Available for the following plans: Lite , Plus, Unlimited HR, Essentials, Engage, Elite, Unlimited HR+Payroll,
Available for the following HR plans: Standard, Premium, Platinum
Available for the following user access levels: Admin
Policies in Employment Hero help you ensure your employees understand and acknowledge your organisation's workplace policies and procedures. Instead of chasing signatures through email or managing paper trails, you can store, distribute, and track policy acknowledgments in one central location – with automatic reminders, targeted distribution, and compliance reporting at your fingertips.
This article explains the following:
- Why use Policies?
- Quick Launch Video
- Getting started with Policies
- Pro tips to maximise value
- Related features
Why use Policies?
Communicate your organisation's values, expectations, and procedures clearly to all employees. Whether it's workplace conduct, leave entitlements, or safety protocols, ensure everyone knows what's expected of them with policies they can access anytime.
No more printing, distributing, and filing paper policies. Upload once, share with targeted groups, and track who's acknowledged what - all without the back-and-forth emails. Employment Hero sends automatic weekly reminders to employees with outstanding policies.
Maintain an auditable trail of policy acknowledgments that demonstrates due diligence. Access a library of Fair Work-compliant policy templates written by employment lawyers that are regularly updated, or upload your own policies to ensure your organisation meets legal requirements.
Quick Launch Video
Getting started with Policies
Choose from Employment Hero's library of lawyer-written, Fair Work-compliant policy templates, or upload your own policy documents. You can customise templates to match your organisation's needs, or start fresh with your existing policies in .docx, .doc, .pdf, or .png format.
Guides:
- Create and share your organisational policies
- Updating policies (see 'Data management' section)
Helpful Hint
Start with your most critical policies first - like Code of Conduct, Leave, and WHS - then add additional policies as you go. Employment Hero's template library includes commonly needed policies to help you get started quickly.
Decide who needs to see each policy and whether acknowledgment is mandatory. You can share policies with all employees, specific teams, locations, employing entities, or individuals. Set whether policies require acknowledgment and how often they need to be renewed.
Guides:
Important
Mandatory policies will trigger weekly email reminders until employees acknowledge them. Optional policies are available for employees to view but don't require acknowledgment. If you update a mandatory policy, employees will need to acknowledge the new version.
Once you publish a policy, employees receive a summary email once per day notifying them of any new assignments. They can read the policy, which can be accessed through the Compliance menu, and check the acknowledgment box to confirm they've understood and agree to abide by its terms. All acknowledgments are timestamped and stored for compliance reporting.
Guides:
- How employees view and acknowledge policies
- Configure onboarding workflows (see 'Add an assigning policies workflow' under the 'Getting Started' section)
Helpful Hint
New employees can be automatically assigned relevant policies during onboarding using Onboarding Workflows (Platinum and Unlimited plans). This ensures they acknowledge key policies before their first day without manual admin work.
Use Policy Reporting to see who has acknowledged policies, who hasn't, and what's overdue. Filter by policy name, status, or employee group, then export to CSV for deeper analysis. Send reminder emails directly from the report to employees with outstanding acknowledgments.
Guides:
Important
Only mandatory policies appear in Policy Reporting since optional policies don't require acknowledgment. Archived policies can still be viewed by employees but can no longer be acknowledged.
Pro tips to maximise value
- Make critical policies mandatory - Policies like Code of Conduct, WHS, and Leave should be mandatory. Employees will receive weekly reminders until they acknowledge them, keeping compliance on track without you needing to chase.
- Use Employment Hero's template library - Start with professionally written, Fair Work-compliant templates that are regularly updated. This saves time and helps ensure your policies meet current legal requirements.
- Set appropriate renewal periods - For policies that change frequently or cover critical compliance areas, set an annual renewal to ensure employees stay current with updates.
- Target policies to specific groups - Not every policy needs to go to everyone. Use teams, locations, or entities to share policies only with relevant employees, reducing acknowledgment fatigue.
- Pin the policies report to your dashboard - You can pin reports to your dashboard using the Pinned Reports widget. Giving you quick access to see what's outstanding at a glance.
- Enable Hero AI for policy questions - Hero AI allows employees to ask natural language questions about your policies and get instant answers, reducing the number of policy-related questions coming to HR.
Related features
Once you've got Policies running smoothly, explore these features to build an even stronger compliance and people management system:
- Documents - Store and manage employee contracts, agreements, and other documents with electronic signature capabilities
- Induction Content - Create and assign induction materials for new starters to complete during onboarding
- Certifications - Track and manage employee qualifications, licenses, and mandatory training
- Onboarding Workflows - Automatically assign policies to new employees during the onboarding process
- Hero AI - Enable employees to ask questions about your policies and get instant, accurate answers