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You remember that old saying “Timing is everything?” This isn’t more true than with the area of employment. Have you ever had a situation where you were contemplating discipline but before you delivered the discipline, the individual filed a claim with a third-party agency? But you truly feel that there were issues you were trying to address that were bona fide performance issues? How do you protect yourself against frivolous cases?
The timeline becomes very important in this type of situation. If you have been in discussion with your employee about performance issues, it is important that you document those conversations. Dates of any conversations you had with the employee or conversations with higher level management or Human Resources about the employee’s performance issues and the items discussed are also helpful.
Your Human Resources representative or legal counsel will likely respond to the claim. It will be their job to establish the timeline as part of the response. Any of the documentation that you have will be helpful to them in putting together that response to substantiate that there were bona fide performance issues prior to the employee’s claim.
If you received a claim from a third party agency (Dept. of Labor, Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, NM Human Rights Bureau to name a few) and are unsure of what to do, contact Southwestern Human Resources Consulting today.
Written by | Magdalena Vigil-Tullar
HR Consultant | MBA, SPHR, SHRM-SCP, CLRP
Phone: 505-270-7494 | Email: magdalena@swhrc.com