Norman J. Hetland
The Spring 1991 issue of Labor Management Decisions contained a detailed review of KnowledgePoint's Personnel Policy Expert, an expert-system software program for creating customized employee handbooks. The review prompted a letter from COR·TECH (Hanford, CA), producers of Policies PLUS, pointing out features of their product and inviting a test of the program.
Testing revealed one major procedural difference between Policies PLUS and PPE: Policies PLUS takes a more global approach to customizing the first draft of policies. It uses an initial questionnaire with 27 questions instead of PPE's one-(or none)-to-ten specific questions for each policy. Policies PLUS then utilizes the responses to the 27 questions to modify all policies and procedures created for the user. After two and a half minutes (using a hard disk) of such customization in the review test, an on-screen tally proclaimed up to 20,000 "actions" taken.
Entering two different sets of responses to the questionnaire (which requires re-installing the entire program) makes apparent to the reviewer many modifications based on user-provided information. Some paragraphs get deleted, others get inserted, a few phrases get reworded, and the like. Yet most policies are rather general and only a paragraph or two long - consistently shorter than those in PPE - so the preponderance of those actions taken are hard to detect or verify.
Program Organization and Content
Comparing the organization of the PPE and Policies PLUS employee manuals is not straightforward. Whereas PPE has 65 policy topics organized in nine groups, Policies PLUS (Version 3.10) has 37 policy sections comprising some 110 subsections. In actual content, both programs cover pretty much the same ground. Policies PLUS sections [and sub-sections] include the following:
Policies PLUS also creates a separate but related Procedures Manual with the following sections:
These statements of procedure provide more detailed nuts-and-bolts implementation rules than do the policies; compare, for example, the entry on the policy for Leaves of Absence with the list of procedures concerning those leaves. But the distinction is sometimes hard to fathom. PPE, in contrast, incorporates many equivalent procedures into its policies without producing a separate manual. Advantages of the Policies PLUS approach are not entirely clear and must be weighed against the frequent need to look in two places for full information on a given policy topic.
It is difficult to compile a precise inventory of policy categories included in one software program but not in the other. Of particular interest to agricultural employers, Policies PLUS places less emphasis on employment provisions of immigration law, confining its treatment of IRCA to the procedures manual. Other neglected or relatively de-emphasized topics, some of which may seldom apply in agricultural contexts, include nondisclosure, several secondary benefits (bereavement, relocation, witness duty), emergency closings, specific kinds of leaves of absence, resignation, and AIDS in the workplace.
Policies PLUS appears to offer more extensive policies or procedures than PPE on employee-owned property, hazardous and toxic materials, non-fraternization, public relations, group insurance, mandated insurance protection other than workers' compensation, retirement planning, employee discounts and reimbursements, and those listings of federal and California employment regulations. Many of these may be of more consequence in industries other than agriculture.
Some idea of the relative inclusiveness of Policies PLUS and PPE may be drawn from comparing their disk storage requirements: Policies PLUS uses about 1.5 megabytes, or about half the space required by PPE. Although the difference could indicate more efficient storage, it probably also reflects comparative frequency and timing of questions asked as well as resulting variations in policies.
Policies PLUS also offers computerized templates for four commonly drafted personnel letters (applicant interview scheduling, conditional offer of employment, and two rejection letters), as well as a hard-copy set of eight personnel forms (reference checks, performance evaluation, new employee checklist, absence/conduct report, attendance record, separation report, leave request, general memo). The letters are very simple; the forms are adequate, but not available on disk files for design refinements.
Program Operation and User-Friendliness
Policies PLUS takes about five minutes to install on a hard disk. A necessary prerequisite step, however, is to make backup copies of six floppy program disks. This took about half an hour for the review test and was a nuisance. (Couldn't the program be set up for direct installation onto the hard disk from write-protected master disks?) Running the program from the backup floppies, incidentally, is possible but too cumbersome to tolerate for long.
Once installed, the program interface operates much like PPE's. Choices can only be made by pressing mnemonic letters, without the PPE options of Arrow and Return keys. The Escape key can almost always be used to retrace one's steps, and the Function keys offer some shortcuts (F1 - Help, F10 - Save & Exit, etc.). On the (PC-compatible) Everex used for the test run, pressing improper keys activated a buzzer that would jolt anybody in the room out of their concentration or slumber.
After the initial questionnaire-driven global modification of policies and procedures, Policies PLUS provides pertinent "Policy Guide" screens for further editing of individual policies. Unlike PPE, however, these screens rarely suggest further choices or changes. Since most of the initial items on the questionnaire affect just one or two policies anyway, they could be asked when those particular policies are being drafted. Such an approach, as used by PPE, allows the user to consider questions in more precise relation to the policies they affect.
Agricultural users will find as much or more occasion to edit policies created by Policies PLUS as by PPE. For this purpose, editing features of Policies PLUS are mostly similar to PPE's, both providing much less than a standard word processor. Notable differences between the two programs: Policies PLUS does have a somewhat more powerful search and replace feature than PPE, so it can globally replace all appearances of a text string instead of doing so only one at a time. Unfortunately, blank spaces cannot be part of a text string, so, for example, the string the is replaced in together as well as wherever it occurs as a whole word. Use of the search-replace feature is further limited to the subsection currently being edited; global replacements can only be made during the initial customization. Even then, not all are under the user's direct control. For example, the company name (entered by COR·TECH when the program is purchased) gets inserted at many, though by no means all, appropriate points in the text of various policies.
The Alt key is used for search-and-replace and for other functions like Block and Paste. Pasting would be easier if marked blocks were highlighted. Users can delete blocks only one line at a time, and can move a block only by copying it to a new location and then deleting the original block line by line. Reformatting requires pressing a function key.
An exotic penalty was suffered for accidentally hitting Alt-C and responding No to an unscheduled question that then appeared. The system was returned-without warning-to the DOS prompt.
Printing is accomplished by pressing letter choices on the main handbook and manual screens. One problem is that margins, page length, and other formats are difficult to adjust, requiring knowledge or lookup of printer codes. The defaults are workable, although the lines-per-page setting was slightly off for the printer used in the review test. Also, printing of the employee manual was interrupted twice by buffer overflows. As with initial policy modification, Policies PLUS takes an all-or-nothing approach to final printing. The only option for printing single policies is as worksheets (which include automatic date and time stamps) or proofs of individual subsections.
PPE allows individual policies to be marked Pending or Accepted and then selected for printing; Policies PLUS allows marking subsections for deletion only. Entire sections cannot be marked for deletion until all subsections have been so marked. Marked sections or subsections will not print even though they may actually not yet be erased from the disk. These sections may be restored later, if desired.
With Policies PLUS, export of policies or entire manuals to higher-powered word processors can be accomplished only by opening individual policy text files from within such programs.
Policies PLUS takes a minimalist, nothing-fancy approach to user documentation. Though clear enough and probably sufficient for normal use, the materials are hardly as attractive and easy to work with as PPE's. Some of the Policies PLUS screens contain typos (e.g., alledged, abandonded, shuold, spearate), doubtful usages (precedent as a verb), and curious phrasing (weekly pay every other Friday), all of which erode confidence if not also clarity.
The tone of Policies PLUS sections and subsections is rather positive and personal, with some headings more so in the manual (Your Pay; Respect and Dignity) than in the internal index descriptions (Compensation; No Harassment). Unlike PPE, Policies PLUS does not identify its legal counsel.
Summary Assessment
Overall, Policies PLUS is another helpful aid in the task of creating employee policy manuals. At $395 retail, it costs $100 less than PPE. Both programs are sufficiently thorough and conservative that choosing one over the other comes down to personal preference. In terms of overall flexibility and scope, PPE generally offers more, but Policies PLUS does have the edge in some aspects of editing and content. Neither customizes as finely as a true "expert system" or provides editing capabilities anywhere near those of a good word processor. But both Policies PLUS and PPE are a cut or two above the standard "sample policies" approach, and they should serve careful users well.
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