Performance Management System Legal Concerns
Legal Concerns of a Performance Management System
The legal aspects associated with performance management systems and the process of performance appraisals can differ from one state to another. Therefore, it is critical that those in supervisory positions make themselves aware of applicable laws in the state or country in which they are operating.
Take time to review the weekly resources and reflect on your own experiences with individual performance management. Then, apply what you have learned and explore this week’s Discussion questions with your colleagues.
Post by Day 3 a cohesive and scholarly response, based on and supported by your required readings, media, and research this week, which addresses the following:
Analyze at least 3 legal compliance issues that you as an HR professional need to undertake to ensure the performance management system is consistently compliant with all relevant laws of the state in which the organization does business.
Analyze 2 ethical situations that could arise when addressing employee issues.
Explain how an HR professional can appropriately address at least 1 specific employee issue without violating its governing law.
Outline the types of consequences an organization could face if it is found in violation of the governing law referenced above.
Performance Management System Legal Concerns Example
Analyze at least 3 legal compliance issues that you, as an HR professional need to undertake to ensure the performance management system is consistently compliant with all relevant laws of the state in which the organization does business.
Discrimination
The federal, state and local laws prohibit HR professionals from developing a performance management system that will advance employment-based discrimination (U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, 2019). As such, as an HR professional, I will ensure that the company’s performance management practices and policies are non-discriminatory in terms of compensation, job requirements, time frame, and any other aspect.
Equal Employment Opportunity
The U.S. Equal Employment Commission has established a law prohibiting employers from practicing the unfair treatment of employees. This federal law extends to HR professionals since they are the ones dealing with employee issues (U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, 2019). Therefore, while developing and implementing a performance management system, I will ensure I do not engage in unfair treatment in terms of disability, nationality, ethnicity, age, sexual orientation, genetic information, gender identity, sex, religion, color, and race.
Involving employees in developing and implementing the system.
Employees are important stakeholders in the development and implementation of a performance management system, and as such, they should be involved in the process. The law requires that when employees are involved in the performance management system development process, it should be done in accordance with [60 FR 43943, Aug. 23, 1995; 60 FR 47646, Sept. 13, 1995] (Code of Federal Regulations, 2020). Under these regulations, the HR professional should communicate the performance plans to employees at the start of the evaluation period. HR is also allowed to recognize and reward deserving employees. HR should help employees improve their unacceptable performance. The HR profession is permitted by the law to reassign, lower grade, and remove employees who, even after given an opportunity, have continued to demonstrate unacceptable performance.
Analyze two ethical situations that could arise when addressing employee issues.
An employee taking credit of colleagues’ work
While using the performance management system to evaluate the performance of the team, the team leader might end up getting the credit instead of the entire team. Alternatively, some team members might receive underserving rewards or recognition at the expense of the outperforming team members. This is an ethical issue since the team members can, in a negative way, single out the underperforming team members, leading to resentment.
Unrealistic and Conflicting Performance Objectives
In the bid to address employee performance issues, the HR practitioner might develop conflicting and unrealistic goals. This might influence managers and supervisors to bully and put underserving pressure on employees, forcing employees to undertake conflicting actions such as violating legal or ethical guidelines to attain the set objectives. Leaders are expected to demonstrate ethical leadership to influence positive behavior from employees (Neves & Story, 2015). Therefore, the setting of performance objectives should be governed by ethical guidelines.
Explain how an HR professional can appropriately address at least 1 specific employee issue without violating its governing law.
Lawton & Pa´ez (2015) advised that leaders should adopt ethical behavior when making decisions. The unrealistic and conflicting performance objectives can be addressed by recognizing the cause of underperformance or problem as advanced by (Buckingham & Goodall, 2015). This will be followed by evaluating the objectives, including the number of responsibilities and commitment from employees. By doing so, the HR professional will create performance objectives that will not put employees on undue pressure and bullying environment. Several court precedents and states in the United States have established workplace bullying laws, as discussed by (Richardson, Hall, & Joiner, 2016).
Outline the types of consequences an organization could face if it is found in violation of the governing law referenced above.
If the organization sets unrealistic goals that will lead to a violation of workplace bullying law, then it faces several consequences:
- Legal ramifications, including paying damages to affected employees (Richardson, Hall, & Joiner, 2016).
- The company might be forced to pay rehabilitation costs for affected employees.
References
Buckingham, M., & Goodall, A. (2015). Reinventing Performance Management. Harvard Business Review, 1-10.
Code of Federal Regulations. (2020, January 1). PART 430—PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT. Retrieved from https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CFR-2020-title5-vol1/xml/CFR-2020-title5-vol1-part430.xml
Lawton, A., & Pa´ez, I. (2015). Developing a Framework for Ethical Leadership. J Bus Ethics, 639-648. doi:10.1007/s10551-014-2244-2
Neves, P., & Story, J. (2015). Ethical Leadership and Reputation: Combined Indirect Effects. J Bus Ethics, 165-176. doi:10.1007/s10551-013-1997-3
Richardson, R. E., Hall, R., & Joiner, S. (2016). Workplace bullying in the United States: An analysis of state court cases. Cogent Business & Management, 3(1), 1-11. Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.1080/23311975.2016.1256594
U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. (2019). Employers. Retrieved from https://www.eeoc.gov/employers