I respect your position and really don't have a problem with a company that feels that way. Personally, from our vantage point, we don't want employees discussing their reveiws with other employees, or sharing with others our opinions about their strengths, weaknesses, goal accomplishments and/or failure to meet certain performance criteria. Why? Because its no one else's business. And we don't want a bunch of pointless discussions about why someone was or wasn't rated higher/lower, why they should or shouldn't be fired/promoted, etc. We want our discussions with each employee, whether it be about problems, discipline, performance measurements or whatever to be considered confidential conversations, that other employees are not privy to. If an employee came to you and asked you to divulge information in another employees file, would you do it? Probably not. But then again, maybe you don't have a problem with that. You say tomato, I say....
Right, you say tomato, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) says violation of Section 8 of the National Labor Relations Act. Section 8 provides (among other things) that it is an unfair labor practice for employers to "interfere, restrain, or coerce employees in the exercise of the rights guaranteed in section 7." Among the rights guaranteed in Section 7 is the right to engage in concerted activity for the purpose of "collective bargaining or other mutual aid or protection." As you probably know, it is well-established that prohibiting discussions among employees about their wages or the terms and conditions of their employment is unlawful (unless the employer has a legitimate and substantial business justification for the rule). The NLRB has held on several occasions that this includes discussions about disciplinary actions taken by the employer, and it has held that blanket rules prohibiting such discussions constitute an unfair labor practice.
While there are some circumstances under which an employer's instruction to maintain confidentiality of things like disciplinary actions are substantial enough to outweigh the employee's right to engage in concerted activity, the NLRB has found pretty consistently that justifications like "it's no one else's business," "it could create unrest among the workers," "we don't want a bunch of pointless discussions about employee evaluations" or "we consider that confidential information" are not sufficient. If, for example, employees think the company is unfairly imposing disciplinary action, possibly in violation of a company's expressed policy, employees have a right to discuss that with each other. Of course employers don't want employees doing that - dissatisfaction with conditions of employment is often what convinces employees to join/start unions. But that's one of the reasons such discussions are considered protected concerted activity under the NLRA.
Also, I do not see how your last question is at all relevant to the topic at hand. We're not talking here about taking an employee's disciplinary notice and giving a copy to anyone who asks for it, or posting it on the company bulletin board for all employees to see. We're talking about giving the notice to THE EMPLOYEE THE NOTICE PERTAINS TO. If the employee then chooses to share information about himself with others, that's his business. If he leaves his warning out on a table where other employees can see it, that's also on him. YOU didn't provide the notice to anyone except the employee, so no, I don't see any risk there at all about supposedly having reviews "floating around."
If you can show me where the NLRA/NLRB requires employers to furnish copies of documents in the personnel file, I will change my practice. I'm well aware of the rules that stipulate that employers cannot prohibit employees from engaging in discussions about wages, hours, terms and conditions of employment. It doesn't say the employer must encourage it. There is no law (other than certain state laws) that says employers are obligated to provide copies of personel files upon employees demand. I still think it a prudent policy to keep discussions with employees private, and treat the personel file as what it is - a company confidential file.
>If you can show me where the NLRA/NLRB requires >employers to furnish copies of documents in the >personnel file, I will change my practice. I'm >well aware of the rules that stipulate that >employers cannot prohibit employees from >engaging in discussions about wages, hours, >terms and conditions of employment. It doesn't >say the employer must encourage it. There is no >law (other than certain state laws) that says >employers are obligated to provide copies of >personel files upon employees demand. I still >think it a prudent policy to keep discussions >with employees private, and treat the personel >file as what it is - a company confidential >file.
My NLRA comments were solely in response to your remarks about trying to prevent certain discussions from taking place in the workplace. Obviously the NLRA doesn't deal with the issue of distributing copies of personnel documents, and if you are in a state that does not require employers to provide employees with a copy of their file on request, that's your prerogative to keep them to yourself. But I do think it's important to consider the reasons for that kind of policy - you suggested that employees will talk amongst themselves about disciplinary action. But those kind of employees will do that whether or not they get a copy of their written warning or performance eval. And it could even be that any "spin" the employee tries to put on the issue will be downplayed in the face of a document that is fair, objective, and doesn't support his spin. I think the point a lot of people have been making in this thread is that refusing to share disciplinary documents with an employee may do more harm than good, so it's prudent to consider what the perceived "good" is, and I'm not sure I can think of much. Refusing copies doesn't make it harder for employees to discuss their discipline with others, and I don't see any risk to the employer regarding confidentiality if the employer gives a copy only to the employee.
On the other hand, I can think of several harms of refusing copies, many of which people have mentioned here already: It creates suspicion in the mind of the employee (suspicious employees tend to be litigious employees); an employee may claim that he never knew of the disciplinary action taken against him; an employee may claim that he never knew the *reason* for the action taken against him; the risk of ambiguity that might result from an employee having to rely on his memory to remember what was discussed during a (probably stressful) disciplinary meeting could lead to confusion on the employee's part about exactly what he did wrong and how he can improve; even if an employee signs an acknowledgment that the disciplinary notice was discussed with her, the employee may later claim that additional comments were added to the warning after she signed (I've seen this happen!).
I just think that refusing to give copies has the potential to create so many more problems than it prevents. Obviously your opinion differs. Of course, I'm also from Massachusetts, so I've always taken it for granted that I have a right to see what my employer is putting in my personnel file. :-) And maybe it's because I've always had that right, or maybe it's because I can remember what life was like before I worked for management , but I can sympathize with an employee who becomes suspicious if he's not allowed to see his file, and I can sympathize with the "Who knows what kind of bad stuff they could be putting in there?" mentality. Incidentally, I think if it comes to litigation, a jury (the members of which almost certainly will be far more sympathetic to that mentality than I am) is probably going to give less weight to a personnel file that was kept secret until just prior to litigation (at which time conspiracy-theorist jurors will suggest that the company could have just put in a bunch of notes about poor performance once it found out the employee was suing, or added extra bad info after the employee signed his warning) than one where the employee acknowledged receipt of copies of all disciplinary notices, making it much harder to claim they were "planted."
Anyway, those are just a few additional thoughts. Obviously brevity isn't one of my strong suits (which I'm sure became apparent long before this post).
missk, OK- this will be my last post on this subject as it is obvious we could go back and forth, point-counterpoint for days. Once again, you need to stop infering that the "no copies provided" policy means we don't allow and/or encourage regular inspection and review of file contents. All disciplinary write-ups, performance reviews, or any other documents that deal with the employees' standing with the company is always openly discussed with the employee, and the employee is always allowed to offer any comments, rebuttles or opposing viewpoints. Nothing is added to that file that the employee does not have complete knowledge of, and that can be verified by the employees being allowed to regularly inspect the file. There is no "risk of ambiguity", or "confusion on the employees part about what he did wrong or how he can improve" because that is discussed in detail with the employee and documented accordingly. If they need to refresh thier memory, I'll review it again with them, in private. And we have NEVER had any employee indicate they suspect we engage in the practice of "...adding bad stuff to the file" Why? Because we have given them every reason to trust our behavior as stewards of the file, our open communications with them about performance and our commitment to privacy when dealing with their issues. Providing copies of file contents does not prevent an unscrupulous company from modifying documents in the file or adding ones to it; providing copies does not insure the employee has no confusion over the true meaning of a disciplinary write-up if the write up itself is confusing, and refusing to provide copies of documents in the file does not mean our employees view that as suspicious, underhanded or negative. The policy of "no copies" means we take very serioulsy the practice of control of company confidential documents, whether its about an employee or about business plans or market strategies, and our employees openly accept that policy . Nothing more, nothing less. Stop equating it to some conspricy to keep employees uninformed. We as a company create the culture of openess and integrity through our track record and our day-to-day dealing with our staff. Whether we provide copies of thier personnel file or not doesn't have a damn thing to do with how our employee view us.
>missk, >OK- this will be my last post on this subject as >it is obvious we could go back and forth, >point-counterpoint for days. Once again, you >need to stop infering that the "no copies >provided" policy means we don't allow and/or >encourage regular inspection and review of file >contents. All disciplinary write-ups, >performance reviews, or any other documents that >deal with the employees' standing with the >company is always openly discussed with the >employee, and the employee is always allowed to >offer any comments, rebuttles or opposing >viewpoints.
Easy there, killer. I never inferred anything of the sort! If you'll note, I explicitly mentioned in my post that these problems can occur even if you openly discuss disciplinary actions with employees and have them acknowledge the discussion. I'm just saying that, when it comes to a matter of proof in court, no matter how thoroughly you discussed an issue with an employee and no matter how clear you thought you were being, the employee can always claim "They never told me that," "They didn't explain it clearly," "I didn't know that when they said 'x' that they meant..." Meanwhile, if you can show that an employee received a copy of the document, on which it is clearly written what the employee did wrong, how he or she should improve, etc., it's going to be much more difficult for an employee to convince a jury that he really, honestly just didn't understand (or remember) what a big deal this performance problem (or whatever was), because the employer didn't make it clear to him or her (not that that should make a difference with respect to liability [for at-will employees], but it often does!). That's my point about how copies offer that extra protection.
As for some other points you made, providing copies *does* prevent an unscrupulous company from modifying documents, because it's gonna be really hard to get away with modifying a document of which an employee has a copy. As soon as you pull out that modified document, the employee's going to come back and show the copy he has and that it's different, at which point it's pretty much case closed. Providing copies may not ensure there is no confusion, but as mentioned above, if you can show the employee received a copy in writing, there's going to be a lot less basis for an argument that the confusion was justified or the fault of the employer. It's also easier to misremember things of which you have only a memory than of which you have a copy that can refresh your memory. Obviously if your policy is that, when someone asks for a copy of a document and you say, "You can't have a copy of it, but you can review the document anytime you like," then that helps alleviate that concern, and that's great.
I also *never* suggested that you (or any employer!) were a party to a conspiracy to keep employees uninformed nor that your employees thought you were nor that your employees were suspicious of your HR practices. I mean, really, I challenge you to find a single instance where I suggested that that was what was going on at your workplace. Rather, I offered my comments *generally* to give examples of some possible instances where not giving copies can hurt. It's not about whether an employer *is* trying to keep employees uninformed, it's about how it looks to an employee, or an investigative agency, or a jury. I mean, that's great that none of your employees have ever had the slightest problem with your 'confidential documents' policy, but not all employers are so lucky. And since lots of people besides you read this forum, I think it can be beneficial to bring up these sorts of issues that others may not have considered. While those issues may not be applicable to your workplace (and I never once suggested they were), they may be applicable to others.
So no need to get all defensive there. I thought you southerners were supposed to be more laid back. Or are you one of those northern transplants? ;-)
I do think there is a large distinction between the approach a company takes with active employees versus ex-employees. I don't have a lot of disagreement with providing current ees with copies of everything they have signed. It just makes sense.
As to the issue of them sharing their personal information with others of the work force, it is a protected activity. The only problem I have with it is that this is a one-way street. Often the sharing is not the actual written documentation, but some EE friendly spin that is circulated. Truth and accuracy are frequently sacrificed on some sort of sympathy altar. The company, however, keeps their side confidential. That allows misinformation, gossip, innuendo, etc to grow unchecked and with the amount of Bulls@#t that is often heaped on this EE spin of facts and circumstance, this stuff can grow out of control pretty quickly.
That's why I typically don't mind if the employee shares their documentation with others. It's going to be a lot more factual (and therefore, more employer-friendly) than the oral version the employee would resort to if he didn't have the copies. Employee's who show their documentation off generally don't realize how bad it makes them look in front of their peers.
If you have a company culture that is such than I do feel for you.
Our company is not like that. My employees do not have that mindset. I think it is because everyone is so happy to be here. We are really good to our employees and they feel a part of the company, they feel respected and appreciated and they do not want to leave.
The few instances we have had to disclipline or terminate have been uneventful because the employee would be ashamed to let any of the other employees know they had been discliplined. If there is talk it usually dies down in a day or two.
Terminated employees are escorted to their desk to pick up personal items and than escorted off the property and they are not allowed to return. It is a policy.
I would still give them copies of any important papers in their file if they asked, make a copy of what I sent them, document their reason, put it in the file.
we do not have to disclipline often. I fired two people in 5 years over a couple of major issues. We work with the employee on minor issues and it is usually resolved quickly.
If your employees have the mindset you are describing I probably would be looking at my management policies and see what is being done wrong.
I do believe that if employees are talking that much about things to cause an uproar than there must be problems somewhere.
Not in a bad way, but in a constructive way. Perhaps there are steps that need to be taken to remedy the situation.
Marc, first I would probably survey the employees to get a feel for what their concerns are , than I would set about to correct them however I could do so.
The employees that are listening and engaging with the discliplined employee should just say that is between you and management and none of my business and go back to work. That is kind of how it is here, sorry, but I have work to do and I don't have time to discuss it with you...it dies down if no one talks to him/her about it.
You need to find out what is causing the talk and the concern amonst the employees and defuse it or it will get worse. Keeping copies from the employees will not stop the talk. They will talk if they are going to with or without a copy of a paper.
Wow, this question has really stirred up a mess. Talking about employee mindset, there are about 80 employees that I deal with, 99 % are women that work beside each other every day. We are a small company and can only pay a little above minimum wage. We are also small town, and don't have a lot of applicants to pull from. Most everyone knows everyone and I and the COO are always heading off confrontations between the women. We are not "fire" happy and when we do have to term someone it is usually because of attendance issues. Everything I do is in the best interest of the company and the employee. Write ups, discipline papers, evaluations or terminations are done after carefull consideration of all the facts. I utilize progressive discipline here and if and when a termination has to occur, the employee has already been through all the steps and they know what comes next.
Sounds like you are doing your best. It is hard in an office of women at minimum wage. You don't have a lot of options and women do tend to talk more.
Sometimes things work for one company that do not work for another. All you or anyone else can do is their best. Keep on smiling and doing what you can.
Sometimes a walk around every so often when you know something is going to be buzzing around keeps the buzz down a bit.
Shirley, perhaps you have a most unusual company where EEs do not talk to each other about things that bother them. Perhaps your employees do not exaggerate things to spin in their favor, perhaps your company is one of those rare ones where everyone lives on the shores of Walden Pond. I don't know any of that.
For you to leap to the conclusion you have is not warranted. I work for a great company, a non-profit that engages in some wonderful services to improve our community. Our wages are at best, in the middle of the market and our benefits are decent, except for a lack of retirement. When state, county and city agencies are hiring, they raid our staff. Often the staff will want to stay but cannot pass up the higher wages and better benefits. That leads to turnover. Turnover leads to other issues with handling additional workload while the recruiting, hiring and training are going on. Additional workload can add a significant amount of stress to those individuals that are doing the work, etc, etc, etc.
We have a good handle on this. We encourage EEs to do as you have suggested, but they do not all have the ability, personality, training, or other perspective to always tell someone to leave me alone and get back to work.
We have surveyed the EEs who are here and those who have left. The largest controllable factor has to do with wages being lower than other opportunities. Our umeployment rate in our county is 3.9% which also factors in. We simply do not have enough dollars to compete with local private and governmental employees.
We emphasize the difference we make in the community and have an empowered staff in that regard. Our management levels are very stable for lots of reasons that only have a little to do with wages. People love working here. I get so much return that is not in my paycheck that I won't even try to express that.
Okay, I guess I deserved that. No we do not live in Walden Pond.
We do know about stress and extra work. I had to deal with a huge cut in staff over a complete reorganization. It was awful, I know about the stress, but I was fortunate and my remaining staff rallied around for the long haul. We had a wage freeze for a few years because of a famine in our growing area, we are just getting back on our feet now and I have brought some good people back. No one in our company is exempt from Stress.
Sorry I just haven't experienced what you have.
I can always improve on my methods and the companies there is room for improvement every day. All we can do is our best.
What we always do need to do and I will stand by this is be there for our employees. We are their support. They are our customers.
When we do that we gain the respect of the employees and when we have their respect they will pretty much do as we ask when we ask it in a nice manner and explain why we are asking.
I guess I am very fortunate that I get along so well with the employees. I have a flare up with the mgmt once in a while usually over wages or benefits for the employees, but not with the employees, they are all the greatest and I tell them that every day.
Didn't mean to get your dander up I think we are in two worlds...Good luck in yours.
I can't help but respond. "Go home Jake it's Chinatown". I remember that classic line from the movie "Chinatown" and that is what I always think of when I think of Texas. I worked there for 12 years and never saw anything like it befor or after. Its all about Texas and it's absolute "at will" very little ee support what so ever. No surprise that the employee can't even view their files. Just so typical. Sorry to sound so synical but, oh well, it's Texas.
"No surprise that the employee can't even view their files. Just so typical."
Actually, Elizabeth, the discussion was about copying items, not viewing them.
And I'm sorry to have to correct your generalization about Texas employers, but at my place of employment here in Austin, employees are more than welcome to do both. It's quite possible to have an at-will employment policy and still treat employees with respect.
Thank you for the corrections to my statement and I send my sincerist apologies. It was out of line and much too emotional. Thank you again for the honesty. Elizabeth
Comments
While there are some circumstances under which an employer's instruction to maintain confidentiality of things like disciplinary actions are substantial enough to outweigh the employee's right to engage in concerted activity, the NLRB has found pretty consistently that justifications like "it's no one else's business," "it could create unrest among the workers," "we don't want a bunch of pointless discussions about employee evaluations" or "we consider that confidential information" are not sufficient. If, for example, employees think the company is unfairly imposing disciplinary action, possibly in violation of a company's expressed policy, employees have a right to discuss that with each other. Of course employers don't want employees doing that - dissatisfaction with conditions of employment is often what convinces employees to join/start unions. But that's one of the reasons such discussions are considered protected concerted activity under the NLRA.
Also, I do not see how your last question is at all relevant to the topic at hand. We're not talking here about taking an employee's disciplinary notice and giving a copy to anyone who asks for it, or posting it on the company bulletin board for all employees to see. We're talking about giving the notice to THE EMPLOYEE THE NOTICE PERTAINS TO. If the employee then chooses to share information about himself with others, that's his business. If he leaves his warning out on a table where other employees can see it, that's also on him. YOU didn't provide the notice to anyone except the employee, so no, I don't see any risk there at all about supposedly having reviews "floating around."
Great Job explaining. I totally agree with you.
Shirley
>employers to furnish copies of documents in the
>personnel file, I will change my practice. I'm
>well aware of the rules that stipulate that
>employers cannot prohibit employees from
>engaging in discussions about wages, hours,
>terms and conditions of employment. It doesn't
>say the employer must encourage it. There is no
>law (other than certain state laws) that says
>employers are obligated to provide copies of
>personel files upon employees demand. I still
>think it a prudent policy to keep discussions
>with employees private, and treat the personel
>file as what it is - a company confidential
>file.
My NLRA comments were solely in response to your remarks about trying to prevent certain discussions from taking place in the workplace. Obviously the NLRA doesn't deal with the issue of distributing copies of personnel documents, and if you are in a state that does not require employers to provide employees with a copy of their file on request, that's your prerogative to keep them to yourself. But I do think it's important to consider the reasons for that kind of policy - you suggested that employees will talk amongst themselves about disciplinary action. But those kind of employees will do that whether or not they get a copy of their written warning or performance eval. And it could even be that any "spin" the employee tries to put on the issue will be downplayed in the face of a document that is fair, objective, and doesn't support his spin. I think the point a lot of people have been making in this thread is that refusing to share disciplinary documents with an employee may do more harm than good, so it's prudent to consider what the perceived "good" is, and I'm not sure I can think of much. Refusing copies doesn't make it harder for employees to discuss their discipline with others, and I don't see any risk to the employer regarding confidentiality if the employer gives a copy only to the employee.
On the other hand, I can think of several harms of refusing copies, many of which people have mentioned here already: It creates suspicion in the mind of the employee (suspicious employees tend to be litigious employees); an employee may claim that he never knew of the disciplinary action taken against him; an employee may claim that he never knew the *reason* for the action taken against him; the risk of ambiguity that might result from an employee having to rely on his memory to remember what was discussed during a (probably stressful) disciplinary meeting could lead to confusion on the employee's part about exactly what he did wrong and how he can improve; even if an employee signs an acknowledgment that the disciplinary notice was discussed with her, the employee may later claim that additional comments were added to the warning after she signed (I've seen this happen!).
I just think that refusing to give copies has the potential to create so many more problems than it prevents. Obviously your opinion differs. Of course, I'm also from Massachusetts, so I've always taken it for granted that I have a right to see what my employer is putting in my personnel file. :-) And maybe it's because I've always had that right, or maybe it's because I can remember what life was like before I worked for management , but I can sympathize with an employee who becomes suspicious if he's not allowed to see his file, and I can sympathize with the "Who knows what kind of bad stuff they could be putting in there?" mentality. Incidentally, I think if it comes to litigation, a jury (the members of which almost certainly will be far more sympathetic to that mentality than I am) is probably going to give less weight to a personnel file that was kept secret until just prior to litigation (at which time conspiracy-theorist jurors will suggest that the company could have just put in a bunch of notes about poor performance once it found out the employee was suing, or added extra bad info after the employee signed his warning) than one where the employee acknowledged receipt of copies of all disciplinary notices, making it much harder to claim they were "planted."
Anyway, those are just a few additional thoughts. Obviously brevity isn't one of my strong suits (which I'm sure became apparent long before this post).
OK- this will be my last post on this subject as it is obvious we could go back and forth, point-counterpoint for days. Once again, you need to stop infering that the "no copies provided" policy means we don't allow and/or encourage regular inspection and review of file contents. All disciplinary write-ups, performance reviews, or any other documents that deal with the employees' standing with the company is always openly discussed with the employee, and the employee is always allowed to offer any comments, rebuttles or opposing viewpoints. Nothing is added to that file that the employee does not have complete knowledge of, and that can be verified by the employees being allowed to regularly inspect the file. There is no "risk of ambiguity", or "confusion on the employees part about what he did wrong or how he can improve" because that is discussed in detail with the employee and documented accordingly. If they need to refresh thier memory, I'll review it again with them, in private. And we have NEVER had any employee indicate they suspect we engage in the practice of "...adding bad stuff to the file" Why? Because we have given them every reason to trust our behavior as stewards of the file, our open communications with them about performance and our commitment to privacy when dealing with their issues. Providing copies of file contents does not prevent an unscrupulous company from modifying documents in the file or adding ones to it; providing copies does not insure the employee has no confusion over the true meaning of a disciplinary write-up if the write up itself is confusing, and refusing to provide copies of documents in the file does not mean our employees view that as suspicious, underhanded or negative. The policy of "no copies" means we take very serioulsy the practice of control of company confidential documents, whether its about an employee or about business plans or market strategies, and our employees openly accept that policy . Nothing more, nothing less. Stop equating it to some conspricy to keep employees uninformed. We as a company create the culture of openess and integrity through our track record and our day-to-day dealing with our staff. Whether we provide copies of thier personnel file or not doesn't have a damn thing to do with how our employee view us.
>OK- this will be my last post on this subject as
>it is obvious we could go back and forth,
>point-counterpoint for days. Once again, you
>need to stop infering that the "no copies
>provided" policy means we don't allow and/or
>encourage regular inspection and review of file
>contents. All disciplinary write-ups,
>performance reviews, or any other documents that
>deal with the employees' standing with the
>company is always openly discussed with the
>employee, and the employee is always allowed to
>offer any comments, rebuttles or opposing
>viewpoints.
Easy there, killer. I never inferred anything of the sort! If you'll note, I explicitly mentioned in my post that these problems can occur even if you openly discuss disciplinary actions with employees and have them acknowledge the discussion. I'm just saying that, when it comes to a matter of proof in court, no matter how thoroughly you discussed an issue with an employee and no matter how clear you thought you were being, the employee can always claim "They never told me that," "They didn't explain it clearly," "I didn't know that when they said 'x' that they meant..." Meanwhile, if you can show that an employee received a copy of the document, on which it is clearly written what the employee did wrong, how he or she should improve, etc., it's going to be much more difficult for an employee to convince a jury that he really, honestly just didn't understand (or remember) what a big deal this performance problem (or whatever was), because the employer didn't make it clear to him or her (not that that should make a difference with respect to liability [for at-will employees], but it often does!). That's my point about how copies offer that extra protection.
As for some other points you made, providing copies *does* prevent an unscrupulous company from modifying documents, because it's gonna be really hard to get away with modifying a document of which an employee has a copy. As soon as you pull out that modified document, the employee's going to come back and show the copy he has and that it's different, at which point it's pretty much case closed. Providing copies may not ensure there is no confusion, but as mentioned above, if you can show the employee received a copy in writing, there's going to be a lot less basis for an argument that the confusion was justified or the fault of the employer. It's also easier to misremember things of which you have only a memory than of which you have a copy that can refresh your memory. Obviously if your policy is that, when someone asks for a copy of a document and you say, "You can't have a copy of it, but you can review the document anytime you like," then that helps alleviate that concern, and that's great.
I also *never* suggested that you (or any employer!) were a party to a conspiracy to keep employees uninformed nor that your employees thought you were nor that your employees were suspicious of your HR practices. I mean, really, I challenge you to find a single instance where I suggested that that was what was going on at your workplace. Rather, I offered my comments *generally* to give examples of some possible instances where not giving copies can hurt. It's not about whether an employer *is* trying to keep employees uninformed, it's about how it looks to an employee, or an investigative agency, or a jury. I mean, that's great that none of your employees have ever had the slightest problem with your 'confidential documents' policy, but not all employers are so lucky. And since lots of people besides you read this forum, I think it can be beneficial to bring up these sorts of issues that others may not have considered. While those issues may not be applicable to your workplace (and I never once suggested they were), they may be applicable to others.
So no need to get all defensive there. I thought you southerners were supposed to be more laid back. Or are you one of those northern transplants? ;-)
As to the issue of them sharing their personal information with others of the work force, it is a protected activity. The only problem I have with it is that this is a one-way street. Often the sharing is not the actual written documentation, but some EE friendly spin that is circulated. Truth and accuracy are frequently sacrificed on some sort of sympathy altar. The company, however, keeps their side confidential. That allows misinformation, gossip, innuendo, etc to grow unchecked and with the amount of Bulls@#t that is often heaped on this EE spin of facts and circumstance, this stuff can grow out of control pretty quickly.
Our company is not like that. My employees do not have that mindset. I think it is because everyone is so happy to be here. We are really good to our employees and they feel a part of the company, they feel respected and appreciated and they do not want to leave.
The few instances we have had to disclipline or terminate have been uneventful because the employee would be ashamed to let any of the other employees know they had been discliplined. If there is talk it usually dies down in a day or two.
Terminated employees are escorted to their desk to pick up personal items and than escorted off the property and they are not allowed to return. It is a policy.
I would still give them copies of any important papers in their file if they asked, make a copy of what I sent them, document their reason, put it in the file.
we do not have to disclipline often. I fired two people in 5 years over a couple of major issues. We work with the employee on minor issues and it is usually resolved quickly.
If your employees have the mindset you are describing I probably would be looking at my management policies and see what is being done wrong.
Shirley
I do believe that if employees are talking that much about things to cause an uproar than there must be problems somewhere.
Not in a bad way, but in a constructive way. Perhaps there are steps that need to be taken to remedy the situation.
Marc,
first I would probably survey the employees to get a feel for what their concerns are , than I would set about to correct them however I could do so.
The employees that are listening and engaging with the discliplined employee should just say that is between you and management and none of my business and go back to work. That is kind of how it is here, sorry, but I have work to do and I don't have time to discuss it with you...it dies down if no one talks to him/her about it.
You need to find out what is causing the talk and the concern amonst the employees and defuse it or it will get worse. Keeping copies from the employees will not stop the talk. They will talk if they are going to with or without a copy of a paper.
Shirley
-t
Sometimes things work for one company that do not work for another. All you or anyone else can do is their best. Keep on smiling and doing what you can.
Sometimes a walk around every so often when you know something is going to be buzzing around keeps the buzz down a bit.
Smiles.
Shirley
Shirley, perhaps you have a most unusual company where EEs do not talk to each other about things that bother them. Perhaps your employees do not exaggerate things to spin in their favor, perhaps your company is one of those rare ones where everyone lives on the shores of Walden Pond. I don't know any of that.
For you to leap to the conclusion you have is not warranted. I work for a great company, a non-profit that engages in some wonderful services to improve our community. Our wages are at best, in the middle of the market and our benefits are decent, except for a lack of retirement. When state, county and city agencies are hiring, they raid our staff. Often the staff will want to stay but cannot pass up the higher wages and better benefits. That leads to turnover. Turnover leads to other issues with handling additional workload while the recruiting, hiring and training are going on. Additional workload can add a significant amount of stress to those individuals that are doing the work, etc, etc, etc.
We have a good handle on this. We encourage EEs to do as you have suggested, but they do not all have the ability, personality, training, or other perspective to always tell someone to leave me alone and get back to work.
We have surveyed the EEs who are here and those who have left. The largest controllable factor has to do with wages being lower than other opportunities. Our umeployment rate in our county is 3.9% which also factors in. We simply do not have enough dollars to compete with local private and governmental employees.
We emphasize the difference we make in the community and have an empowered staff in that regard. Our management levels are very stable for lots of reasons that only have a little to do with wages. People love working here. I get so much return that is not in my paycheck that I won't even try to express that.
We do know about stress and extra work. I had to deal with a huge cut in staff over a complete reorganization. It was awful, I know about the stress, but I was fortunate and my remaining staff rallied around for the long haul. We had a wage freeze for a few years because of a famine in our growing area, we are just getting back on our feet now and I have brought some good people back. No one in our company is exempt from Stress.
Sorry I just haven't experienced what you have.
I can always improve on my methods and the companies there is room for improvement every day. All we can do is our best.
What we always do need to do and I will stand by this is be there for our employees. We are their support. They are our customers.
When we do that we gain the respect of the employees and when we have their respect they will pretty much do as we ask when we ask it in a nice manner and explain why we are asking.
I guess I am very fortunate that I get along so well with the employees. I have a flare up with the mgmt once in a while usually over wages or benefits for the employees, but not with the employees, they are all the greatest and I tell them that every day.
Didn't mean to get your dander up I think we are in two worlds...Good luck in yours.
Shirley
Sorry to sound so synical but, oh well, it's Texas.
Actually, Elizabeth, the discussion was about copying items, not viewing them.
And I'm sorry to have to correct your generalization about Texas employers, but at my place of employment here in Austin, employees are more than welcome to do both. It's quite possible to have an at-will employment policy and still treat employees with respect.
Thank you again for the honesty.
Elizabeth