Once Again, Basic Management Principles Would Have Helped Avoid A Lawsuit

Occasionally,  I run across a case that is such a model of management missteps that it practically begs to be included in the blog. Here is there another example. 

A female employee had worked her way up through the ranks at Aramark to a senior management position. Her problems started when a new manager came in, one whose actions went apparently unmonitored.

You can read a more complete version of the facts here, but let me summarize a couple of timeless lessons that apply to virtually every employee management situation.

1. Long-term employees, and in particular long-term employees who have worked their way up through the ranks into management positions in the company, are entitled to a basic level of respect in how management deals with them. That respect normally takes the form of some kind of extended due process, especially in termination situations. A company terminating a long-time employee should be particularly diligent in reviewing the circumstances surrounding the termination, and management's actions in dealing with the employee.

2. While employers may generally expect the workforce to adapt to the requirements of new leadership, a radical change in subordinate performance evaluations may well indicate a problem with the leadership rather than the subordinate employees. Company leadership should be sensitive to a new manager finding significant faults with established performers. See, #1, above.

3. Complaints from management-level employees should never be ignored, but instead investigated carefully. That doesn't mean that the employer accepts as true every allegation from a manager, but the company must establish a rational basis for not taking corrective action in response to those allegations.

4. No termination decision should take place in a vacuum. The employer must be aware of all the circumstances within its span of knowledge surrounding an employee who is about to be fired. In this case, someone should have noted that the employee filed an HR complaint days before the termination was effected.

This is relatively common sense stuff, or put another way, Smart and Legal Employee Management 101.  Not following these basic principles gets expensive very quickly.