Effective December 1, 2013, your company will need to meet more stringent standards established by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration for training its employees on the handling of hazardous substances in the workplace. This new OSHA training is necessitated by the revised Hazard Communication Standard that OSHA put into place starting in March 2012.

Recently I read a column in Forbes magazine by Rich Karlgaard. It was about legendary Stanford women's basketball Tara VanDerveer. Many may not realize that Vanderveer spent much of her time as a student at Indiana University in the 70s watching, observing, and learning from Coach Bob Knight. She says one of her secrets to success was "hanging around" the best and brightest in her business.

November is American Diabetes Month. For those of you who know me well, you are probably aware that diabetes prevention and education is a subject about which I am very passionate.

November is American Diabetes Month. For those of you who know me well, you are probably aware that diabetes prevention and education is a subject about which I am very passionate.

While the holidays were once a time of family togetherness and peaceful rejoicing, today's world has made it a frantic rush to host the perfect party and outdo relatives with gift selections. With holiday work events, family meals, and parties with friends, you may feel pulled in several directions asyour calendar quickly fills up. Alas, the stress begins. But what to do? Make sure you schedule time for yourself to relax and enjoy the season or you run the risk of over-stressing, losing sleep, and becoming so exhausted you get sick.

A few weeks ago we put all the lake stuff away for the offseason. As I gazed at the water skis, I couldn’t help but think about what a great summer it had been. My nine year old, unable to get up the summer before, was up on two skisby early June this year. A few weeks later he had me remove the training strings holding the skis together. My eleven year old went from two skis, to dropping one, to becoming a pretty impressive slalom skier by summer’s end.

It was not without a lot of hard work from both of them. I can’t tell you how many times I got the call of “Ready Dad!”, slammed the throttle forward and took off, only to look back and see them take a dive into the lake. Every time, I dutifully circled the ski rope back around them. We would repeat the same process as many times as it took.

During 2012, 55 percent of small businesses experienced at least one data privacy breach and 53 percent encountered multiple breaches, according to the Ponemon Institute. Despite this, the National Small Business Cybersecurity Study found that only 10 percent of small businesses have an allocated staff member who is responsible for online and cyber security.

The key to an effective wellness program is communication. Your employees must know about the programs and understand how they can benefit. Here are five strategies to help you achieve your goals:

With all of the media coverage surrounding the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare), it’s easy to lose sight of the fact that we have a real crisis in America with health and health care costs. It’s widely known that obesity and diabetes rates have doubled in the last 15 years and that costs are tracking up along with these trends. Any organization doing a deep dive on their health claims costs realizes that the Pareto Principle is alive and well. It’s likely 20% of their employees or family members are incurring 80% of their costs, and that 80% of those costs are directly related to conditions linked to lifestyle choices.

Several years ago the National Institute of Health put out this comment: “If we could get Americans to do just three things:

1. Stop using tobacco products
2. Stop drinking to excess
3. Not be obese

Football, backyard campfires, multi-colored landscapes, pumpkin carving, and Halloween festivities. The month of October brings awesome activities and traditions that people of all ages can enjoy. However, for those working in the health care industry, the month of October brings in one of the busiest times of the year: the dreaded cold and flu season.