Short takes: holiday pay, lift-outs, health-care reform, and more

Holiday pay: legal requirements – About.com’s blog features attorney Mel Muskovitz addressing common questions and answers related to holiday pay practices.
“Lift outs” – an emerging trend? – Jay Shepherd of Gruntled Employees discusses the practice of “lifting out” an intact team of workers from another company and the problems that can ensue. This practice, which is perhaps more commonly known as employee raiding, seems to be on the increase. Jay’s post discusses and comments on a recent article on the topic that appeared in The Boston Globe.
American bosses come in second – American managers may want to take a lesson from Avis and embrace the “We try harder” slogan as a mantra. In a survey of 70,000 respondents in 28 countries conducted by Kelly Services, Mexican bosses rated highest on a 10 point scale, with U.S. bosses coming in second. One potential area for improvement? About 29 percent of the U.S. workers said they were are rarely or never rewarded for a job well done. See the full study results (PDF).
Worker burnout – Douglas Eisenhart of HR Blog points us to a recent study on employee burnout that is discussed in Human Resources Executive. According to study authors, it is not the job that causes burnout, but the organization. One of the biggest employee complaints? They don’t get enough respect. They don’t feel they are valued or sufficiently recognized for the jobs that they do. We may have a recurring them here. Have you thanked your employees today?
Worker interruptions are expensive – according to recent studies, it is estimated that U.S. office workers get interrupted as often as 6 to 11 times per hour and the price tag for these interruptions may be as high as $588. While technologies like phone, e-mail, and instant messaging are intended to create efficiencies, the downside may be a drain on productivity.
How much does an employee cost? – Joseph G. Hadzima Jr., senior lecturer at MIT Sloan School of Management, offers a broad guide for planning employment costs based on analyzing various expense categories.
Health care reform – If the topic of health care is on your radar screen, you may want to follow a new reform proposal from Senator Ron Wyden that is under discussion in the blogosphere. Joe Paduda at Managed care Matters has been following this issue – he offers an overview and comments on the plan and follows up with a roundup of reactions and commentary from blog health care pundits. He then offered yet more thoughtful commentary on some of the proposal’s core provisions. Keep an eye on Joe’s blog if you want to follow emerging health care policy issues.
Holiday doo-wop – OK, we can’t resist one more cute holiday greeting featuring Santa and a chorus of his reindeer crooning a holiday classic. You need flash and be sure to turn up your speakers.