How to Handle Employee Complaints: Being Transparent
Depending on the type of complaint that comes in you're going to want to keep relevant portions of your staff appraised of it while simultaneously safeguarding the privacy of the individuals involved. It's important to be transparent in these situations because "employees are probably going to know this on the office gossip vine anyway," says Kelly. "They want to see that management is aware of it too and that management does take action and demonstrates a commitment to a higher ethical standard."
Some companies include write-ups of complaints and how they were resolved – with personal details expunged, of course – in their monthly newsletters. This has the added benefit of encouraging reports of future problems by demonstrating your proactiveness. At a smaller company it may be easier for the CEO to just call a general meeting, but you would want to consult a lawyer to make sure you don't violate the privacy of the employees involved in the complaint.
This transparency regarding ongoing complaints should be coupled with a strong program educating employees on the procedure for raising a complaint, the certainty that they won't be penalized for coming forward, and the assurance that the company will investigate and take action when appropriate. When it comes to transparency, not only will this benefit your employees but Kelly says, "regulators are looking for the same thing if you need any other incentive."
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How to Handle Employee Complaints: How to Prevent PR Damage
Sometimes a disgruntled employee will go to the press with a problem that they're having but Guerin notes that employees usually do that because they feel they weren't taken seriously. Letting them know you will handle their concerns quickly and fairly can forestall a media disaster. Kelly adds that, in his experience, "most employees don't want to do a hatchet job on their employers," rather they want to see their problems solved to everyone's benefit.
Jason Calacanis got angry when an employee left his company, Mahalo, for a position elsewhere. Calacanis proceeded to vent his anger at the employee via e-mail and terminate his company e-mail account. As a result, the whole exchange ended up on popular blog TechCrunch. The lesson: try not to lose your temper, and if you do, don't leave a paper trail.
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How to Handle Employee Complaints: Be Prepared
As in any business scenario, thinking and planning ahead regarding employee complaints will do wonders to mitigate your risk. Ramos' company works with businesses that have anywhere from five to hundreds of thousands of employees. For an extensive investigation, DRM's fees can be anywhere from $3,000 to $25,000 per week, but "the cost of a lawsuit is much higher especially if you're talking about punitive damages," Ramos says. "As a result of conducting a thorough investigation, we have saved [some of our clients] hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees."
Two particular areas where you can plan ahead are background checks and other HR policies. "A lot of times an employer does not do a pre-employment background check to simply weed out people that can cause the company harm," Ramos says.
You can get even better protection by having a clear policy and reporting procedure regarding potential issues, particularly harassment. The Supreme Court has said that if you do that, it drastically decreases your liability, unless a manager or someone with the authority to speak for the company perpetrated the harassment.
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How to Handle Employee Complaints: When to Bring On a Mediator
Sometimes, after an incident, you need to bring on a mediator in addition to providing employees with training. Training educates employees about company policy and the legality of certain behaviors, particularly in the case of harassment, but mediation serves a slightly different function. "The purpose of a mediator or someone else who does conflict resolution is to preserve a relationship," Guerin says. This is useful if the guilty party in a complaint has been disciplined but not fired. In that case, the two people will have to overcome any past bad blood to continue to work together. The mediator does not have the power to enforce a solution on anyone but they help the parties establish common ground rules for future interactions.
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How to Handle Employee Complaints: Don't Cut Corners
Some employers don't want to take the time or money to conduct a proper investigation so they just fire the accused employee to make the problem go away. This exposes you to some serious risks as Ramos explains that if an employee has a history of bad behavior, a company might just jump the gun and fire him or her without probing the situation further.
To prevent discrimination lawsuits, employers will sometimes fire that person with a group of others so that they can claim it was for economic reasons. Another risk however, is that you may treat the symptom but not the cause; there may be other involved employees who go undiscovered as a result.
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How to Handle Employee Complaints: Resources
Compliance Week is a Boston, Massachusetts-based monthly magazine covering corporate governance, risk and compliance.
Diversified Risk Management is a Downey, California-based firm that handles corporate security and investigations.
Contacting organizations such as the American Bar Association and the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants can help you locate professionals who specialize in employment law and investigating employee complaints and misdeeds.
