No employee handbook may be safe from the National Labor Relations Board.

This week the NLRB overturned a rule in an employee handbook that prohibits employees from engaging in conduct that’s offensive to other employees, according to Politico Pro. What’s the problem with that? The rule “is not accompanied by any other descriptive language that would help employees interpret what types of ‘offensive’ conduct the rule is targeting,” the NLRB said.

A week ago, the board threw out a provision in T-Mobile’s employee handbook that required workers “to maintain a positive work environment by communicating in a manner that is conducive to effective working relationships.” The NLRB thought this rule stifles workers’ rights, under Section 7 of the National Labor Relations Act, to engage in concerted activities.

And a month ago, the NLRB decided that 23 rules in an employee handbook formerly used by Quicken Loans were “overly broad.”

So how do you write an employee handbook that doesn’t offend the NLRB?

“Avoid the temptation to draft broad statements and instead draft provisions under the purview of whether an employee would reasonably construe the provision … limits their Section 7 rights,” attorneys Thomas Chibnail and John Hasman write in National Law Review. “The Board’s decision is a reminder that, well-intentioned or not, work rules and policies must afford workers’ their protected rights to the disharmony of argumentative, contentious, and even negative work environments.”

Source: Philadelphia Business Journal