Heather Grimshaw: Welcome to Absence Management Perspectives, a DMEC Podcast. The Disability Management Employer Coalition, or DMEC as we're known by most people, provides focused education, knowledge and networking opportunities for absence and disability management professionals. DMEC has become a leading voice in the industry and represents more than 20,000 professionals from organizations of all sizes across the United States and and Canada. This podcast series focuses on industry perspectives and delves into issues that affect DMEC members and the community as a whole. We're thrilled to have you with us and hope you'll Visit us at www.DMEC.org to get a full picture of what we have to offer. From webinars and publications to conferences, certifications, and much more. Let's get started and meet the people behind the processes.

Hi, we're glad you're with us. I'm Heather Grimshaw with dmec, and today we're talking about the benefits to employers developing strong formalized return to work policies. Our guests are Ryan Bruce, Director of Client Solutions for New York Life group Benefit Solutions, and Kristen Jones, Director of DMEC Education Programs.

Ryan wrote an article about this topic in a recent issue of DMEC's At Work magazine, which we will unlock for listeners and include a link to it in the Notes section.

Before we kick off our discussion today, I'd like to ask Kristen to provide a quick hit explanation of a formalized return to work policy and how it helps employers and employees.

I'm also hoping she will shed some light on the need for and what we mean by quote unquote formalized policies.

Kristin Jones, CLMS, PHR, SHRM-CP: I'm happy to, and I'll try to make sure I catch everything in there, but if I miss something, definitely let me know. But I mean, return to work at its basic form, it really just means getting our individuals back into productive employment, whether it's the employee's regular job, whether it is something modified or transitional.

It's really just committing to a formal and structured process around doing that versus relying on ad hoc efforts. And so when we think about a formalized return to work policy and a formalized program,

it really involves having things like a written policy around return to work and what the employer's stance is and what their approach is to that. Because there are options in how employers approach return to work and there's definitely a cultural aspect for an organization with their program as well.

And it's really documenting the aspects of the program, how it is structured, you know, what are the options for return to work and how does the employer engage with the employee and you know how is, how is this structured?

You know, typically an employer will have kind of a hierarchy of options that they'll run through or evaluate to try to bring an employee back. You know, looking at jobs within the department,

looking at transitional or modified duties, temporary jobs, schedule changes, some things like that are typically included and talked about. And you know, know there's processes around those. And it's when employers don't have a more formalized structure around that, it creates risk.

Because then you are relying on, I don't want to say, the whims of individuals. I think people put more into it than that. And typically the people leading these conversations do have a level of understanding, but you open yourself up for inconsistencies for folks who maybe don't have as much of an understanding or education around that. You also open yourself up to frontline leaders being involved at levels that, or leading in ways that aren't always the most appropriate. Because, you know, as well intentioned as they are, their bottom line is running their particular area of focus.

And you know, this returning someone to work safely and effectively requires some more thinking, broader picture and outside the box from that. It's really less about the short term gain of returning an employee to their specific job and more about an organization's sustainable culture fostering, you know, the employee's needs, the employer's needs. It really creates a win win situation when it's done well and it focuses on their ability and not their limitations and what you can do to bring them back.

You know, we know that when it's structured properly and someone is brought back effectively for the employee, returning them to gainful productivity is really beneficial in a lot of different ways.

They regain their sense of community, it helps them recover more quickly physically and mentally, and it contributes toward financial stability. Most of the times when employees are out, they're receiving partial wage replacement or in some instances none. But we do have a lot of paid opportunities with statutory leaves and short-term disability and long term disability and things like that. And then from the employer end of things, you know, employee absence comes with a cost.

And when an injury or illness pulls someone out from the workplace and they're experiencing time away from work, the best strategy for an employer is to gain control over those costs and try to bring them back to productivity. So again, it really is win win to have a good program, a robust program around return to work and formalizing, that just improves people's adherence to the program and it reduces liability as well. So I think it's definitely an important focus for employers and something that at dmec, we've always advocated. And we have resources to help people. We have a lot of member resources around, like sample policies and tools and things that employers can lean into and data and information. We also have a training course around building a return-to-work program. So we really hope that professionals lean into those supports and their network with one another to facilitate a strong program.

Heather Grimshaw: That's really helpful and I think sets the stage really nicely for this discussion.

So, Ryan, one of the first things I'm hoping that you will talk about is how frequently employers should review their policies and whether most employers are aware of the need to review these policies, if there are any industry recommendations or guidelines.

Ryan Bruce, MEd, CRC, SPHR, CLMS: Yeah. So I think consistency is going to be my answer to every single question that you're going to ask me on this podcast today. And listening to Kristen and what she's describing, like, every single part like that is that is a consistent employer. When we can make consistent moves and review consistently, we are going to set the stage appropriately for having a way for an employee to really be able to easily ask for help, for having a way that, as an employer, we can review what help they need and treat them as an individual. But the only way we get that is through that formal and consistent application and creation of policies. So I always think once a year, if you're a company that maybe does a strategic plan review every three years, whatever it is, have a consistent schedule for being able to review what you have. If you come home from a conference like DMEC compliance, and you got some really good ideas on how you can apply those in the future to what you have or what maybe you need to build so that you can assess your consistency in treating employees kind of the same until you treat them all as individuals.

That's a really good strategy. So I think overall, like, every one to three years. But if you can combine it with an effort that already exists in review, especially if that review can be done by separate people. I know when I write a policy, I think it's great. Like, I don't know. I think it's going to be great next year, too, probably. But if someone else reviews it, they're going to be able to bring kind of a neutral view in maybe their learning and their opportunity and how maybe one or two words can make a world of difference. So I would also say, you know, one to three years, but change up. Who's looking at it, too.

Kristin Jones, CLMS, PHR, SHRM-CP: I love Ryan, when you said it, I actually literally wrote it down as you were saying it, because I loved it so much. But you said when you treat them the same until you treat them as individuals, and I think that's such a core part of a lot of different policies and programs, but especially Return to Work is. Is, you know, having that structured process where you're treating them the same. You know, you have your. Your guidelines, your guardrails. And then until you treat them as individuals, all of these processes within our space and absence and disability management requires that. And I think sometimes we forget that, or we forget kind of the intent of these programs and policies, or we don't write them in a way that gives that space to do that when we get to that point. So I just. I love that how you. Because we talk about that, like having consistent processes and then treating, you know, everything case by case and as an individual and personalized, and I think that that's such a hard thing sometimes to reconcile in our minds.

But when you say treat them the same until you treat them as individuals, I just. That that's like a caption for me from this. I love it.

Ryan Bruce, MEd, CRC, SPHR, CLMS: Yeah. I think the only thing accommodation requests have in common is that they're all different. And when we can embrace that idea, then it really. It's almost freeing once you embrace that, because then you're all right. So. Well, I have to look at what's different than what I thought. I have to look to see how this could be different than the employee I helped last week. And it sounds exactly the same, but maybe it's not. Maybe you don't need equipment, maybe you don't. Maybe they are asking for time off, but what they really need is a change in schedule because they want to work, they want to make money.

So it's really that kind of. That very interesting part. That's what got me into this role of like, looking at accommodations as almost as a huge profession move. And then the interesting elements are what kept me here so far, for sure.

Kristin Jones, CLMS, PHR, SHRM-CP: I think the theme for our compliance conference this year was the Art of Compliance. And it really is that when you talk about kind of that. That marriage or that blending of the individualized and the structured aspects of it, and it really is an art.

It's really amazing to see when it's done well and it has so much potential in it.

Heather Grimshaw: I'm wondering, too, in terms of the context, about industry awareness for regular training and education in this area, do you both think that that's pretty common among employers,

or is Ryan's comment about one to three years for reviewing the policies and really having that additional set of eyes which I really appreciated as well is, is that pretty understood or do you think that would be news?

Kristin Jones, CLMS, PHR, SHRM-CP: I believe people are aware of the need to review policies both in our space and in other areas of the organization. I think the understanding of the importance of it is different than, or maybe separate from actually carving out the time and because it is, it's, it's time consuming, it is a large effort and, and it can be easy to set to the side if you don't know of any glaring gaps or issues with your policy. It, it's something that I think is, is easily kind of set and said well we'll, we'll get to that. And how many of us, I think probably all of us have a list that's who knows how long of the I'll get to that items. I know I sure do. I personally don't think it's news to folks that it needs to be done. I think it's just keeping the, the importance of that kind of front and centered and letting, making sure it stays a focal point.

Ryan Bruce, MEd, CRC, SPHR, CLMS: And I'm going to, I'm going to take a flip on that too.

So plain language for these policies because we're talking about a policy that's in place to make sure everyone knows what's going on. And a lot of times I see a policy like this being written from a legal team, for a legal team and not necessarily for an employee or for an employer. So I would say reviewing some of these and making sure that they're in the language that's going to resonate with your actual audience is really important too. Most employers want to be able to have an easy, simple process for someone to ask for help so they can retain that talent. It's a hard labor market. You gotta retain talent and this is a really good way to do that. So making sure that people don't get so turned off by legal language that they decide not to ask for help and suffer in silence is also kind of a really other interesting piece of how to look at all of this too

.

Heather Grimshaw: That's a great point that legalese, it can be daunting, let's face it. So Ryan, in the article you note the importance of adhering to documentation and operational policies to comply with the Americans with Disabilities act and the dangers of inconsistencies. You specify the risks of distinguishing between occupational and non-occupational injuries and illnesses and I'm hoping that you will share more information about this.

Ryan Bruce, MEd, CRC, SPHR, CLMS: Yeah, it is a little dangerous to treat people differently. We want to be able to say that when you're looking at if there are two people with exactly the same thing and exactly the same request, which we've already said never ever happens, but we're just being theoretical right now. So theoretically, when this happens, we want to make sure that they get the same consistent outcome. So back to the theme of consistency. So when you are treating occupational or a work-related injury or illness differently from an accommodation perspective than you are with someone who's asking for help and has a serious health condition, they have a disability under the definition of ADA, but they have a non-occupational injury or illness,

maybe they got hurt hiking, then you're creating an inconsistency in how you're treating people. And when those inconsistencies come about, that employee who went hiking at home with his family and got hurt and now is asking for help, but you're saying no, but he knows someone who had the same injury, who got hurt at work, did get that accommodation. Well, if I'm that hiker who got hurt at home, I'm going to be a little bit upset about that. And if I have to lose hours, if you're telling me that, you know, I have to use my FMLA time and what happens when that exhausts and you're not going to approve any other further lost time as an accommodation under ADA, while I have physical therapy, I might get really upset. I might have to seek counsel on what I can do to protect my job, that I really want, that I like, that I love working with the people. But now I have a problem and that inconsistency is going to be the highlight of that request. So eliminating those inconsistencies and really seeking out what's different, what are those pieces, those elements of a policy that could create an inconsistency and treatment of individuals is really important to look at.

Heather Grimshaw: That's really helpful. And I think it harkens back to your earlier comment about the theme of consistency there. So you're being consistent. Ryan, One of the recommendations in the article, and this is shifting gears a little bit, is for employers to update job descriptions. This sounds basic, yet it is something we hear a lot about from conference and webinar speakers. And I'm wondering if this is a frequently overlooked element to designing successful accommodations, Ryan, and if so, what your recommendation is for listeners.

Ryan Bruce, MEd, CRC, SPHR, CLMS: My recommendation is for every year to review every single job and make sure the job description is correct, signed off by an employee performing their job, their manager in an HR department. Now, I don't know too many employers who are going to be able to do that though. The truth is you have a ton of jobs, a ton of job descriptions and reviewing them with consistency is really, really difficult. I have worked with a couple manufacturing companies and one thing that I have seen that, that they do really well is talk to a lot of their employees at a year-end performance evaluation and part of the topic is a job description and they get to look at it and say, yeah, this is what I do. Or if it's a bunch of different stations from a manufacturing standpoint, maybe they look at a couple and make sure as a manager, as a team leader, a floor lead, a supervisor, that you're going to get to all of those by talking to at least one employee. And that is a really good way for this goal. That can be really daunting of well, I'm going to make sure to validate a job description every year. That's almost impossible. But when you make it part of like a formal review process, it becomes a little bit more attainable. And sometimes an employee says something, but as a manager, you know what they're supposed to do. We're like, well yeah, it's this heavy box that I have to lift every 30 minutes and it weighs 48 pounds. I'm like, well that's not, that's not in that job description at all.

So you can take that and kind of take those learnings and have them kind of go back to HR and get a strategy in place. I think that is like a really, really good way to look at job descriptions. A manager and the employee doing it, they both know exactly what's going on and they can determine, hey, maybe a change needs to be made and maybe my HR business partner is going to be able to help me with this. You know, again, maybe it's every other year, maybe as a manager it's going to be your job to kind of just review those on paper, just make sure they're all good. But I think it's a really important task to review the job descriptions because it's only setting yourself up as an employer for success in the future. So we just did an exercise at the DMEC compliance conference where we gave some individuals a job description that we wrote up and we demonstrated what that job is. And only a couple people looked at the job description and said, well, the box, that task, the job description says you're doing it much less frequently than what I'm watching you do right now. And that has a tremendous impact on physical demand levels down the road for a job. And Potential stressors. Are you using the equipment you're supposed to be using to help? And the answer was, well, no, I'm not in this demonstration. Good job looking and finding that discrepancy and that inconsistency.

So I thought that was a really interesting piece that even though we, we have these job descriptions, sometimes we overlook them when we're looking at how does a job description impact the idea of an essential job function when you're looking at an accommodation.

Kristin Jones, CLMS, PHR, SHRM-CP: I definitely agree. I think the best practice that I know of, that I have heard is the exactly what Ryan described of engaging the employees doing the work and their direct manager at, you know, performance review or evaluation time as a great opportunity to do that. I do know we've heard from some folks then in the like HR areas who say, but that's really overwhelming if we do our, you know, evaluations and then every January we're getting, you know, all of these updates to these job descriptions all at once. And you know, I think more modern evaluation programs involve more touch bases with like formalized touch bases with touch points with employees on their performance. So some of sometimes it's a mid-year and a year end, sometimes it's you know, quarterly kind of documented check ins and then a year in. I mean I think most of them have that bigger year end but there are typically other additional and still formalized, maybe not quite as, as structured as the year end, but still formalized and documented touch points. And think about creatively using those, you know, maybe some of them are done in the, that mid-year review time or mid year touch point rather than putting all of them at the year-end review. And like Brian said, maybe you know, groups of jobs are done every other year and then you know, you kind of alternate some of the jobs. So it's not quite as much all at once I think because it's important to think about the full process of implementing those changes, you know, validating and implementing the changes to those job descriptions as well.

And sometimes things happen off cycle. I mean just thinking, you know, internally at dmec, we have grown a lot, our staff in, in the last, you know, this year, in just the, the last few months. And so we're actually undergoing, you know, kind of some, having some meetings and conversations with our teams now to look at the job descriptions specifically within the education department of, of the DMEC team. Because we've grown, we're, we now have more people and we're touching on some of the projects and some of the work we're doing in different ways than we did before. And so it requires going back and looking at the whole for the group and reassessing what those descriptions look like and how they flow together. And so there's also some key points that also bring that to relevance. In addition to the annual reviews, you know, when something has changed in the structure of a department or a team or something has fundamentally changed with the job itself, I mean, sometimes those are bigger things like hiring three more people. Sometimes that's, you know, changing equipment and, you know, remodeling the warehouse with some new equipment and that fundamentally changes how some jobs are done or. But that routine review is important not to let get away from us. And then also thinking through when those changes happen, you know, remembering to kind of look back at what is the impact there as well in those job descriptions.

Ryan Bruce, MEd, CRC, SPHR, CLMS: Yeah, and I, I think one element that Heather and Kristen, you're, you're both hitting on too is I'm really busy as an HR business partner and HR leader. And that's really an important thing to not just take into consideration, but to admit and figure out and prioritize. When I look at accommodations, a lot of the time it's, well, let's just make sure that we have a way to intake and let's just make sure that we have a way that we can, can deal with this consistently. And that's a, that's a really good start. That's really, really important. And making sure that you understand then who's going to treat people consistently. So when I think about culture, I think about who likes to do things at a client, at an employer site. And when you have an HR team that's centralized, who is the known resource and the no go to players, then you have almost a little bit of an easier path with a consistent application of accommodations. You know how to check eligibility, you know who's going to do an assessment to see what we can do. Start the interactive process. If it's transitional return to work, we know about how long we might be able to look at transitional return to work across the whole company so that you can narrow it down to specific jobs or departments that, to see what's reasonable for you. We have a good idea about how they're going to get paid. Is it their home department? Is it something else that's set up entirely? If you have a more distributed model where managers are the ones who are in charge of the interactive process and they have some guidelines online, then you might start seeing some more inconsistencies. So I think you have to acknowledge your culture, but also you have to acknowledge where you are too. Do you have time to move to a centralized best practice model where one or two or a team of HR business partners, depending on your size, are in charge of an interactive process? And if a manager says no, you're taking a look at that first before signing off on that as the official company response to an accommodation request. So a lot goes into it. I don't think that there's a single answer. I think there's some best practices, but you also have to look, look at how they are best going to be applied to you.

Kristin Jones, CLMS, PHR, SHRM-CP: And I think we see some differences. And you know, I don't want to speak for Ryan. I'm, I'm assuming you probably do as well. But just as at employers, entry points to these accommodation conversations as well. You know, some employers, just based on culture and also the nature of the jobs, the work site, what they're able to do, have the ability to have some more flexibilities in place that really kind of keep people out of the accommodation process from the get go.

And I'm not saying that's a goal to keep people out of the process, but just due to the nature of their culture, maybe they have some flexible schedule options that employees can avail themselves to with or without a medical need for it. Just it could be a preference that might keep someone out of an accommodation process because they can, they can avail themselves of that flexibility on their own without the need for a formalized process. Just because the workplace kind of has baked in some, some flexibility, some inherent flexibility. Sometimes it's things, you know, I've heard of organizations who, who utilize kind of automatic yes accommodations. You know, sit stand desks are one that come to mind just as kind of low hanging fruit example of um, you know, that's a pretty common one that it's like you, you don't have to go through a, a process or, or submit a, for a request or talk to your manager about back pain or anything like that. You can just go online and order one or maybe they have kind of a catalog or request it through the, the proper department at work and just say I, I would like a sit stand desk. And it could be just because I, I want to get a little more activity in my day and have a walking, you know, a walking pad under my desk. Or it can be because I have a, a back issue and, and my doctor that for me. But the bottom line is they just have to request it. So there's, and that I think is heavily influenced. But like I said before, the nature of the work and the nature of the workplace itself, and then also the workplace culture definitely influences that as well.

But there's, there's some things that, that definitely influence that experience for an employee coming into, I don't want to say like into the system, but kind of into these processes.

Heather Grimshaw: That leads me into my last question for both of you, which is how common it is for employers to include stay at work tactics in their policies and programs and why this is an important component to a return to work formalized policy.

Ryan Bruce, MEd, CRC, SPHR, CLMS: Yeah. So I am a certified rehabilitation counselor by training, which means that I'm a vocational rehabilitation counselor. I started my work at New York Life helping people to go back to work and quickly moved into the more proactive space and helped to create a program, jeez, maybe like 13 years ago now that was based in pre disability stay at work support for our clients. So I have kind of an unfair, extremely biased opinion on this one. I'm going to say it is not common enough for employers to have substantial stay at work tactics in their policies and programs. And it is incredibly important. A really interesting. It wasn't really a study. It was more of an exercise we did with a very large account. And we did this right before COVID started actually, and we revisited it on a couple different instances over the last number of years. But we took a look at the employees that we were helping in a stay at work program and we looked to see, okay, well like a year from now, where are they? And two of them out of like 150 experienced a disability lead leave. And no one had a long term disability leave that we helped in a stay at work program from that initial data set that we worked on. And to me, that's awesome. But at the same time, we can't say, oh well, a stay at work program is going to decrease your disability incidence by 99%. But if they do go on disability, maybe they'll be on a little bit longer because those people were most at risk for disability to begin with. So like we, you could look at that, but that's kind of a correlation. What we do know is that these people were able to return to their normal duties and work efficiently with a little bit of accommodation. Maybe it was an ergonomic review where we said, maybe you should pay attention. If it bends, bend it at 90 degrees and if it doesn't bend, keep it straight. Let's try to work in that with that mindset and see where we go. Maybe it was buying A sit stand workstation for that employee that cost a couple hundred dollars. Both of those very small accommodations that had a huge impact on the workforce. So I think the idea of making stay at work tactics more accessible to employees so that they can ask for help and you have a really simplified process to kind of get them some simple help. Yeah, it's still an ADA accommodation. Should you track it? Yeah, you should because you're showing as an employer the amazing work that you're doing and how important that tracking is in the future.

You're never going to know obviously. But documentation, an important part about HR in general. Document, document, document.

So when I look at that, I think that stay-at-work tactics and programs so important, but they don't have to be extensive. And the job accommodation network, Askjan.org is a really great neutral tool for folks to use. Most accommodations are under $500, like 90% and like 30% of accommodations are free and cost absolutely nothing. It's just how you can react to an employee and how you can help them to be able to bring their best selves to work.

And I think it's really important and slightly underutilized. But again, I'm incredibly biased on this question.

Kristin Jones, CLMS, PHR, SHRM-CP: I definitely agree. I think that a lot of times, and just coming from myself being an HR practitioner before coming on at dmec, a lot of times employees don't engage with their, certainly with hr. Sometimes, you know, I think it's more hit or miss with their manager, but they don't really look to their employer as providing options and being a resource for them before it becomes the medical need or their issue becomes such a large issue that they need to go out or they're preparing to go out for leave. And that early intervention really can make such a big difference and be so impactful for the employee and the employer. It's, I think this is kind of full circle to my very, you know, kind of opening statements around return to work programs and why to formalize and what the impact of that is of,

you know, the benefits to the employer and the employee when the employee comes back to work sooner in a healthy way. I mean, it's that much more when they're able to stay at work.

But again, they, they don't often realize that the organization is prepared to help meet their needs in the early stages. And if they see nothing about a stay at work focus and the ways that an employer is committed to engaging with them and focus on their health and their wellness to keep them productive and to keep them healthy, they're going to think that doesn't exist if it, if it isn't there, if they can't find it in their minds, it doesn't exist, exist. And I think that's, you know,

an assumption that's going to be made across the board and that employers need to be aware of. It's not enough just to say, well, yeah, of course we would do that.

They just need to come ask us. Yes, there does need to be that engagement and that dialogue, but they have to first know that or have indicators that it's even a possibility.

But I think it is really important. And that stay at work mindset really treats work itself as a part of recovery, as a part of, you know, their lives are no longer separated from, you know, work is this chunk and home and personal life is this chunk.

It's so much more fluid now. And we talk about that in other areas of work life and our language that we use and how we're talking about that. But we also have to think about it in terms of our programs and how we are meeting employees where they are and meeting their needs and making sure we're opening that dialogue with them.

Heather Grimshaw: That really brings everything full circle. And I think the reference to ensuring that the stay at work examples and commitment are outlined and visible, as you said, Kristin, is so important and really does map back to what Ryan said earlier about treating every employee as an individual and ensuring that unique element to the accommodations and the interactions. So thank you both so much for your time today and your willingness to weigh in on this really important topic. Once again, we will include links to Ryan's article in At Work magazine as well as the DMEC Return to Work micro credential course that Kristen mentioned earlier as well.

Kristin Jones, CLMS, PHR, SHRM-CP: Thanks, Heather. Thanks, Ryan.

Ryan Bruce, MEd, CRC, SPHR, CLMS: Thank you, guys.