Human Resources Articles

Cheat Sheet / Updated 04-11-2022

These days, strong leadership is more important than ever. Companies with great leaders significantly outperform their peers. At the same time, globalization, attrition, and changing demographics have led to a scarcity of executive talent. As a result, the competition for top leadership talent is fierce. If you want to ensure your company's survival by hiring great leaders, you'll need some effective way to find them, hire them, and ensure they stick around.

Cheat Sheet / Updated 04-05-2022

Performance management is a continuous process of identifying, measuring, and developing the performance of individuals and teams and aligning their performance with the strategic goals of an organization. A performance management system is a key tool to transform people’s talent and motivation into a strategic business advantage.

Cheat Sheet / Updated 03-25-2022

Let’s face it. Although the term diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) may be common knowledge, it’s not commonly understood. Moreover, as the workforce continues to be redefined by demographic shifts, this adds additional layers of complexities and responsibilities for leaders. You already have a lot on your plate, and with DEI becoming a greater focus for many companies, it can be daunting to be expected to know all that you should in demonstrating new behaviors and practices and making decisions. The following sections provide a quick reference to give you food for thought, best practices, and strategies on some key DEI considerations, as well as guidance on how to perform an aspect of DEI effectively.

Cheat Sheet / Updated 03-22-2022

When you're a business coach or mentor, you have a lot to manage, and you may be a one-man or one-woman show. How do you keep all aspects of your practice moving forward? Use the at-a-glance tips in this Cheat Sheet to help you navigate the world of business coaching and mentoring.

Cheat Sheet / Updated 03-15-2022

Training and development can be incredibly rewarding, but it is also filled with challenges. This Cheat Sheet aims to cut to the chase in several key areas that trainers deal with all the time. You'll find succinct tips on avoiding pitfalls, designing great visuals, and loads of quick ideas to improve your sessions.

Cheat Sheet / Updated 03-02-2022

To complete any project of lasting importance in people analytics, you have to master concepts and activities that live in many different domains. This cheat sheet provides some information about these domains, concepts, and activities.

Cheat Sheet / Updated 02-22-2022

Becoming a so-called expert in human resources (HR) can be a complex endeavor because, well, people are complex. But for someone starting out in an HR role, hiring qualified employees and managing them effectively can be boiled down to a few basics: evaluating résumés, interviewing candidates, and creating an employee-friendly work environment. In addition, you need to be aware of key federal laws affecting HR. Keep the following in mind, and you’ll be off to a good start. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons. Inc. Copyright © 2013 Robert Half International, Inc., as to Author-Created Materials

Cheat Sheet / Updated 02-22-2022

Conflict at work can be physically and emotionally exhausting, regardless of how directly you’re involved. Discover how to mediate a conflict in your workplace by following a set process and asking the right questions. And be prepared to use internal and external resources to help you resolve the conflict.

Cheat Sheet / Updated 02-01-2022

Workplace performance appraisals and reviews can often be challenging for managers and supervisors. These checklists and tips help guide you through preparing for performance evaluations, conducting employee reviews, avoiding common appraisal mistakes and pitfalls, and following up with employees after the appraisal is complete.

Article / Updated 10-26-2019

Six important principles often come into play in the case of litigation related to the implementation of a performance management system: employment at will, negligence, defamation, misrepresentation, adverse impact, and illegal discrimination. Employment at will In employment at will, the employer or employee can end the employment relationship at any time. This type of employment relationship gives employers considerable latitude in determining whether, when, and how to measure and reward performance. Thus, an employer could potentially end the employment relationship without documenting any performance problems. There are two exceptions regarding an organization’s ability to terminate an employee under these circumstances: There may be an implied contract derived from conversations with others in the organization or from information found in the company’s documentation (for example, employee handbook) indicating that employees would be terminated for just cause only. Decisions about terminating an employee should consider a potential violation of public policy. Negligence Many organizations outline a performance management system in their employee manual, employment contract, or other documents. When the system is described in such documents and not implemented as described, legal problems arise. For example, there may be a description of how frequently appraisals take place, or how frequently supervisors and employees are to meet formally to discuss performance issues. If an employee receives what she believes is an unfair performance evaluation and the system has not been implemented as was expected, she may be able to challenge the system based on negligence on the part of the organization. Defamation Defamation is the disclosure of untrue, unfavorable performance information that damages an employee’s reputation. An employee can argue that the organization defamed her if the employer states false and libelous information during the course of the performance evaluation, or negligently or intentionally communicates these statements to a third party, such as a potential future employer, thus subjecting the employee to harm or loss of reputation. The definition of defamation includes the disclosure of untrue information. Defamation can take place when an employee is evaluated based on behaviors that are irrelevant and not job-related, when an evaluator doesn’t include information that would explain or justify poor performance, or when an evaluator revises a prior evaluation in an attempt to justify subsequent adverse action taken against the employee. Defamation doesn’t exist when information regarding poor performance is clearly documented. Misrepresentation Whereas defamation is about disclosing untrue unfavorable information, misrepresentation is about disclosing untrue favorable performance, and this information causes risk or harm to others. When a past employer provides a glowing recommendation for a former employee who was actually terminated because of poor performance, that employer is guilty of misrepresentation. Adverse impact/unintentional discrimination Adverse impact, also called unintentional discrimination, occurs when the performance management system has an unintentional impact on a protected class, such as sex or race. Contrary to a common misconception that “class” refers to ethnic minorities or women only, adverse impact also happens when, for example, men receive consistently lower performance ratings than women. In other words, a protected class is a group of people with a common characteristic who are legally protected from discrimination on the basis of that characteristic. So if a group of white men consistently receives lower performance scores, then there is adverse impact because these individuals share the same characteristic (male) of a class that is protected (that is, sex). Illegal discrimination/disparate treatment Illegal discrimination, also called disparate treatment, means that raters assign scores differentially to various employees based on factors that are not performance related, such as race, nationality, color, or ethnic and national origin. As a consequence of such ratings, some employees receive more training, feedback, or rewards, than others. Illegal discrimination is usually referred to as disparate treatment because employees claim they were intentionally treated differently because of their sex, race, ethnicity, national origin, age, disability status, or other status protected under the law. The majority of legal cases involving performance management systems involve a claim of disparate treatment. What can an employee do if, for example, she feels she was given unfairly low performance scores and skipped over for promotion because she is a woman? To make such a claim, an employee can present direct evidence of discrimination, such as a supervisor making sexist comments that may have influenced the performance management process. Alternatively, she needs to provide evidence regarding the following issues: She is a member of a protected class. She suffered an adverse employment decision as a result of a performance evaluation (was skipped over for promotion). She should not have been skipped over for promotion because her performance level deserved the promotion. The promotion was not given to anyone, or it was given to an employee who is not a member of the same protected class (that is, another woman). If an employee provides this kind of evidence, the employer must articulate a legitimate and nondiscriminatory reason for not having given the promotion to this female employee. Usually, this involves a reason that is clearly performance related. This is the point at which employers benefit from having designed and implemented a system that is used consistently with all employees — the golden rule. Such a system is legally defensible, and any decisions that resulted from the system, such as promotion decisions, are also defensible. Let’s distinguish illegal discrimination from legal discrimination. A good performance management system is able to discriminate among employees based on their level of performance, and this is legal discrimination. In fact, a system that doesn’t do this is not very useful. But a good performance management system doesn’t discriminate illegally. Illegal discrimination is based on variables that should not usually be related to performance, such as sex, national origin, ethnicity, and sexual orientation.