Human Relations Scenario

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1. You just had one of those days?exciting and overwhelming. As your company's director of human relations, you have dealt with an employee asking how much leave he can take when his wife has their first baby next month. A phone call from the company's CFO involved discussions of potential layoffs in order to "make the budget." A group of employees came to meet with you, and they indicated they were talking with union organizers as a way to combat the company's policy of monitoring phone calls and e-mail messages. Another group of employees expressed their feelings that they were not being paid for all the time they worked.
Before heading home, you take a few minutes to reflect and ask yourself the following questions:

How is the workday calculated?
How a workday is calculated depends on the company policies, fair labor laws, and type of workday the employee is required to work. For instance, you have a "normal workday" which is 8 hours (9 if you have an hour lunch, 8 1/2 if you have a half hour lunch). There are the 9/80 work weeks which would mean your workday would be a 10 hour work day with an hour lunch, or a 9 1/2 hour work day with a 1/2 hour lunch. There are 4/10 workdays which are 4 11 hour days with one hour lunches (or 4 10 1/2 hour work days with a 1/2 hour lunch). Depending on the state or your employee classification, anything over 8 hours could be considered overtime worked or anything over a 40 hour week would be considered overtime as well. Again, it depends on the state in which you are employed. Another example is a fireman or nurse. Their workdays are 12 and 24 hour shifts and in some cases 72 hour shifts. In the case of the scenario above, I think it would be safe to say that the staff are all hourly and will be paid for an 8 hour day starting from 8 and ending at 5pm with a one hour lunch and two fifteen minute breaks throughout the day. They will be paid for the breaks, but the ...