How To Improve Your Disability Leave Management

Have you ever hired a fantastic employee who you want to keep on your team for as long as possible?

As a business manager, you want to build and retain a team of great workers, but the threat of a worker becoming injured always remains. When your workers suffer injuries that lead to disabilities, they often need time away from work to recuperate, impacting your team.

In response, many companies have introduced disability leave management. This involves overseeing and seeking to strengthen programs to help employees heal and get them back to work.

But how do you build and fortify your disability leave? Keep reading to learn more!

Use a Return-to-Work Program

Fewer than half of all workplaces in the United States have existing return-to-work programs. By failing to implement these programs, though, they run the risk of losing their talent should a disability occur.

Return-to-work policies centralize the goal of getting the employee back to work as soon as physically possible. They often involve plans for employees to hold light-duty positions or assignments and still receive a paycheck while they recover.

So, if you want to keep your workers, consider offering to pay them for lighter work while they recover and offer them their full jobs back after they have healed.

Forming a Return-to-Work Policy

How do you create a return-to-work policy?

First, focus on determining eligibility. What criteria will employees need to meet? What options might you offer to people in different positions? How will your employees exit the policy and return to their regular?

You should also put an employee or a team of workers, including a leave of absence coordinator, in charge of managing your disability leave management. This establishes a clear group of people who will be in charge of making decisions and smooth over any problems that arise.

Consider hiring a vocational consultant to provide you with greater detail setting up a return-to-work policy for your employees. Investing in a vocational legal expert will pay off in the long run.

Learn to Identify Accommodations

The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) requires employers not to discriminate against workers with disabilities and to provide reasonable accommodations for them.

Yet, when an employer remains unfamiliar with the disability, it may be difficult to determine which accommodations are reasonable and necessary. Use the regulations outlined by the ADA to assist you in identifying proper accommodations and think carefully about how you can alter the employee’s day-to-day work so that they can still perform their job.

You can also work with vocational legal experts to learn how to best meet the regulations and discover great accommodations.

Ready to Improve Your Disability Leave Management?

As a business, the best way to retain your employees will involve improving disability leave management policy.

Having a system through which you allow employees to recover from injuries while still working helps. When you follow the advice above, you increase your chances of keeping your top workers on your team, even if they suffer from disabilities. Continue to be proactive and consider hiring a vocational legal expert to help.

Contact our vocational experts at Solutions Northwest Inc.  – our vocational experts are involved in personal injury, workers’ compensation, and family law.

If you need our guidance, our legal experts are ready to guide you through the process. Contact us today to make an appointment.

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