Attendance, Leave, and Virtual Office Policy

Version 8.0 [Discontinued]

This policy works together with the Working hours and the Holiday (Section-3) of the employment agreement.

I. ATTENDANCE:

Policy Statement:

All employees are required to be regular and punctual every day at work. The employees will record their daily attendance (TIME IN and TIME OUT) on the SumHR. This policy is applicable to all employees. The HR Manager will ensure that the leave record of the preceding month is appropriately scrutinized for the purpose of processing the payroll.

Policy Description:

a) The employees would be mandated to follow the project time based on the following guidelines:

• The PLs along with their team members should discuss and agree on a standard preferred working pattern, taking into account the needs of the team and the project completion goals set by the organization. This system should also be used to manage any changes in routine to avoid unnecessary disruption within the organization. The system once discussed must be approved by the COO and the CTO before implementation.
• Lunches and scheduled breaks cannot be eliminated from the daily project time schedule in order to reduce the number of hours in the workday. Where there are exceptional or unusual circumstances please refer to HR.
• Scheduled breaks cannot be taken in the first and the last 1.5 hrs of working. Any departure to this would be duly recorded by the HR.
• TL’s should ensure presence at all times when their team is working.

Responsibilities

Employees are responsible for ensuring that:

• the Punch IN time is accurate and adheres to the pre-decided, pre-approved project time. Reasonable liberty may be granted by the HR or the PL under unavoidable circumstances.
• the record complies with the rules outlined in these procedures by HR.
• approval has been obtained for any absences or additional hours worked

The project time would follow a core time from 11 am to 5 pm during which all employees must be present. It is during this time that all-important meetings such as the SOD, EOD, development meets, mentor meets, Strategy Meets would be scheduled.

b) Every employee would be mandated to complete his 9 hrs in office in the ambit of project-time. If an employee is unable to complete his mandatory 9 hrs for 3 times in a month then an amount equivalent to one day’s gross salary of the employee will be deducted or leave would be deducted from the leave balance based on his/her leave balance. Presence during the core-hours would be a must for all.

c) Employees must not leave the premises of the company during working hours without prior approval from his/her supervisor or the HODs. In case an employee leaves the office without informing his/her supervisor (except for lunch timings) his/her half-day salary will be deducted. The request is to be made through an email CCing all stakeholders.

d) Late arrival is defined as arriving after the prescribed starting time, similarly, an early departure is defined as leaving before the prescribed end time. Repeated tardiness and leaving early will not be tolerated.

e) Leaving the premises of the office prior to the prescribed end time will be marked as Early Departure. Only three early departures will be allowed in a month.

f) Late Comings will only be permissible in case of heavy rain, stormy conditions, or a strike in the city. But only the HODs can give their team members relaxation in timing. These requests are to be made through an email and the HR and COO must be kept in CC.

g) It is mandatory to mark attendance on the sumHR during the start and end of the day. Any miss over this would be considered as a policy violation & the person would be marked late or absent too.

II. LEAVES:

Policy Statement:

All employees are required to be present every day at work. But we believe that there are some inevitable factors that may force an employee to avail of the benefit of leaves. Mckinley & Rice also encourages its employees to avail of the leaves on an annual basis instead of availing them habitually.

However, granting leaves will be at the sole discretion of the management.

No leaves will be approved in case of the close delivery deadline for any project & on the pretext of previous bookings.

• All members should request the EL, CL, SL, LOP, HDs, etc. on sumHR to the Deputy Manager(HR), the COO, and their respective HODs. The HODs would be the final approving authority in these matters. It would be the responsibility of the HODs to keep HR informed of the leaves they approve.
• For HODs- The COO would approve or reject the leaves based on the status of the work and the individual’s leave balance.

Policy description:

a) There are mainly two types of leaves i.e. Paid Leaves and Unpaid Leaves:

1. Paid Leave: All employees will be entitled to 20 days of leave per annum. These are categorized as Earned Leaves (EL), Casual Leaves (CL), and Sick Leaves (SL).

Earned Leaves (EL): Each employee is entitled to a minimum of 1 earned leave on his/her leave account completing one month in the organization after his/her date of joining, which states for completing every month in the organization an employee will get an earned leave on his/her leave account. That means if an employee does not take any leave in a year then the employee would have 12 earned leaves in their leave account out of which a maximum of 10 leaves can be carried forward to the next year.

EL criteria: -

• If an employee joins before the 15th of a month then he/she is entitled to the EL for that month.
• If an employee joins on or after the 15th of a month then he/she is not entitled to the EL for the month.
• ELs will be given in the Probation Period. However, SL and CLs would not be given. This change would be applicable for people joining starting in January 2021. For those joining the company until December 2020, the previous policy would stay applicable.
• Interns would be entitled to One (1) EL/month.
• In the case of Resignation/Termination (duration of Notice Period), no new ELs would be added to the employee’s leave bank.
• Considering the nature of the leave, the same must be planned and should be approved using the due process at least 1 week in advance.

Casual Leave (CL): Casual Leave qualifies as an act or event which occurs by chance or accident without any pre-planning or anticipation in the normal course. An employee is entitled to a maximum of 4 casual leaves in a year based on his/her date of joining.

Casual leave criteria: -

• An employee would be entitled to 0 CL in the probation period.
• If an employee joins in the first quarter, then he/she is entitled to 4 CLs for a year.
• If an employee joins in the second or third quarter, then he/she is entitled to 2 CLs for the year.
• If an employee joins in the fourth quarter, then he/she is entitled to 1 CL.
• Interns would not be entitled to any CL.
• In the case of Resignation/Termination (duration of Notice Period), no new CLs would be added to the employee’s leave bank.
• Considering the nature of the leave, the same must be planned and should be approved using the due process at least 1 week in advance.

Sick Leave: Sick leave is time off from work that employees can use to stay home to address their health and safety needs without losing pay. An employee is entitled to a minimum of 4 Sick leaves in a year based on his/her date of joining. Like a casual leave, each employee can avail of 1 sick leave per quarter.

Sick Leave Criteria:-

• An employee would be entitled to 0 SL in the probation period.
• Interns would not be entitled to any SL.
• In the case of Resignation/Termination (duration of Notice Period), no new SLs would be added to the employee’s leave bank.
• Considering the nature of the leave, the same can be availed without any prior notice.

If an employee takes more than or equal to three sick leave, in this case, the employee is liable to submit evidence such as a medical certificate showing that the employee was entitled to take sick leave during the relevant period. Failing to do so would warrant disciplinary action.

In case of resignation, the employee is eligible to avail of the leaves during the notice period of 45 days or less, however, no more leaves would be added to the employee’s leave bank. Also, a maximum of 10 leaves can be encashed in the Full and Final settlement only after the employee has successfully completed one year with the organization.

Encashment requests would only be entertained for the employees who have stayed with the company for a period of more than 1 year.

None of the leaves would be approved in the last 15 days of the notice period.

In the case of Resignation/Termination during the probation period, the employee is not eligible to take any leaves. In case of absence, the salary for the same would be deducted during the full and final settlement.

In the case of termination after the probation period, the employee is eligible to avail of leaves collected previously during the notice period of 45 days, however, no more leaves would be added to the employee’s leave bank. Also, no leave encashment requests would be entertained.

2. Unpaid Leave / Leave without Pay / Absent: This type of leave can be availed during the probation period or when the paid leaves of an employee have exhausted. If availed, an amount of salary equivalent to the days the employee had taken this type of leave will be deducted from his/her salary of that month.

b) All employees are required to send the leave request on sumHR at least one day in advance to the designated authority (HODs or the COO along with HR) if they wish to avail of any type of leave for personal work/casual reasons. In case it is not possible to apply for leave then the employee will be required to send the email within three days of availing any type of leave.

Other than the above-mentioned annual leaves, McKinley & Rice offers the following leaves to its employees:

Maternity Leave: This policy is applicable to all full-time women associates working in India who have completed working 365 days (1year) excluding the probation period in the company from expected delivery. Mckinley & Rice realizes that all the women employees should cherish the experience of the Pre-Maternity phase.

An employee is entitled to up to 24 weeks of paid maternity leaves. Out of the 24 weeks of maternity leave, up to 8 weeks may be availed before & including the date of delivery and the remaining may be availed after the date of delivery OR the entire 24 weeks may be availed after the birth of the child, including the date of delivery.

Paternity Leave: A male employee with less than two surviving children, may be granted Paternity Leave for a period of 15 days before or up to six months from the date of delivery of the child. If paternity leave is not taken within 6 months of the birth of the child, it is treated as lapsed. This policy is applicable to all full-time men associates working in India who have completed working 365 days ( 1year) excluding the probation period in the company from expected delivery.

Bereavement Leaves: At McKinley, we value the emotional well being of our employees and hence provide 5 days of bereavement leaves to employees each year to be used under the unfortunate instance of a death of someone in the immediate family of the employee (including only the parents, spouse or kids).

Covid Leaves: Employees affected by COVID-19 and kept in isolation will be provided with paid leave of 10 days. Such leave shall be permissible when the employee provide a verified RT-PCR report.

III. Work From Home (Virtual Office):

Applicable starting COVID vaccine availability.

Work From Home policy has always been an integral part of McKinley’s Employee Value Proposition (EVP). The policy ensures that working from home is beneficial to both, our employees and the company.

a. All team members would be mandated to work from the office (WFO) for 4 days/ week against the existing 5 days/week. The remaining 1 day/week would be on the WFH basis.

b. The team's work schedule would be decided by the HODs of the respective departments and would be approved by the strategy committee.

Situations that could lead to a refusal for grant of WFH include but are not limited to:

a) In case of a pre-scheduled company event for which the employee is a part of.

b) In case a meeting is scheduled with the management, client, or any external stakeholder important to effectively run the business.

c) In case a DEFCON is raised for the project the employee is working on.

d) Other reasons for refusal to grant working from home depending on the COO’s judgment.

Employees not adhering to the WFH/WFO norms or taking arbitrary steps such as not following the regular WFO as mandated by this policy would face disciplinary action depending on the magnitude of the issue at hand. The same would be a valid cause for the termination of an employee from the company.

Additional guidelines pertaining to WFH-

a) The employee would be expected to be present online (slack) and no laxity with the deadlines would be considered due to the employee taking a WFH. The pre-decided deadlines would be sacrosanct and must be respected by the employees.

b) The employee will have to inform the HODs, PLs, and the HR officers a day before to take approval for WFH.

c) No EL would be provided for the month an employee opts for WFH.

c) There would be no compounding of WFH over months. If an employee fails to avail of the WFH for a particular month for any given reason, the same would lapse at the EOM.

d) Employees serving their notice period in case of both resignation and termination would not be eligible to avail of this benefit.

e) The COO would reserve the right to revoke the WFH leverage for employees if any misuse is established. The issue of revocation would not be liable to be covered under the “Policy of Grievance Redressal”.

WFH/WFO Project Management Charter[ EXISTING]-

Identical charters would follow for both WFH and WFO. The same has been notified below-

a. All Project Leads(PLs) would be mandated to carry out the Start of Day Meetings (SOD) with their fellow team members (referred to as Engineers hereafter) first thing in the morning.

b. All PLs would be mandated to carry out the End of Day Meetings (EOD) with their fellow engineers at the close of the day.

c. The SOD meeting would happen project-wise as per the notion charter. The AOs in this meeting would need to review the previous day’s work and chalk out a plan for the current day’s work. These meetings would be attended by the Technology Lead (TLs) as well to enable adequate project discussion, query resolution, and efficient project planning.

d. The EOD review would be slightly longer and would entail a full review of the tasks completed by the Development Team during the day. The EOD meetings would be attended by the Project Lead (PL) and the Technology Lead (TLs) as well to enable adequate project discussion, query resolution, and efficient project planning.

Platforms

a) Google Meet would be used as the platform of choice to conduct virtual meetings in the case of WFH.

b) The client meetings are required to be recorded by the AO/PM and uploaded to Google Drive. The link to the recording needed to be attached in the Minutes of the Meeting (MOM).

Communications

a) The PM would be authorized to maintain MOM for all meetings except for the daily EOD review. In case of the absence of the PM, the MOMs were needed to be maintained by the AO.

b) All communication would be conducted on the particular project’s Slack channel.