Hi just going through some posts and realised no one has commented. Our school go with the LA model policy and doctor it accordingly, it then goes to Governors for comment and approval at committee meetings.
Hope that's okay.

Hi AD

I include a footer with "Last review date" and "Next review due by", which is one year after the last review date. That way each policy gets as a minimum an annual check but if there is a change in statute or case law, or some other reason to change the policy earlier, then the dates are changed accordingly. The next review date can go into your Outlook calendar or similar to remind you to make the check. There are quite a lot of policies that only need to be read through and the date changed, and they're good for another year.

The procedure section that follows in the format I use is more likely to need tweaking - sometimes because of something I have read in this forum and thought "that's a good idea" and adopted it.

To sum up: keep it simple.

If a policy is being used regularly, then you shouldn't need a tool or review procedure, as the need for amendments will arise organically. If a policy isn't being used regularly then one should wonder why there's a policy at all...

Of course, there are reasons why a policy might not be used for a long time. For example, in an SME you may go a long while without having a case of new parenthood. But if you have organic HR, it should be a part of their role to stay up to speed with changes in legislation and regulations as well as with general industry trends. So even in those cases, updates should happen as and when they need to rather than to an artificial timetable.

More tricky, though, is where responsibility (and authority) for making changes should lie. I've recently been trying to persuade my organization that responsibility for maintaining HR policies is better delegated in whole to HR than, as it currently stands, held at Board level. This allows the policies to be "living" documents that change quickly in response to new needs and ideas. Overall, I think it should be held by the HR team as a whole, as this encourages everyone to not only become familiar with them, but to read them with a critical eye: an essential skill in HR policy development.

Of course, if you are the sort of organization that likes to distribute hard copies of HR policies all over the place, it will be awkward keeping track of where they are and which ones are up-to-date. But that's more a good reason for not distributing hard copies than it is for having a rigorous schedule.

In reply to Robey:

Hi Robey

If your policy is to do the legal minimum, policy changes will be driven by changes in the law. If your policy is an expression of an ethos and your beliefs on how people at work should be treated, then your policy may be well in advance of the law and you will not be able to rely on external triggers like case law to keep it fresh and relevant.

In an SME, some policies and procedures might not be needed for years, but that makes it more important to have them, not less. When a particular situation occurs with reasonable frequency, you remain fairly current on how to address it. When something is serious and important but happens very infrequently, like a death in service in an SME, the last thing you need is people faffing around because they aren't sure what line they should be taking. Another example: our policy statement on imprisonment (yes, this has happened) begins: "It is an extremely rare event for a member of staff to be held on remand or given a custodial sentence. For this reason, this policy records our approach to situations of this type so that we do not have to work out how to handle the situation afresh each time it recurs."

On your point about HR taking over responsibility and authority for making changes to policy, I see a governance issue. Directors should sign off on key policies which are there to ensure that the organisation, in the person of the board of directors who carry the legal liability, fulfills its legal responsibilities, so I think that Viv is doing the right thing in sending policies to her school governors for comment and sign off. The functional specialists then draft procedures based on the policy position of the board or governing body, but you really want management to feel that the organisation's position as set out in a policy is how *we* do things round here, not how HR does things, so I'd be a bit wary about campaigning for HR to take full responsibility.

In reply to Elizabeth Divver:

Yes, of course, if you're talking about introducing a new policy or making a significant change to a core HR policy, involvement at the highest level is an excellent idea and HR shouldn't be free to do what they please.

But I shouldn't need Board approval to update the maternity pay rates on 1 April or to correct a typo.

Too often, I see HR teams sitting on outdated and poorly-written policies that they know are outdated and poorly-written, because they're waiting for the next review date for the Board to approve amendments. This attitude just serves to underline perceptions of HR as a bureaucratic, box-ticking service.

My argument is for HR to have clear authority to make non-substantive changes unilaterally, and for the pace of substantive policy change to be set by HR who should be telling the Board when their input is required. Meanwhile, a Board member with responsibility for HR keeps tabs on policy to ensure no one gets excited and exceeds their remit.

I think my frustration is fed by inheriting a large pile of policies that have been dutifully reviewed and approved by the Board, year after year, which are then ignored because not only are they crashingly dull and poorly written but also at odds with operational practice.

In reply to Robey:

I would say that the policy statement on maternity pay would be something along the lines of "we will ensure all employees receive their statutory entitlements" or " we wish to ensure that there is no financial pressure to return early and therefore offer enhancements to statutory entitlements" The prevailing rate of SMP would then be part of the procedure, not the policy. In other words, I am making a distinction between the policy, which sets out an approach, and a procedure which enacts that approach. If that seems like splitting hairs, just think what a help it would be to you in your current situation.

It sounds as if you need to scrap the policies you have inherited to replace them with a new set that reflect reality.

In reply to Elizabeth Divver:

*Already done* :D