Practical guides for modern hiring
Honest writing on AI in HR, structured interviews, compliance, retention, and the messy realities of building a hiring process that actually works.
Performance Improvement Plans: Documenting Your Way to a Defensible Exit
A performance improvement plan is either a genuine last chance to turn someone around or the paper trail that keeps a termination from becoming a lawsuit. Often it is both. Here is how a small employer writes one that actually works — and what turns a PIP into evidence against you.
Severance and Separation Agreements: When to Offer One and How to Make the Release Stick
Severance is not legally required, so the only reason to pay it is to buy something back — usually a signed release of claims. But a release only protects you if you follow the rules that make it enforceable, and recent labor-board decisions just narrowed what you can put in one. A small-employer guide.
Employee Benefits for Small Employers: Health Insurance, HRAs, and the Stack That Keeps People
You are probably not legally required to offer health insurance — but the moment you want to hire and keep good people, benefits stop being optional. Here is the small-employer benefits stack in plain English: group plans, QSEHRA and ICHRA reimbursement accounts, retirement, and the pre-tax mechanics that make it affordable.
How to Conduct a Workplace Investigation as a Small Employer
When a harassment, theft, or misconduct complaint lands, how you investigate matters as much as what you find. A step-by-step process a small business can actually run — fair, documented, and defensible — without a dedicated HR department.
Job Abandonment and No-Call/No-Show: Writing a Policy That Holds Up
An employee stops showing up and stops answering. Did they quit, or do you have to fire them? The distinction changes your unemployment exposure and your final-pay obligations. How to write and apply a no-call/no-show policy that protects you.
The HR Audit Checklist Every Small Business Should Run Once a Year
Most small businesses do not discover an HR gap until it becomes a claim, an audit, or a fine. A yearly self-audit finds the missing I-9, the misclassified contractor, and the stale handbook while they are still cheap to fix. A practical, section-by-section checklist.