We’ve talked about the advisability of doing social media background checks before. Briefly, the negative of doing such checks is that you’re guaranteed to find out things you didn’t want to know about race, religion, etc. Once you have that information, it’s easy to suggest that it played a part in your decision-making.
On the other hand, some experts think doing the checks is now part of due diligence, because you might find out things that you need to know, such as whether the person has a tendency toward violence.
The best advice seems to be that if you do want to do the checks, have them done by a third party or, at least, someone not in the hiring chain. That person or entity can then report to the hiring manager only job-related findings, scrubbing the report of unnecessary and inappropriate data.
But the bigger question that the 15 percent/100 percent figure brings up is, what does it mean that managers’ actions are so far from where your orgaization’s policies are?
And what else are your managers doing that you wish they weren’t?
Here are a few things that we think are going on; what others might you add?
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Daily Duties
- Making compensation decisions without checking with Compensation/HR Manger
- Denying requested leave, like FMLA, that the organization is obligated to provide
- Ignoring complaints about wage/hour or safety
Documentation
- Failing to document at all
- Documenting with inappropriate phrases (“older woman in the wheelchair” written in margin of a resume)
- Maintaining a separate set of documents
Discipline
- Failing to follow procedures outlined in policy/handbook
- Disciplining in public
- Disciplining inconsistently, perhaps favoring friends or certain types of employee
Discharge
- Terminating without checking with HR
- Terminating without reference to similar situations
- Terminating without considering recent protected actions
- Terminating in a way or at a time that gives the impression of retaliation
What Can You Do?
What can HR do to make sure that policies are followed? It’s the same old story: Policy, Training, Enforcement.
- Policy. You have to start with a clear policy that tells managers how to handle routine employment situations.
- Training. Then you have to publicize the policy and conduct regular training to reminds managers of their obligations (and of the expensive consequences, not just to the company, but to their careers)
- Enforcement. Upper management has to be ready to step in when executives don’t pay attention to policies.
What About Your Managers?
Do your managers all toe the line? Or are there some infractions you’d like to share? Get them off your mind. E-mail me at sbruce@blr.com.