Tag @work magazine issue

Employers hold the key to designing benefit plan and policy designs that support employees and ensure compliance with an increasing number of local, state, and federal laws. And the need to open doors to new program possibilities that help support employee health and wellness as well as recruit and retain an increasingly diverse workforce is emphasized in this issue of DMEC @Work magazine. It is time to rethink approaches, test benefits that protect and support employee health, and reassess accommodation programs to ensure that practical realities align with organizational intent. This issue of @Work magazine focuses on the Americans with Disabilities Act and Return to Work. The magazine is a DMEC member benefit that helps unlock possibilities for employers of all industries and sizes.

Integrating disability and absence management supports a seamless approach to helping employees stay at work and return to work as outlined in this issue of @Work magazine. Content illustrates the value of taking an integrated approach to this work — from offering holistic benefit plans that address financial, physical, and mental health aspects of employee health to recognizing (and communicating) the reality that work can be part of recovery. Learn more about why industry influences return-to-work durations, the true cost of taking a siloed approach to disability and absence management, and the best ways to minimize disruptions from intermittent leave. In today’s work environment, successful employers expect and encourage employees to use benefits and capitalize on generous plans that include leave. They act as guides to support the diverse needs of employees at different ages and stages of their lives and careers.

As more employers realize the powerful influence work has on employee health and well-being, what steps can they take to ensure a safe, healthy environment? This issue of @Work magazine highlights practical examples of how benefit plans and policies can help protect brain and body health and encourage recovery, examples of caregiving support that results in higher productivity and morale, and why prioritizing mental health claims pays off. Read on for member experience stories, tips, tools, and tactics that will help disability and absence managers at all levels ensure safer, healthier environments.

Ensuring employer compliance requires creativity and due diligence; a commitment to detail and a dedication to helping employees during vulnerable times. This issue showcases the variety and complexity of this work as well as competing demands on disability and absence managers. It also emphasizes the value of community and access to colleagues, who share challenges and successes and lean in to provide guidance. Read about lessons learned during the first year of implementing the Colorado Family and Medical Leave Insurance program, how assessing cognitive demands can help protect employees from reinjury when they return to work, tools to help teams take an unbiased approach to accommodations, and more.

Leave management experts define innovation in myriad ways as illustrated in
this issue of @Work magazine. Content spans the gamut from building the business case for paid leave to identifying the nuances of data automation and the value of selecting one-stop-shop software platforms. We feature the Emerging Leader and inaugural Kaleta-Carruthers Award winners and celebrate the passion that drives leave management experts to find innovative ways to support employees and ensure employer compliance!

This issue of the magazine encourages employers to step outside the traditional confines and seek new ways to support diverse groups of employees. It champions the notion that returning to work can be part of the healing process when a leave is necessary and provides examples of how employers can encourage employees to return to work as soon as possible. Read about the bravery needed to test new approaches to accommodations and the willingness to expand the concept of disability and absence management to be more inclusive. The issue, focused on of compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and Return to Work, includes articles about how employers can support employees diagnosed with cancer, benchmarking tips, how to avoid legal missteps after a leave of absence, ways to create accessible environments for employees with different types of disabilities, and more.

The process of integrating disability and absence management has been called a journey and, as authors note throughout this issue of @Work magazine, it is one well worth taking! This approach, a hallmark of the Disability Management Employer Coalition (DMEC) since its inception, helps employers comply with an increasing number of (and nuances to) laws across the U.S.

There is increasing pressure on employers to invest more strategically in the mental health and well-being of their employees, and this issue of DMEC’s @Work magazine includes guidance on high-level strategy as well as practical implementation.

This issue of @Work magazine illustrates the need for professionals to track leave laws (and their variations across the country) while taking a creative approach to accommodation requests to ensure compliance and help employees stay at work when possible and return to work when it is safe to do so.

This issue of @Work magazine offers suggestions for how employers can encourage appropriate use of available leave to avoid and address burnout and ensure whole-person health, guidance for designing return-to-work pathways that minimize employee stress, practical approaches that help one employer support absence and disability managers, and more.