed to work the best were ones that included face-to-face meetings at least once a month. Something to consider if you are starting up a wellness program or are looking to tweak yours.

The studies showed that those who participated in these programs lost an average of 2-14 pounds. Not bad, although the effects on the bottom line is still not known. Separate research shows that “about” 6 percent of health care costs is associated with excess body weight.

As I have said before, I am a fan of wellness programs and think they are a win-win for both the employer and employee.

Could you imagine not being able to fire someone who has had five DWI’s in the past seven years? Could you imagine holding a discipline hearing (to determine if you could fire a bad employee) in a jail cell?

Many lawsuits arise out of a failure on the part of HR or management to properly document bad behavior. When the firing comes, the court is left with one side versus the other and no real documentation to justify the termination. Even in an “at-will” situation, improper terminations can cost the company big time.

In any class or seminar related to firing, they would remind you to document, document, and document. However, even the best documentation cannot save many principals and school districts when it comes to firing bad teachers.

For proof, check out this story about the stranglehold teacher unions have on many school districts and what some teachers can get away with.

From the Washington Post:

Few people know better than school superintendent Allan Gerstenlauer that disciplining a tenured teacher can be a long and expensive process.

An English teacher in his Long Island district remains on the payroll, earning an annual salary of $113,559, even after pleading guilty earlier this month to drunken driving charges- her fifth DWI arrest in seven years.

The teacher will remain on paid leave at least until a disciplinary hearing in August, and it will be up to an impartial arbitrator to decide whether she needs to be fired as she faces a likely prison sentence.

“It is very frustrating that the process takes so long,” Gerstenlauer conceded.

The case illustrates a nagging problem in school districts in New York and elsewhere around the country: firing bad teachers. It is also part of the ongoing debate over education reform and the role tenure plays in the process.

The story goes on to detail that the cost of any average termination in New York City is $250,000.

The most ridiculous comment in the article came courtesy of the president of the New York State Teachers Union: “Tenure provides the right to due process. It is consistent with the American way; a person is innocent until proven guilty.”

I would assume a fifth DWI is enough due process. I would assume pleading guilty is due process. But not according to the teacher’s union.

The Center for Union Facts was quoted in the Post article, and they have a lot of good information on their website and I encourage you to check it out.

Yesterday, the AFL-CIO voted to officially endorse Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama. I say official because the union supports Democrats more than 99 percent of the time. But, now that the union made the official endorsement, their campaigning will begin en masse.

The union has pledged to spend more than $50 million on behalf of the Illinois Senator. Other labor groups will add millions more.

And the issue they are most concerned with is the Employee Free Choice Act. Read more about the legislation if you haven’t heard about it yet.

I usually don’t republish entire articles on my blog, but think this essay from the Heritage Foundation about the Employee Free Choice Act is spot on.

Written by James Sherk:

Giving Employees Free Choice in the Workplace

Workplace relations and the economy have changed substantially since the 1930s, but federal labor law has not evolved with these changes. The National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) still reflects a top-down, adversarial view of management–labor relations that is foreign to many workers today.

Private-sector union membership has fallen over the past generation as many workers have concluded that traditional unions do not meet their needs. In response, the labor movement is pushing the Employee Free Choice Act. Instead of taking away workers’ right to vote on joining a union by secret ballot, Congress should restore employers’ and employees’ right to explore innovative labor–management relations. Most workers want a voice in their workplace even if they do not want a traditional union.

Employee involvement (EI) programs enable workers to participate cooperatively in workplace decisions, but the NLRA prohibition on creating “company unions” is so broad that it bans any EI programs that give workers a real voice. The Act forces workers to choose between a traditional union and no formal representation at all.

Read the entire essay here.

I must admit the only résumé’s that have ever come across my desk, to my inbox, or over the fax have been traditional one or two page résumé’s, usually with a cover letter.

However, some trendy job seekers have been taking it up a notch with video résumé’s. So I guess a step above the paper résumé and below the video résumé is the audio résumé. That is what is available at JobCircle.com, a Northeast online job board.

Using what they call Voice Intros, anybody can record a 60 second audio sampling. This is a free service and all you have to do is make a toll-free call. When listening to a sample, it is mainly a cover letter. You state your name, education, experience, and give a bit on why you would be a good candidate.

I am not sure if it will catch on. I could see discrimination lawsuits by those who may not speak clear English and don’t get the job- but then again this is voluntary. Of course, the flip side (as noted here) is that someone with a foreign sounding name can prove they speak perfectly clear English despite popular stereotypes.

I have talked about wellness plans, and the need to implement them, but it looks like some state legislators think that businesses are moving to slow and are trying to mandate the programs.

From Workforce Management:

While most of the measures gently encourage employers to promote wellness by offering financial incentives, at least two states are now considering taking a harder line: A California Assembly committee passed a bill this month that would require employers contracting with the state to offer one or more wellness programs to their employees. A bill introduced in Michigan would require that the state give preference to employers that offer wellness programs in awarding contracts.

Read the rest of the article, with details on the plans, here.

I am always cautious on mandates especially when an initiative is rather new and there are details we do not know (like how much it will cost and what the return on investment is). If it is financially beneficial, the companies will take the lead in implementing wellness programs (trust me).

I have heard the term living wage on a number of occasions. It differs from the minimum wage in that it must keep up with the cost of living so that employees can afford housing, food, health care, etc. That means it can change with or without raising it. A number of cities across the country have some type of ordinance mandating the so-called “living wage.”

One such city is Hayward, California. A California appeals court recently upheld a $1.4 million lawsuit against Cintas for failing to pay the workers the required minimum with translated into $9.26 per hour with health insurance or $10.71 without. Reports say that Cintas paid the workers between $7 and $8.50 per hour.

By all accounts Cintas paid at or above the state minimum wage, it just did not pay attention to the living wage, which is where it went wrong. If you live in a municipality that has the living wage, it is just as important as you keep up with that wage as you would the minimum wage or other employment laws.

I read this story on HREOnline.com earlier this week detailing a new law that makes it easier for former employees to collect unemployment benefits. Most people in the States are use to being able to challenge unemployment claims if a former employee quits or is terminated for good reason. In France, not so much…

Apparently this legislation is supported by the country’s Conservative President Nicolas Sarkozy, and protested by the French Socialist Party. This is part of Sarkozy’s proposed overhaul of the French employment laws, which include generous protections for the workers but making it easier to hire and fire.

France is dominated by labor unions that have held the country back for years, made it less competitive on the international scene, and left their economy staggering at best for some time. Unemployment currently stands at over 7 percent.

You may or may not have heard that the New York Mets fired manager Willie Randolph earlier this week. The Mets, with the highest payroll in the National League, have been playing sub-500 baseball and famously blew a huge division lead last fall. When you factor this in, the firing of Randolph is not unwarranted or without good reason. The way the Mets went about it, and possibly the timing, may not have been the best though.

Newsday, a New York City newspaper, featured this column yesterday with HR pro’s who said the Mets made a number of mistakes in his firing.

From Newsday:

Strike one: Randolph got the word in the dead of night, 3,000 miles away from home and right after he had led the team to a 9-6 win over the Angels.

To translate, this would be the equivalent of terminating an executive (who lives and works on the East Coast) when he is on business on the West Coast. There are certainly instances when you may discover some cause for termination, but if it is built up over a period of time, try to be a little bit more compassionate and wait until he arrives home.

Strike two: If a person is to be dismissed for performance, you don’t wield the ax right after a big win, which in Randolph’s case was a big public win.

If you were building up a case to terminate an employee, you probably wouldn’t do it right after he successfully led his team on a big project. Granted, beating the Angels in June is not the equivalent of winning the World Series, but it was a win. If you done it after a losing streak- or even on a day off- it would have looked better.

Strike three: Experts said you don’t want employees to hear the news from outsiders, as some players did as they returned to the hotel.

In a position like this, you should probably call a team meeting to notify the players that Randolph has been fired immediately after it happened. The same is true for the office. It is much better to notify key employees and the workers reports in person than to let them hear it through the grapevine (or if you a professionally sports team, the media).

Did Randolph deserve to be fired? You can easily make the case that he did indeed deserve to be fired. But did the Mets going about it the right way? That would be a much tougher case to make.