If we were to develop an "Employee Bill of Rights," what should be on it?

Free From....
BS, red tape and political games
Meetings for meetings-sake
Spin!
Treated as "machines" instead of humans

I dido John's Respect, similar but related, I would say employees should be free from having ideas being shot down as "stupid" and encouraged to share all ideas because who knows how they could evolve when socialized.

I don't like respect on this list - I believe respect is earned and it's what makes respect a valuable commodity, if it was a free gift it would be utterly devalued. I do believe people should be treated as though they are worthy of your respect, until such a time as they demonstrate otherwise though.

So my list...

1. Honesty - which promotes both the individual and business interest, but is not rooted in cruelty. ("Of course I don't look fat in this." should still be OK, because it promotes kindness).

2. Trust - people should be free to do their jobs in the way they see fit without excessive oversight as long as they deliver ethical results in that manner.

3. Ethics - the business will congruently work to an ethical framework, and employees will be treated ethically at all times.

4. Fairness - the business will aim to develop talent and promote from within where possible. No discrimination on non-work related matters of any kind will be tolerated. Rewards will be based on your value add - not personal relationships.

5. Fun - the work environment will endeavour to be one of fun, and companionability for everyone.

6. Common Sense - the over-riding principle of the business will be use your common sense. You will be empowered to do so, and to make decisions based on it.

7. Responsibility - you are responsible for your own actions. The business will take responsibility for all of your actions in its name as long as you are taking responsibility too.

8. Give and take - the company will recognise your contributions and will act flexibly for those who act flexibly towards the business.

9. Work-Life Balance - the company is not about "presenteeism", we expect people to work their contracted hours only and to take their whole holiday allowance. In exchange we expect you to achieve the results you commit to in the time allowed.

10. Open Communication - the company commits to listening to and responding to your concerns and enabling you to raise them. The company does not promise to take any specific action however but will provide reasons for its actions.

I was pretty explicit that these were extreme examples Charlie because they're easy to identify.

One of the reasons companies have probation periods is to discover whether someone is worth of the respect of being an employee - or whether the interview process was a misleading one (it works both ways - the employee gets some time to discover whether they can respect the organisation too).

I know there's a 50/50 split on the way people feel about this - but generally where I'm from respect is an earned commodity, we always treat you as though you are worthy of respect unless you show otherwise but actual respect is something that comes with time.

I've worked in a couple of organisations where certain individuals had zero respect from their colleagues because they hadn't earned any - but they were still employed because of their personal relationship with a CEO. It's a depressing but fairly common state of affairs.

I'd love to be more explicit in an example of this but that would be unethical - whether someone has my respect or not, they don't deserve to be outed online either.