These holidays impact workplace schedules and employee availability, so knowing which holidays are coming up in 2025 can help ensure smooth operations across time zones. 

For more information, consider an official government page.

Here’s a detailed breakdown of these holidays and their significance for the year.

Summary

For HR professionals in the USA, knowing the India holidays 2025 is essential for effective planning. Understanding these categories will help you manage schedules and operations smoothly in 2025.

The post 2025 Holidays Calendar: India appeared first on AttendanceBot Blog.

My request was approved right away, and I spent the day recharging. The next day, I felt refreshed and ready to dive back into work with renewed energy. 

Not many days had passed, and a coworker sent me an insightful article from Business Insider that highlighted an interesting trend: sick leave, especially for mental health, is on the rise—particularly among Gen Z, who are prioritizing their well-being more than ever.

It got me thinking about how much the landscape of sick leave has changed over the years. With tools like AttendanceBot making it easier for employees to log time off, and with companies becoming more open to understanding the need for mental health breaks, sick days are no longer just for the flu. The idea that taking a day off to reset your mind and body is now considered just as important as recovering from a cold is refreshing, and I believe we’re seeing a cultural shift towards a healthier, more sustainable work-life balance.

Since AttendanceBot itself manages leave and time off for more than 50,000 employees worldwide, I decided to grab an engineer and do a quick analysis of sick leave trends among knowledge workers across different regions of the world. As I suspected, there’s been a noticeable increase in the number of annual sick days taken, and it’s clear that employees, especially in places like the UK and Australia, are embracing the need for rest, both physically and mentally.

Below are my takeaways from the trends and statistics showing sick leave trends in the US compared to other places in the world, using AttendanceBot data representing 50,000 knowledge workers.

Let’s break down these two graphs in a simple, friendly way. They show how much sick leave knowledge workers are taking across different regions—Australia, Canada, the UK, the US, and a worldwide average—from 2019 to early 2024.

Graph 1: Annual Sick Days Per Employee

• US employees (black line) have remained fairly stable in sick days, using slightly more over time and currently hovering just above 2.5 days per year. As commonly cited, the US and Canada use sick time the least compared to their peers, a trend that doesn’t seem to be changing anytime soon.
• Canada (red line) trails its peers. While employees are taking more leave now that 5 years ago, they’re still only averaging about 2 sick days per year.
• Australia (blue line) leads the pack when it comes to sick days, with employees typically taking around 4-5 days a year. There was a dip in 2021, but Australians have pretty consistently taken about 4.5 sick days per year.
• The UK (purple line) had a big year in 2022, averaging almost 5 sick days, and while that number hovers around 4 today, it’s still an increase from prior years.
• The worldwide average (green dotted line) is just below 3 sick days a year, though worryingly that average has been dropping slowly but steadily since 2019.

Graph 2: Sick Leave as a Percentage of Total Leave

• The US (black line) has generally been using more proportional sick days over time, but 2024 has seen a slight decrease, down to 11% today
• Canada (red line) – as expected based on low total sick time, uses the fewest sick days as a percentage of total leave. Ultimately this is great news that Canadians are still taking other types of leave, just not sick time.
• Australia (blue line) has the highest percentage of total leave taken as sick leave, which likely explains their large volume of sick days.  Australian employees have remained fairly consistent around 16% of total leave.
• The UK (purple line) has seen pretty drastic differences year to year, with 2023 and 2024 seeing a significant increase in sick leave taken to other types of leave, around 16%.
• Worldwide (green dotted line) usage has hovered around 10% since 2019 but seems to be dropping slowly over time as other types of leave become more popular.

Quick Summary:

• The US generally trails its peers in sick time, though it matches pretty closely the worldwide average.
• Canada uses the fewest sick days absolutely and as a percentage, but usage is increasing.
• Australia takes the lead in both sick days and sick leave percentage.
• The UK saw a big jump in sick time starting in 2023, possibly a new normal after COVID-19

So if you’re sick, it’s good to be an Australian! Or if you’re uncomfortable with those sick days and prefer to take other types of leave, maybe give Canada a spin.

Rising Sick Days: What’s the Data Showing?

Looking at the trends globally, there are some key takeaways. For instance, in the US and Canada, the average number of annual sick days per employee has remained relatively stable over the past few years, hovering around two days. However, in countries like Australia and the UK, we’ve seen much higher averages. Australia, in particular, consistently records over four sick days per employee, and the UK saw a spike post-2022, which could reflect the lingering effects of the pandemic.

What’s interesting is that while some regions have a steady rate, others have fluctuated, possibly due to a variety of factors like changing work-from-home policies, burnout, and, as the article from Business Insider highlights, Gen Z’s strong stance on prioritizing mental health.

Mental Health as Part of the Equation

The data also shows that when we look at sick days as a percentage of total leave hours, the numbers are even more revealing. Australia leads the way with sick leave making up around 16-18% of total leave time. The US and Canada, on the other hand, show a lower percentage, sitting closer to 8-10%.

This could reflect cultural differences in how sick leave is perceived and utilized. In some countries, there’s a stronger emphasis on pushing through illness or stress, while in others, like the UK and Australia, there’s more acceptance around taking time off to recharge mentally. 

The rise in sick days among knowledge workers worldwide might also be attributed to the fact that more people are working from home, which can blur the lines between personal and professional time. Many employees may feel the need to take sick days not just for physical ailments, but also for mental exhaustion, burnout, or simply the need to step away from work.

Gen Z and the Future of Sick Leave

The Business Insider article raised a great point about how Gen Z, the youngest working generation, is taking mental health even more seriously than previous generations. They’re not afraid to take sick leave when they feel overwhelmed, and they’re pushing companies to recognize mental health as a valid reason for taking time off.

This shift could signal a broader change in workplace culture, where employees of all ages feel more comfortable taking time off when they need it, whether it’s for their physical health or to manage stress and burnout. As more companies adopt tools like AttendanceBot, tracking these trends becomes even easier, helping businesses understand the importance of providing flexibility and support to their employees.

The Takeaway

Sick leave isn’t just about sneezing and sore throats anymore. As the trends show, more employees, particularly knowledge workers, are recognizing the importance of taking time off for mental health, and companies are becoming more receptive to it. Whether it’s an employee taking a mental health day or a working mom like me who just needs a break from it all, the conversation around sick leave is evolving. 

And who knows? Maybe these trends will continue to rise as more people prioritize their well-being over the traditional “push through” mentality. It’s clear that we’re moving toward a more balanced approach to work, and I, for one, am all for it.

The post The Rising Trend of Taking a Sick Leave appeared first on AttendanceBot Blog.

How is Slack Frontiers Structured?

A lot of conferences can feel a bit irrelevant because they only suit a specific niche, but Slack understands that Slack users are diverse and it tailors its sessions to suit this diverse group. The sessions are divided into different categories and the event platform lets attendees mark sessions to their favorite lists in advance so they can get the best out of the event. There are three top-level categories – keynotes, luminary speaker series, and general sessions.

Keynotes

Slack Centric Keynotes

• Reinvent Work from Your Digital HQ: Slack leaders come together to discuss how Slack’s new platform innovations will empower employees to build solutions and transform their work styles. Jump to Slack = Digital HQ to read the details.
• A Conversation with Bryan Stevenson: Human rights activist Bryan Stevenson discusses mass incarceration in America and how Slack’s Next Chapter program can help tech companies employ formerly incarcerated individuals.

Luminary Speaker Series

• A Conversation with Jennifer Doudna: Nobel Prize-winning scientist Jennifer Doudna’s thoughts on collaboration in the lab, what she’s learned about leadership, and how to approach the ethical dilemmas that come with innovation. Amazingly inspiring and learning how she had to grapple with the attention after getting the Nobel and how she rethought time management and came up with a strategy for spending time with her son.
• A Conversation with Simone Biles: The world’s most decorated gymnast discusses how her indomitable spirit can inspire others to defy personal limits and reshape conversations around mental health.

Playlists

Playlists are an amazing feature of Slack Frontiers 2021. They’ve categorized sessions by interests, roles, and location in the hierarchy so you can just hit play, and the sessions stream like a TV channel.

The following playlists are available at Slack Frontiers 2021:

• Collaborative
• Developer
• Engineering Apps and Solutions
• Engineering Decision Maker
• Government
• Innovation at Work
• Insights for Partners
• IT and Security Apps
• IT Decision Maker
• Marketing Decision Maker
• Marketing Professional
• New to Slack
• Sales Decision Maker
• Service Decision Makers
• Sales Professional
• Sales, Service, and Marketing Apps
• Service Professional
• Slack Admin
• Slack and Salesforce
• Solutions to Transform Your Business

AttendanceBot and Slack Frontiers 2021

Interestingly, the first platform we launched AttendanceBot on, was Slack and since then we’ve been Slack power users even in our own workspace.

So it made sense that our leadership attended Slack Frontiers 2021.

This year our Co-Founder Ujjwal Grover and Growth Lead Dakota LaFee took their pick of sessions at Frontiers. They will live blog their notes and takeaways from the sessions they attend here.

Slack = Digital HQ

New tools launched by Slack to supercharge your Digital HQ

If Slack is your Digital HQ right now, wait till you hear about these new powers that Slack is about to get.

New building blocks for workflow builder

Slack now offers reusable building blocks that let you create actions either inside Slack (like sending a DM) or outside Slack in another app (like opening a Jira ticket) to create more powerful workflows. There is also a list of extensive templates so you can don’t need to start from scratch and just pick what you most useful and update it as needed.

Connecting with Sign-in-with-Slack link for other products

Slack will now allow other apps to leverage Sign-in with Slack making it super easy for you to get in and out of your Apps without needing to set up another username-password.

App makers will soon be able to let users subscribe to updates in Slack

Subscribe in Slack

What if you could get alerted about mission-critical updates from other apps like a failed deployment, out-of-budget ads campaigns, a spike in user-reported issues, etc right inside Slack. Well, soon you’ll be able to. Apps will soon be able to offer a “update me on Slack” subscription to other Apps.

Brand new developer tools to help build apps faster

The new Slack CLI helps developers build and deploy apps faster. Soon developers will not only be able to create and test their apps using the CLI but also host the app data in Slack too.

Apps can now attach metadata and talk to each other in Slack

Attach metadata to messages that can be consumed by other Apps

Taking one more giant leap, the workflow builder will soon allow developers to attach metadata to messages that can be used to power really cool workflows. Imagine being able to take different workflows based on the value of user input.

Interested in learning more, head over here

Enabling Hybrid Work

Monty Hamilton shared several insights on mastering hybrid @ Telus

Structure the unstructured

With so many working remotely the need for human connection has only intensified. As a result, we can no longer rely on spontaneous connection but need to structure our schedule to include unstructured time with others. Planning ad-hoc interactions do little to devalue the quality of time spent. Get disciplined about calendared huddles!

Plan for digital-first in the office

Though digital-first has become a dominant strategy, what will be kept as companies return to the office? There’s no one answer, and that’s kind of the point. For employees, some will thrive in an office and others at home. Externally, many customers have come to appreciate the faceless digital experience while others still demand a human face. In either case, the key is that differentiating needs to empower preference and need.

Avoid false flexibility

Though office policies themselves may be flexible, if leadership themselves don’t lead by example then much of that flexibility is lip service. When leaders work strict schedules and refuse to take advantage of flexibility themselves, it sends negative signals about irregular work hours and creates real differences in outcomes for access, perception, and promotion.

Better Marketing Campaigns with Slack

Slack offers a wealth of advantages to supercharge a marketing team (or any team at all), exemplified by channels, no-code workflow building, and seamless integrations. Among these, channel is king.

Are channels really so much better than email? Yes.

• Transparency – there are no silos between stakeholder groups, which avoids duplicative work and misalignment.
• Agility – navigation is infinitely easier than one or multiple email threads, and central document housing eliminates time spent chasing references.
• Focus – context switching is minimized because so many software services integrate right into Slack

Which are the most critical features of channels?

• Descriptions & pinned items give new (& existing) users instant access to key stakeholders and content being discussed.
• Threads, search, and emojis make navigation seamless. Threads keep conversations neat & tidy, AI-assisted search eliminates lost conversations, and “react-jis” make status rapidly available to viewers – what’s complete versus what has urgency, approval, or eyes on.
• Slack connect is the ultimate platform for customers, partners, and vendors. Not only does the channel have a more personal relationship than email, but it drastically reduces the back and forth for items that require approval, review, or any kind of collaboration.

Any superuser tips? Of course.

• Use naming conventions for your channels! At Slack, they use prefixes like team, proj, and help
• If you’re new to channels, start with projects. If you’re experienced, make sure you have department-wide and cross-department channels.
• Huddles are a particularly good resource for quickly explaining topics that may be lost in translation over text. They’re great for explainers, creative work, or trains of thought.
• Slack connect can house up to 20 different organizations in one channel – don’t be afraid to collaborate with multiple partners.

Slack Tips to Spend More Time Selling

A handful of hot tips to grease your sales engine:

• Dedicate space for recurring topics. Best practices include maintaining a channel for wins, new hires, tactics, and appraisals.
• Organize your channels! Use naming conventions like CUST-[name] to organize channels for all your (major) accounts. For external partner channels on Slack Connect, use a prefix like EXT- to clearly signify external visibility.
• Integrate, integrate, integrate. Connecting with your source of truth – say CRM – means you can not only automatically update channels with relevant information but send comments back to your CRM without ever leaving Slack.
• Use huddles to most quickly share recorded insights OR start open huddles in a channel to collaborate with everyone who’s relevant and available.

Deliver a Great Customer Experience with Slack

CX agent onboarding

Onboarding a new CX agent involves inundating them with a lot of information. One way to handle this is to create personalized onboarding channels where you can offer them guidance and learning material and feedback. Gabrielle Dracopoulos from Intuit talked about how they use custom bots and channels to power their support team for their high-volume days.

Problems faced by new CX agents

Informal Communication

Foster informal connection and recognition to create an environment of belonging. Use clips and huddles to have lightweight conversation flexibly. Alex Holmes from Influx talked about the use of channels to empower people by letting them ask questions openly and transparently. Use emoji protocol (eyes to indicate seen and a checkmark to indicate done, etc) to act on messages and update or delegate actions.

Gabrielle also spoke about how their survey platform integration with Slack enabled agents to see what did or didn’t work – faster and more accurately.

What customers value in terms of support experience

Using Slack Connect

Chris Bryan from Slack talked about how using Slack Connect to bring all partners and third-party service providers together. Everyone can work together to deliver an amazing customer support experience. Simple queries can often require agents to interface with multiple parties. With Slack Connect, they can reply to your customer faster by conferring with your partners, right inside Slack, without losing context. You can invite your customers to a Slack Connect channel to offer priority support, simplify reach out, or give feedback, creating a long-lasting and mutually valuable relationship.

Use apps to handle internal queries

Andrew Gillespie talked about how Slack uses Slack to service its customers using workflows, custom bots, and channels. As a result of leveraging context support in Slack, they’ve been able to reduce escalations by 65%. Voice of customer is driven by prioritizing customer feedback via channels. Agents bring up customer feedback to specific channels where product experts and owners can act on it. Once feedback is acted upon, the agents need to inform the customer to close the loop, and using emojis and apps in channels, helps them achieve this seamlessly.

Resolve Customer Issues Faster with Slack

Customer success is transitioning from a cost center to a profit center

• Customer loyalty is increasing in value. Often, a 5% increase in retention means a 25% increase in profit.
• In a Slack survey, 50% of customers said they’d switch to a competitor after just one bad CS experience. 80% said they’d switch after two.
• The trifecta of customer experience is personalization, differentiation, and proactivity. These are not the domain of marketing or sales.

While gaining prominence, customer support suffers from classic plagues

• Answers to customer questions are poorly organized, undocumented, out of date, or distributed across systems
• Customer support becomes slow and ineffective when information is not easily accessible or relies on individual experts
• Inaccessible information creates a vicious cycle: slow search begets frequent escalation which begets further delays and weighs down productivity. Not a good experience for customers or support teams.

Slack solves most or all these afflictions, even for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority

• Channels connect agents, experts, and managers in one location.
• Channels also bring key documents under one roof.
• Integrations bring ticketing software directly into Slack for maximum visibility and responsiveness
• AI search means even recent, relevant documents are a keystroke away, or even recent conversations when no document is available.
• The MTA solved huge gaps in communication between field-office customers by codifying verbal information, structuring workflow, and integrating an army of siloed data systems. The result = more transparency and greater credibility.

Day 2 Launch

Design Your New HQ: People-Centric and Digital First

Sheela Subramanian from Future Forum presented findings from broad research on designing an effective workspace, and Dolapo Falola from Slack followed up with specific tips for implementing in Slack.

Redesign > Retrofit

The spontaneity of covid-19 meant most businesses adopted a lift + shift approach to migrating to remote work: RETROFIT processes, behaviors, and culture from WFO to WFH. Stay C-suite-centric instead of transitioning to people-centric.

Retrofitting refuses to recognize that one-size-fits-all no longer exists and it isn’t working. Currently, 1/3 of women are considering leaving or downshifting their careers, and 57% of knowledge workers are looking for new opportunities.

The only way forward is flexible, inclusive, and connected

Flexibility is consistently the highest employee priority behind compensation, and works best using both the WHEN and the WHERE dimension. That said, flexibility also requires structure to work, and indeed employees prefer flexibility within a framework.

Inclusivity, on the other hands, is a less vehemently demanded but equally critical norm. Future Forum has found that middle management in particular suffers from grievous lack of training typically imparts the most damaging cultural environments in an organization. Employees that think their teams lack transparency have barely half the level of excitement for work.

Finally, connection is conceptually the easiest and logistically the hardest to implement in a post-covid world. Particularly for digital-first companies, it turns out the investment in digital tools is a much stronger indicator of connection than prior culture or behaviors. In a rather wild finding, companies with high levels of connection tech investment saw 100% higher feelings of belonging and 200% higher overall satisfaction.

Tips for Bringing Your Digital HQ to Life

Along with the specific advice offered by Sheela, Dolapo offered a smattering of Slack-focused tips for shifting cultural and behavioral practices.

• Video clips: we need to do more than just shift meeting from office to zoom. Slack clips offer transcripting and easy navigation like markers and speed up/down in order to supercharge verbal communication. The simplicity and speed of clips make them competitive with text for shifting team behavior.
• Slack Atlas: makes key internal data readily available to allow employees to connect more easily by browsing org charts, advanced user profiles, and even custom fields like food preferences or hobbies.
• Slack Connect: allows fully customized protocols with external customers and partners to much higher levels of collaboration while maintaining security needs and preferences. 77% of the Fortune 100 uses Slack Connect for external stakeholders.
• Apps and workflows: use the giant Slack App Directory or Workflow Builder to automate and normalize everything from sharing weekend plans and photos to provisioning for new teammates.

IDC Marketscape

Wayne Kurtzman talks through wisdom from two years of IDC research on collaboration software.

What did the pandemic do to collaboration?

• Collaboration was already a red-hot space, and covid-19 was much more than a tipping point
• Adoption of collaboration progressed by about 5 years in just the first 6 months of lockdown
• The value of trust and openness have quickly accelerated

Why did Slack stand out among vendors?

• Integrations in the app directory outnumbered competition
• Ability to connect externally was true competitive advantage
• Asynchronous audio and video options elevated a once messaging space
• At the end of the day, companies with more than 3 Slack integrations were able to bring products and development to market 77% faster than their peers

The future of collaboration is hybrid, and only a small fraction of businesses are truly ready

Takeaways from Tayo Rockson, Professional Storyteller

Digital channels and remote communication provide more ways to tell a story, but more doesn’t always mean easier.

Keys to any remote culture

Different environments require different behavior to succeed, and remote work is just like any physical or emotional environment – it all comes down to appreciate differences in success, belonging, and safety.

• Success looks different by country, culture, phase of life, identity, and remote teams must deeply understand how contributors differ in their goals.
• Belonging is similarly individual, and while shared traditions can help bridge gaps between individuals, they can also alienate those unable or unwilling to participate.
• Safety is freedom to be oneself, and is equally valuable for people and businesses. Without safety, teams lose the ability to have difficult conversations, push back, or fully participate in the market of ideas and effort.

Tips from a digital nomad

• Use difference to make a difference: historically we’ve treated differences as a zero sum game and either chosen to deny, exploit, or eliminate. Taking time to appreciate open the window to mutually beneficial difference.
• Curiosity DIDN’T kill the cat: asking questions healthy, even when there’s risk of showing ignorance. The key is to keep asking questions but keep them open-ended and listen to understand
• Try out an empathy hour: work connections can’t be 100% about work. Healthy relationships require multi-faceted connection, and something as simple as huddling for a team “empathy hour” where work topics are prohibited can make a world of difference.

And finally, Tayo reminds us that a globalized, digitalized world doesn’t actually make connection easier – systems and institutions still exist that make it difficult to be yourself, and often they too are strengthened by digitalization. It’s up to us to intentionally build teams and cultures that promote identity.

Platform’s Next Frontier – Employee Experience

On the back on Slack’s recent push to personalize each unique slack experience and make workflow builder a tool for non-technical users, Angela Ashenden @ CCS Insight shares research on the evolving employee experience.

Employee experience is more and more reliant on tech

While employee experience is a highly complex topic that impacts career opportunity, fulfillment, and relationships with family, colleagues, and work, tech is an increasingly crucial factor for knowledge workers. In fact, 3/4 of employees now consider technology among top considerations for choosing an employer.

Diving deeper, it turns out that IT complexity is the single biggest issue employees have with their tech stack. Excessive context switching is so pervasive – even within short tasks – that nearly 2 in 5 employees recognize that it’s become an issue for them. Meanwhile, an average of 2 hours a day is being spent on simple and repetitive tasks, which further drains time from high-value, creative work.

In looking to solve for these problems, Slack continues to deliver value by centralizing focused conversations, keeping documents and information within arms reach, and providing no-code solutions for repeat workflows.

Strengthen Teamwork with Slack Atlas

After acquiring Meadow last year, Slack finally provided a little more insight into their much awaited Slack Atlas enterprise functionality for enhanced user profiles. Currently only available to North American teams over 500 employees, Atlas will soon be available in other geographies.

Slack Atlas at 1000 Feet

• At base, Atlas is an enhanced user profile to supplement Slack’s basic profile
• Atlas also enables beautiful, interactive org charts
• The end goal of Atlas is further enriching context for human to human interaction

How is Atlas different than the basic Slack profile?

• The basic Slack profile provides – well – basic information to make sure you’re messaging the right person. Name, title, photo.
• Slack Atlas provides much, much more context about colleagues, including:
  • Who they work with
  • What they work on
  • What expertise they have
  • Where they’re at
  • What they like
• In the future, Atlas may even provide information integrated with partner – marketing may be able to see accounts assigned to a sales colleague directly from Salesforce.

Okay but what specifically does it look like?

• Below we can see the Atlas profile window on the right and interactive org chart opened in the center screen.
  • At the top of the profile window remains basic profile info
  • Below basics are action options to message, huddle, and more
  • Next up we see high-level org info like manager and direct report, with a link to open the org chart
  • Underneath immediate org info are key people, likes assistants, mentees, or mentors
  • Below people are affiliations, including static groups (departments) and fluid (projects)
  • Finally, the bottom of the Atlas window shows highly customized bio additional information, including expertise, interests, or fun facts.

The post Our Takeaways from Slack Frontiers 2021 appeared first on AttendanceBot Blog.

In this topic, we will cover the meaning behind the term ‘ban the box’ in-depth. You will learn in which states this movement is currently active and everything else you need to know about this campaign. 

What is the ‘Ban the Box’ Law?

According to this law, employers are banned from asking ex-convicts questions related to their criminal history. The idea of this law, sometimes known as Fair Chance Legislation is to give ex-convicts a fair chance to begin with, and a fresh start at work, despite their previous criminal activity. 

This campaign gathered massive support because it’s important since America has a growing number of criminal records out of which mostly are drug crimes. In this case, after serving their sentence they have a hard time finding new jobs and stay unemployed for a very long time, according to its advocates. 

According to NCSL, an estimated 77 million Americans have a criminal record. 

While Hawaii began this campaign, a decade later, Minnesota was the first to follow. Ever since then this movement has gained immense popularity and support with more states in the US now adopting this policy. Currently, this movement is active in 33 states and more than 150 cities. In its support, advocates say ban the box is not only helpful for ex-convicts in finding a job but is also great for the American economy. The reason is that it helps most people get employed.

Although the BTB law was primarily adapted by public sectors, it gained support in the private sectors, too.  The law seeks to protect ex-convicts from being automatically disqualified from the employment process on the basis of previous convictions. 

Ban the Box States

What are the states with ban the box laws? Let’s take a look at some of the major states and their municipalities one by one:

Ban the Box California

In California, employers with at least 5 employees are prohibited from inquiring about the criminal record of an applicant before making a conditional job offer. In Los Angeles, employers that have 10 or more employees have a similar ruling. San Francisco mandates that unless a conditional job offer is made, a criminal inquiry is banned. 

Ban the Box Law Exceptions In California

Ban the box law is not applicable to the following positions in California:

• A position for which it is mandatory by law to check the conviction history background of an individual.
• A position with a criminal justice agency
• A farm labor contractor position
• A position that requires by federal, state, or local law, a criminal background check on an applicant for employment or to restrict their employment on the basis of any criminal history.

Ban the Box Arizona

Arizona mandates all state agencies follow the Second Chance Box Policy. According to this law, no state agency should ask if an applicant has a criminal history. Secondly, a criminal record shall not disqualify an applicant for the interview process.

Ban the Box Hawaii

In Hawaii, all private employers must take the ban the box law into account and are prohibited from asking an applicant about their previous criminal acts until the conditional job offer.

Ban the Box Ohio

According to House Bill 56, also known as ban the box legislation, no public employer has the liberty to ask an applicant about their criminal history. 

Ban the Box Massachusetts

Beginning in 2010, Massachusetts was one of the first states to support the ban the box movement. In Boston, Cambridge, Worcester all private employers and vendors doing business within the city are not allowed to ask an applicant about their criminal record.

Ban the Box Illinois

Illinois governor J.B Pritzker signed a bill called The Employee Background Fairness Act on March 23, 2021. This bill prevents employers from inquiring ex-convicts about their previous felonies. 

Ban the Box New York

New York’s Fair Chance Act that took effect on July 29, 2021, prohibits employers from any discrimination based on an applicant’s criminal record, criminal accusations, or convictions. 

Ban the Box New Jersey

On August 11, 2014, New Jersey governor Chris Christie signed a bill called Opportunity To Act. This law became effective in 2015 and currently prevents employers from enquiring applicants about their criminal history during the initial employment application process. 

Ban the Box Wisconsin

All criminal history questions are banned until a conditional job offer in Wisconsin. This law is for employers who have their business in the city on contracts worth more than $25000. Wisconsin government passed the law in 2015.

Ban the Box Florida

Effective since February 2021, ban the box law in Florida requires the removal of the check box which asks ex-convicts of their previous criminal record. Other cities in Florida with this rule are Tampa, Orlando, Gainesville, Jacksonville, Tallahassee, and Sarasota.

Ban the Box Texas

All employers with 15 or more employees in Texas are prohibited from asking an applicant’s criminal background. The law is meant to give everyone a fair chance until a conditional job offer has been made.

Ban the Box Nevada

Ban the box in Nevada which was made effective in January 2021, prohibits employers from asking applicants about their previous convictions. The exceptions however include peace officers, firefighters, or any position that has access to the National Crime Information Centre.

A ban the box state map is as follows:

Source

Going Beyond BTB: Fair Chance Laws

Fair chance law is often used interchangeably with the BTB law. Although the differences are minor but fair chance laws provide much more benefits to ex-convicts to prevent any kind of discrimination against them. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission gave the following points in 2012 for a fair chance to ex-convicts:

• Any record-related background checks are to be delayed until a conditional job offer is made.
• Company ads that require background checks are to be banned.
• Removal of questions that enquire ex-convicts about their criminal history during job interviews.
• And finally, imposing a restriction on the use of criminal convictions by employers.

What Does Ban the Box Mean For You?

As employers, BTB law can mean many things for you. Organizations that hire people from across the country must comply with many regulations. An HR manager is often stuck in the dilemma of hiring an ex-con to give them a fair chance or to become liable for negligent hiring. Ban the box legislation doesn’t entirely stop an employer from conducting a background check. Instead, it delays it until a job offer is made. Until now, there is no federal ban the box law. Only cities and states pass this law. Sometimes an employer may face restrictions on how they can use the information obtained from the background check. In some states like California, an employer must give an applicant notice.

Is Ban the Box Law Effective?

Some pros of the BTB are:

Higher Employment

Ban the box law has been so effective, the states have now included private organizations on the list too. Ever since the law became effective in the 2000s, the percentage of hiring people with conviction histories, across the country has significantly increased. According to research conducted by Case Western Reserve University, former prisoners have a better chance of getting hired based on their skills, despite being an ex-convict. This is when application forms do not ask them about their criminal history. Up to 4% of ex-cons have been employed in the US.

Higher Retention Rate

Economists say, hiring people with records is smart business. How? Because the retention rate is higher and turnover is reduced. Another benefit of hiring ex-convicts is that they are loyal to an organization, making a better hiring pool for you.

Lower Conviction Rate

A study showed that criminal defendants prosecuted in Honolulu for a felony crime were 57% less likely to have a prior criminal conviction after the implementation of Hawaii’s ban the box law.

Are there any Drawbacks to Ban the Box Law?

As everything that’s effective has a few drawbacks too and so does the BTB law:

Narrow Applicant Pool

When employers don’t have the liberty of asking applicants about their criminal history, they sometimes replace these questions with heightened educational and job experience. This ultimately narrows down the pool of applicants that could’ve been eligible otherwise. 

More Discrimination

Ban the box laws may end up increasing racial discrimination. When employers don’t have the freedom to inquire about an applicant’s criminal records, they prefer hiring more white Americans because they have statistically less conviction rates than African-Americans. According to a study, white Americans are 23% more likely to get a callback as compared to other races.

In another study, it was found that BTB policies decrease the probability of employment by 3.4 percentage points (5.1%) for young, low-skilled black men.

Adverse Action and Ban the Box Law

Adverse action describes the processes which employers must follow when rejecting, terminating, or assigning an individual on the basis of their criminal background check. The FCRA has laid out 3 steps in this matter:

• Employers must send a notice before the adverse action along with a copy of an applicant’s background check history.
• They must allow typically five business days of time for the applicant to respond.
• Then send the final adverse action notice to them as the last step.

Ban the box is concerned with 3 different aspects of adverse action:

• A reasonable time period between the initial and the final adverse action notice.
• An explanation of which aspect of the background check has led to the adverse action from your side.
• Notifying the candidate of their right to meet the HR and their right to provide a report of the inaccuracy of their background check, if any or if they went to rehabilitation after their conviction.

Final Word On Ban the Box Law

The BTB law varies from state to state. Some rules and exceptions that are part of one state law may not be of another. As an employer, it is important for you to have a compliant framework to follow ban the box requirement at all levels. The best practice is to consult with a lawyer who can advise you on your obligations and rights.

The post Ban the Box: All You Need to Know appeared first on AttendanceBot Blog.

Well, there are several types of leaves that help us achieve that. The State of New York has a Paid Family Leave that has several benefits for it people.

In this article, you will explore Paid Family Leave NY and all the necessary details about it.

What Is Paid Family Leave NY?

The Paid Family Leave NY provides employees with benefits that allow them to care for their family and loved ones without losing their job and economic security. The program protects employees’ jobs and ensures that they get the same job or role back upon returning from their leave.

Employers have to continue providing health insurance benefits to employees while they are on PFL. However, employees have to continue to pay their health insurance premium contribution while on PFL.

Who Is Eligible for Paid Family Leave NY?

Mot full-time and part-time employees are eligible for Paid Family Leave NY. Employees who work regularly for 20 hours a week can be eligible if they have worked for their employer for 26 or more weeks consecutively. On the contrary, those employees who work regularly but for less than 20 hours can only qualify after working for 175 days.

Employees become part of the NY Paid Family Leave program by default upon joining an organization. However, they can choose to opt out of the program if they have temporary employment such as a seasonal employment contract, and do not plan to work for the company for long to become eligible.

All employers in New York state have to allow employees to take Paid Family Leave.

What Situations Qualify for Paid Family Leave NY?

Bonding Leave

Bonding leave refers to paternity and maternity leave related to childbirth, adoption, and foster care. An important point to note here is that Paid Family Leave only begins after birth and does not apply to the prenatal period. A parent is eligible to take PFL during the first 12 months of having a child, adopting r fostering a child. The parent must take the leave within the first year of birth or replacement. However, flexibility is offered for adoption and foster care-related matters. For example, parents can take leave if they have to travel to another or country, meet with doctors or attend counseling sessions.

Care For Loved Ones With a Serious Medical Condition

People who come under loved ones include parents, spouse, domestic partner, child, parent-in-law, grandparent, and grandchild.

Exigency Leave

Exigency leave is also known as Active Deployment Leave. This allows employees to take leaves whose parent, child, spouse, or domestic partner is on active duty.

How Does Paid Family Leave NY Work?

• The disability policy will include the Paid Family Leave coverage and is mandatory for New York employers to carry it under the New York Disability Benefits Law (DBL). Employees will fund the premium cost for the coverage through payroll deductions. The State of New York will establish the maximum rate for employees’ contributions.
• An employer cannot force the employee to take all their sick leaves or vacation time (PTO) before utilizing PFL. An employer can mandate an employee to use their sick or vacation leaves for full pay but cannot require them to use the PFL.
• Employees will continue to receive health insurance and job protection benefits while n Paid Family Leave.
• It is mandatory for all private employers to be a part of the program. Public employers, on the contrary, have the choice to opt-in.
• Paid Family Leave NY is funded through employee contributions in the following way:
  • The New York Department of Financial Services (DFS) develops the rate and rate structure. They are announced on September 1 of each year and are effective from January 1 of the upcoming year.
  • Employee’s salary determines the rate.
  • Employers deduct 0.511% of employees’ gross weekly wages.
  • The New York State determines the average weekly wage on March 31 of every year.

What Are the Benefits of Paid Family Leave NY?

• Employees can take the maximum benefit length in the given 52 week period. The p52 period starts on the first day of the employee’s DBL or PFL benefit.
• The New York State Department of Labor publishes the NY State Average Weekly Wage (NYSAWW) manually to determine the maximum benefit payable.

Who Pays for the Benefits?

New York State requires employers to charge employees’ payroll for the cost of the benefits. However, According to RIT, there will be no more deductions from employees’ paychecks in 2021.

Difference Between NY DBL and NY PFL

Covered and Non-Covered Employers Under the Paid Family Leave NY

Covered Employer

• All private sector organizations with at least one employee excluding the owner.

Non-covered Employer

• Public employers,  a political subdivision of the state, a public authority or any
  other governmental agency
• Sole proprietors, Limited Liability Partnerships, Limited Liability Companies and self-employed people with no employee working under them
• Independent contractors

Who Is a Covered Employee for Paid Family Leave NY?

An employee becomes covered when they fulfill the following criteria;

• Physically working in New York State
• Doesn’t fall into the excluded class
• Working for a covered employer or an employer who voluntarily provides Paid Family Leave NY coverage

Who Classifies as a Non-Covered Employee for Paid Family Leave NY?

• An employee working for a non-covered employer
• Employees who are already receiving disability benefits under state disability insurance or workers’ compensation
• An unemployed person who is receiving unemployment benefits
• Employees on administrative leaves
• Minor child of an employer
• Maritime, government, railroad, or farm laborers
• Christian Science readers, ministers, priests, rabbis, members of religious orders, sextons,
• Non-compensated individuals who volunteer to offer their services for non-profits organizations
• People working as professionals or teachers  for a religious, charitable, or educational institution
• Individuals who receive aid from a religious or charitable institution in return for their work
• students in the secondary or elementary school who work part-time during the year or vacation period
• Independent contractors and subcontractors
• spouse of an employer that files a spousal exclusion form

Are You a New York Employee or an Out-of-State Employee?

• If you work from your home in New York then you qualify as a New York employee. This also applies if your employer is located outside of New York state.
• If you work outside of New York, regardless of where your employer is located, you will come under out-os-state employee.
• An employee who has to travel to New York for occasional work or duties will not be known as a New York employee unless the employer is based there.

Final Word

Now that you know about Paid Family Leave NY and its benefits. you can take leave accordingly. As an employer, awareness is equally important as you can administer them properly

The post All You Need to Know About Paid Family Leave NY appeared first on AttendanceBot Blog.

The article focuses on MWBE certification, its eligibility criteria, and its benefits. This piece will also introduce you to a few programs that have been developed by some states.

What Is an MWBE Certification?

MWBE stands for Minority/Women-Owned Business Enterprises. Some states might treat it separately as an MBE or WBE. However, in either case, it is a certification issued by states to provide developmental benefits to the businesses owned by women and minorities. Apart from the state-run programs, there are a few that have been developed by the federal government and private organizations.

Being a minority, you have to belong to any of the following groups:

Black

Originating from any of the African racial groups.

Hispanic

Being a descendant of Mexican, Puerto Rican, Dominican, Central or South American or Cuban origin. The origin could be Latin American.

Asian-Pacific

People coming from the Far East, Southeast Asia, or the Pacific Islands.

Asian-Indian Subcontinent

People having their roots in the Indian Subcontinent.

Alaskan Native or Native American 

Persons having their roots with the original people of North America.

Benefits of Getting MWBE Certification

If you are someone who is running a minority/women-owned business, then you may want to consider getting MWBE certified. This is because it comes with some great benefits. Let’s get to know a few of them:

Competitive Advantage

If your company is certified, you may get some competitive advantage. It gives you the opportunity to work with bigger players in the industry. Being certified means having access to developmental assistance, opportunities, and resources.  This will help you secure government contracts that were inaccessible before. So, for instance, if you have a catering business, having the certification will give you the chance of catering a government lunch. Similarly, if you own a soap company, you may become a soap supplier to a state facility.

Online Visibility

Having an MWBE certification increases your business’s online visibility. So, the agency that will certify your business is most likely to publish your company’s name on their website. This increases the chance of prospective customers seeing you online and contacting you. Moreover, it builds a valuable backlink to your business’s website.

Company Expansion

Many states develop grant programs and funding opportunities for minority-owned small businesses. Having an MWBE certification gives you several opportunities to bag some capital for your business’s expansion.

Publicity

In addition to online visibility, an MWBE certification helps to publicize your business. Having a state-level certification gives an opportunity to send a press release to local media channels and publications. Moreover, you can also publicize this on your company’s social media platforms.

Branding

With an MWBE certificate, you have a chance of augmenting your branding efforts. You can add a certification logo on your website, email signature, or business cards.

Supplier Diversity Program

This is the biggest and most important benefit that minority and women-owned businesses enjoy. When large corporations buy goods and services from minority-owned businesses, the chances of growth increase manifolds.

It’s not that only small businesses benefit, giant players also reap the befits of getting supplies from small companies. Let’s have a look at a few of them:

• Big players become agile, flexible, and resilient.
• Highlight their commitment to diversity and inclusion, putting them in a good light in the market.
• Enables them to serve untapped markets.
• Get access to innovative products to buy and sell.

Eligibility Criteria to Obtain MWBE Certificate

Eligibility criteria vary from one state to another. Some of the common criteria are as follows:

• At least 51% of the company’s ownership has to be in the hands of one or more persons belonging to the socially or economically disadvantaged group.
• The owner of the business should be a US citizen.
• The company should be physically located in the US.
• The company should be a for-profit enterprise.
• Women or minority members should be looking after the management and daily operations.

It is advisable that you carefully review the requirements of the program you want to join before submitting your application.

The MWBE Certification Process

To get your business certified, you must go through the following steps:

• Go through the eligibility criteria to see if your business qualifies for an MWBE certification.
• Collect the required documents.
• Complete the online application.
• Pay the application fee online via a credit card.
• Upload all the relevant documents online and submit your application.

Points to Know About the MWBE Application Process

• The application process takes around 90 days.
• Before starting an online application, you have to register on the site of the regional council where you intend to apply.
• The processing of the application starts once the payment has been made.
• The concerned state authorities review the application and documents thoroughly.
• Your business site will be thoroughly scrutinized.
• The Certification Compliance Committee will meet regularly to review your application.
• Once the Certification Compliance Committee approves your application, it goes to the Board for final approval.
• The Regional Affiliate notifies you once your application is approved.
• In case your application is not approved, you may submit a letter of appeal.

Documentation Required

Documentations vary by business type. Below is a list of documents that each business type is required to submit:

Sole Proprietors

• Complete application
• Driver’s license or valid ID
• Proof of US citizenship
• Declaration page signed dated and notarized
• Ethnicity proof of owners
• Current financial statements
• Bank Signature card
• Occupational licenses if applicable
• Resume of owners
• Proof of EIN
• Bonding Capacity proof if applicable
• Notes Payable if applicable

Franchises

• Franchise Agreement

Partnerships

• Partnership agreement
• Proof of capital investment
• Certificate of formation of the partnership
• Articles of Partnership
• Proof of Partnership purchase

Corporations

• Certificate of Corporation
• Proof of capital investment
• Minutes of the recent board meeting
• Current stock ledger
• Articles or Certificates of Amendment

LLCs

• Certificate of organization
• Operating Agreement
• Proof of capital investment
• Minutes of the meeting
• Minutes of the meeting in which members were elected
• Copy of certificates of ownership
• Copy of membership transfer ledger
• Unit purchase proof

Women-owned Business Enterprises

Women-owned business enterprises can be found in three major industries- construction (15%), arts, and entertainment (12%), and other services (12%).

Why Work With MWBEs

A major reason why businesses would want to work with MWBEs is to gain tax savings. On the federal level, companies that work with MWBEs can get tax breaks. This is a reason why some companies procure supplies and use the services of MWBEs.

Another reason could be that companies would want to diversify their supplier and customer network. Some businesses also feel that working with MWBEs reinforces their company’s values and mission.

MWBE New York City

Like other states, New York City has an MWBE program that assists women and minority entrepreneurs in growing their businesses. Getting certified with New York City means that minority/women-owned business enterprises become visible to prospective buyers, agencies, and contractors who want to purchase goods and services from new suppliers.

There are several benefits of getting MWBE certified with New York City. Let’s have a look at some of them:

• Once you get the certification, your company gets registered in the NYC Online Directory of Certified Businesses. It is a public website that promotes small certified businesses. It includes businesses from various industries such as catering, graphic design, IT, engineering, childcare, plumbing, event planning, accounting, and many more.
• If your company has the certification, you can get access to targeted consultation, networking events, and customized courses.

A business seeking MWBE certification in New York must meet the following requirements:

• The business should have the legal authority to conduct business in New York state.
• The company must be in the business for at least one year.
• At least 51% of the business should be controlled by a minority member or woman who is a US citizen or a US permanent resident.
• The business should have one of the following structures:
  • Sole proprietorship
  • Limited liability company (LLC)
  • Limited Partnership (LP)
  • General Partnership
  • Corporation
  • Limited liability partnership (LLP)

You must ensure that your business should be for-profit.

• The company’s headquarters should be located in one of the following counties of New Jersey and New York City or within the five boroughs of New York City.
  • Westchester
  • Suffolk
  • Bergen
  • Hudson
  • Passaic
  • Nassau
  • Putnam
  • Rockland

State MWBE Programs

When exploring MWBE certification, do your research to find out about state-level programs your business might qualify for. You can begin to contact agencies and offices in your state or city that looks after the women and minority programs.

• Visit the Minority Business Development Agency’s website for programs offered by different States.
• You may also reach out to the Small Business Administration to find state-level and federal programs that your company may want to join.
• Another option is to reach out to the Chamber of Commerce in your area and speak to their small business liaison. You might come across some opportunities for your business.

FAQs

What is the validity of the MWBE certification?

The MWBE certificate is valid for three years.

Why is it important to provide supporting documents?

It is important because the state has to ensure that the business’s daily activities are managed by a woman or a member of the minority group.

Do documents remain confidential?

Yes, the department ensures that no financial and personal information of a business is revelated without the owner’s consent.

Does one have to send original documents?

No, only copies of the documents are needed.

Does certification guarantee that a business will get state or other contracts?

No, it doesn’t. A company has to do its own marketing, advertising, and networking in order to attract customers. The certification only facilitates and doesn’t give you anything of itself. In the end, how many contracts and customers you get depends on your own marketing strategy.

What is the purpose of visiting the company site?

The purpose is to ensure that all the information in the application and documents holds true. Department conducts on-site visits to see business facilities and understand their functions.

What happens when the certification expires?

The department sends a recertification notice to every certified business at least 60 days before the certificate expires.

What is the purpose of recertification?

The purpose is to ensure that the state department has the firm’s updated information.

A Path to Success

As an owner of a small business, getting an MWBE certification is a path to success. It is one of the tools to help you compete with other players in the industry and grow your business.

If you haven’t secured a certificate yet, now is the time to do so. It will help you create a strong brand identity.

The post Elevate Your Business with MWBE Certification appeared first on AttendanceBot Blog.

As a result, a lot of companies decide to run payroll themselves to reduce their costs. However, it is an error-prone and time-consuming process.

Hence, it is usually best to invest in a payroll service to avoid payroll mistakes and save time. 

We, at AttendanceBot, are excited to announce a better way to run payroll for your team. Track time, vacations, and process payroll along with AttendanceBot and Gusto integration.

How can you process payroll using AttendanceBot-Gusto integration?

AttendanceBot is a time-tracking and vacation management tool that tracks PTO and vacation time for your employees as well as the hours worked. By integrating AttendanceBot and Gusto, you can run payroll for the hours worked by your employees.

1. Easy Setup: Connect your AttendanceBot and Gusto account with a single click within Slack, MS Teams, and Google Chat. You can either connect an existing Gusto account or even create a new one via AttendanceBot. Simply match your team members from AttendanceBot to Gusto and you’re good to go.
2. Send hours from AttendanceBot to Gusto: Send employee hours to run accurate payroll on Gusto in a single click. Track regular hours and overtime hours that you team members work to ensure your team is paid for the hours they work. Review their timesheet and send hours to Gusto with ease.
3. Save time and money: Log in hours and let AttendanceBot calculate total hours and overtime for your employees. Integrate employee benefits and perks in a single system and get rid of the manual work involved.

Proper payroll management ensures that your employees are paid for the hours they work and on time. You don’t need to outsource processing payroll for your team anymore. Just provide relevant employee information and log the hours worked and let AttendanceBot calculate the net pay automatically.

Get started with the future of payroll here. If you have any questions, feel free to reach out to us at sarah@harmonizehq.com.

The post Simple Time Tracking and Payroll Using AttendanceBot and Gusto appeared first on AttendanceBot Blog.

With the workflow builder, you can automate routine tasks on Slack such as welcome new teammates, run daily standups, make team-wide announcements, and so on. Not only do you save time but also stay focussed with workflow automation. Well, you can now, automate requesting time offs and connect tools in Slack as well.

How does it work?

To get started, you can either open Slack’s workflow builder (under Tools in the workspace menu) or launch the workflow builder by clicking on the Shotcut lightning icon from any channel. You can either create a workflow from scratch or choose from the templates. Identify the processes that can be automated to build a customized workflow.

For example, you might want to request time offs from a public channel and announce the time offs on #announcements. Or you might want to collate the requested time offs in a Google spreadsheet. To do so, connect the respective apps to Slack. Once you do so, the workflow builder will guide you through the process of selecting and creating a workflow that performs the intended task. Once done, Publish the workflow. You can then access the workflow from the Shortcut icon or the workflow.

The post Introducing Workflow Builder: Steps from Apps appeared first on AttendanceBot Blog.

Update leave balances on AttendanceBot faster

We are building the easiest and fastest way for organizations to manage their employees’ leaves and time offs. This means that you can record and manage your employees’ past as well as upcoming leaves using AttendanceBot. 

However, inconsistency in employees’ leaves can impact your payroll. Hence, we have made it easier for you to update your employees’ past leaves.  Whether you want to adjust leave balances for your team members in bulk or you’d like to migrate your data from another system (no hard feelings), you can do so in an instant. 

Simply collate the leave balances for your team on an Excel and upload it. AttendanceBot will then, reflect these changes for your team.

Choose which leaves to hide

In this new humanized update, we have improved the way your team is notified about each other’s availability. For each of the leave types available to your team, you can control your team’s privacy by choosing which leaves you’d like to show and hide. Say, you are requesting a “sick day” to take your dog to the vet but you don’t want your colleagues to worry about it. You can, therefore, hide “sick leave” so that the type of leave doesn’t appear on public interfaces.

Read more about how to do this here.

Boost your business by restricting time off requests on certain days

As much as we love the holiday and sale season, we understand how it impacts your business. Well, no more! Introducing blackout dates. 

Set a date or a range of dates during which employees won’t be able to request time offs. You can now, work in your full potential on the high volume days and minimize your business loss!

Try it now and let us know what you think.

We’d love to get your feedback or comments about AttendanceBot. Write to us at sarah@harmonizehq.com.

The post New in Leave Management: Leave Privacy and Blackout Dates appeared first on AttendanceBot Blog.

While most of you must be working remotely, collaboration and human connection are important for building teams. It is necessary ever than before that you ensure the safety of your team members while doing amazing things.

Hence, we’ve made it easier for you to return to a safe workplace. Introducing new COVID19 features.

Here are a few steps you can take to ensure the safety of your team members.

• Ask employees to record whether they are working from the office or home each day by saying “work from the office today” or “working from home today”.
• Track the people working from the office on your calendar.
• Set up custom announcements on public channels so that team members know who is working from the office.
• If someone falls sick, track who else was working from the office with them.
• Set up morning reminders for team members to set their working locations for the day.

Try it out and prepare for the (new!) future of work.

The post Use AttendanceBot to Create to a Safe Workplace for Employees during COVID-19 appeared first on AttendanceBot Blog.

Actually, it was more of a live coding session (show me the code!!) where Sarah, Mark and Katie walked us through redesigning an app that used older elements to the one that utilizes the newest UI elements in the block kit, to offer a much neater and more usable experience to users.

Sorry for the poor photo. I was right at the back during this workshop.

What you see in the photo, above was the final before-after comparison and clearly, the After part looks a lot more readable and usable.

Taking a cue from this, we have redesigned our ‘help’ message as well. Our users would know that ‘help’ is the go-to command to learn more about using AttendanceBot and having a much clearer, more usable response to it, will go a long way in making AttendanceBot more user-friendly.

We’ve put our before and after screenshots below for reference below. Do let us know what you think of it.

Here’s what it looked like before.

Before

And here’s what it looks like now.

After

The post Redesigning AttendanceBot with the New Slack Block Kit appeared first on AttendanceBot Blog.