I am not a big fan of writing a policy or rule for every employee activity, there is definitely risk in trying to regulate all activities and work done in a company. If your policy manual is so thick that no one reads it, your policies are useless. In addition, having every activity regulated can have a negative effect on employee moral and a chilling effect on creativity.

However, you must have some policies in order to protect the company and effectively communicate with your employees about their rights and the employment relationship.

Over the next few posts, I will offer a few policies that your company should have in place in order to mitigate risk of costly litigation.

The first policy all companies should have is: Employment at will.

In California employees are considered "at will", that means that they can be fired at any time, without cause (except for unlawful reasons such as discrimination or retaliation). Even though employees are legally considered at will, absent a written contract, you should have a policy that is communicated to your employees informing them that they are at will employees and what that means.  This policy should be recieved and acknowledged by all employees.