Unpaid Mandatory Meetings?

[BiohazardBetty]

The organization I work for has started making our morning "huddles" mandatory for each unit. In case you aren't familiar, it's where the charge nurse tells us a little about what to expect that day like pts with anticipated discharges or if a patient has blood or chemo ordered... They can be really beneficial or a complete waste of time, depending.

Most units have their huddles after they get report so the nurse knows more about the patient and can add to the info the charge shares. My unit, however, has them at 6:40, which is 5 minutes before you are required to clock in, & consequently, you are not paid for this 'mandatory' meeting.

Yes, it's only 5 minutes, but here's the thing- now our annual raises are based on several different factors, having 95% attendance at huddles is one of them. EVERYONE has to be there for the unit to meet the goal. One person missed today so, the whole unit's score for today is only around 80%. Yesterday 3 people missed so our unit's score was even lower. BUT, none of those people were late clocking in.

Can we really make anything mandatory before the time you are required to clock in? Wouldn't we be required to pay people to be in a mandatory meeting at any time? I want to be upset with the people who've missed, but I can't really justify being mad when they came to work on time & just didn't show up to a 5 minute meeting for free.

What are your thoughts??

[morte, LPN, LVN]

i would watch my back with this manager, she should have known, and probably did, that it was wrong to try to require you to be there early. it would have been her little coup if she had gotten away with it.

[Eru Ilúvatar]

I would think that there would be some legal implications to base annual raises on attendance at meetings that you are not getting paid for. You don't say if your hospital has a union or not, but I can't see how a union would stand for something like this.

Raises are not really protected under the law so that part is a little more shaky. I just wish that as a company profit increased grew part of it would trickle down among its members. I mean if they have no money then I can deal with it, but I mean no money because of a bad financial year, not because the CEO got a big raise [emoji58]

[MBarth]

I'd check with an attorney - but I believe that if an employer requires staff attendance at a meeting at work, then salaried employees have to be paid for it. Can't have it both ways -- either require and pay - or don't pay/don't require.

[kakamegamama]

I'd check with an attorney - but I believe that if an employer requires staff attendance at a meeting at work, then salaried employees have to be paid for it. Can't have it both ways -- either require and pay - or don't pay/don't require.

Salaried employees (exempt) are not required to be paid for attendance if it is outside of their normal work time. Hourly employees (non-exempt), yes. I remember when one of my favorite nurses became salaried instead of hourly (she went from assistant manager with an hourly wage to manager with a salaried wage)....it was a considerable decrease in pay due to the hours she put in above her shift worked hours. Often she would work over 40 hours/week. But, when she became salaried, it didn't matter how many hours she worked, the pay was the same.