AAP - Opinions Please

Gadget

At my new company as I prepare our AAP they want me to include people applying for promotional opportunities on the applicant flow log. Then, when our software program calculates adverse impact these folks count against our numbers since their "Hires" show as "promotions."

In the past, I did not list employees who applied for internal positions on the applicant flow. I've passed several OFCCP audits like that --- am I right or wrong about this. Help, please.

Thanks.

ray a

I do track promotions and transfers, but just those actually moved, not those who applied internally through our posting system. The applicant flow log lists only outside applicants for employment, not internal applicants.

Irie

My tracking method is the same as ray a's.

Al Vreeland

Let me confess that this is not my area of expertise. But my partner, David Middlebrooks, who heads our AAP Compliance Group responded as follows:

I trust you are speaking about the adverse impact analysis -hiring. Compliance officers can vary on their perspective on this issue. It seems the better method is determined by a company's practice. For example, we have clients who post all openings with equal availability for internal and external "applicants" to apply. In these cases, external applicants and internal applicants are considered at the same time. For those job titles where this is the practice, it makes sense to treat them all as "applicants" because if the analysis implies adverse impact, the ultimate issue boils down to an analysis of each hiring decision to determine whether discrimination occurred. That usually involves a cohort analysis which requires comparison off ALL persons considered for the position. Further, one would not get an accurate reading of adverse impact unless you considered the race/gender mix of the whole pool of qualified applicants from which a position is filled.

In instances where the practice is that a job title is filled only from within, clients typically include this position in the promotion analysis. Further, to be exact, if you have internal postings from which a job is filled, your pool from which you draw is only those who bid and not all who could have bid or who were otherwise qualified but who did not bid.

If you need clarification, David's number is (205) 323-9262.


Al Vreeland
Editor, Alabama Employment Law Letter
Lehr Middlebrooks Price & Vreeland, P.C.

Gadget

Thanks everyone for your prompt and insightful help. (Of course, it helps that you agreed with me.) We will be doing a separate log for internal applicants to go along with our adverse impact analysis on promotions.

Thanks again.