wrokforce reduction and progressive discipline
GLC
174 Posts
We recently had another workforce reduction and one of the employees who lost her position was a supervisor. This supervisor has not been the best leader in this position. Her supervisor (male) had talked to her numerous times about her management skills, with little improvement. This has all been documented on her annual evaluations over the last three years. She was like a mother figure to her staff instead of coaching and motivating them to get their productivity up, always making excuses for them. She had been a supv here for about 5 years. Her team had the lowest productivity this year.
Typically, we would go through progressive displine when we are having an employee with performance problems but this was never officially done, but she was well aware they we were not happy with her. As I said, her first supv had talked to her and documented her performance problems on her evaluations. She did get a new supervisor (female) this year who started the progressive discipline with her. She had given her a verbal warning and many other informal conversations about her performance and her team's performance. She is now claiming that we did not go through the progressive discipline with her before we eliminated her position.
Our layoff policy focuses on performance, with seniority being last. She has claimed gender discrimination as well which is another issue. Do you think she could have a claim against us because we did not go through the formal progressive discipline with her. When a company needs to reduce its workforce, they really don't have time for progressive discipline? What do you think?
Typically, we would go through progressive displine when we are having an employee with performance problems but this was never officially done, but she was well aware they we were not happy with her. As I said, her first supv had talked to her and documented her performance problems on her evaluations. She did get a new supervisor (female) this year who started the progressive discipline with her. She had given her a verbal warning and many other informal conversations about her performance and her team's performance. She is now claiming that we did not go through the progressive discipline with her before we eliminated her position.
Our layoff policy focuses on performance, with seniority being last. She has claimed gender discrimination as well which is another issue. Do you think she could have a claim against us because we did not go through the formal progressive discipline with her. When a company needs to reduce its workforce, they really don't have time for progressive discipline? What do you think?
Comments
EDIT: I've read Baloonman's response and yours again. I'm confused. You say you eliminated the position. Is that a fact?
I read through this and thought, no problems from how I look at it. You have documented performance coaching sessions. She has not been performing adequately and there is some notes in file and most likely notes her supervisors have from these sessions. It would be nice if this was all perfectly documented in her file but such is life.
The first sentence above, combined with her team being the least productive seem like pretty strong evidence that the reason for letting her go was performance. I would not lose any sleep over it.
My $0.02 worth.
DJ the Balloonman
You say that in a layoff a company does not have the time for progressive discipline. That is true, but they may pay the price for not having time for progressive discipline at an earlier date.
When I refer to progressive discipline, I mean (1) verbal warning (2) written warning (3)suspension (4) term. That is what we did not officially do. Trust me, she had numerous performance improvement plans. I guess what we didn't do was actually call them verbal warning, written warning, etc. even though we did a performance improvement plan. She can't say she did not get those because she signed them. This person would improve slightly then revert back to her old ways so it is our fault for not staying on her. We have a tendency to let people stay longer than they should. This pattern pre-dates me. I am trying to get mgmt. to see the harm it causes when we allow non-performers to stay for life.
1. Possession of critical or needed skills
2. Performance history
3. History of disciplinary actions and attendance records
4. Length of service
Those two positions both will go away. No one is replacing them. Another supv. from another site will be managing that team now along with her own team so she will co-manage two teams. Since the staff reduced where the laid off supervisor worked, we did not need a FT supervisor there. When one is doing a reduction in force, what do they look at. I would think we would have to use something so we used mainly #1 #2, and 3 above. We wouldn't just draw names from a hat. Please advise.