Suspension for Exempt Manager

njjel

Have any of your ever suspended a manager for failing to properly perform his/her duties? We have a situation here where upper management wishes to suspend a manager for a week without pay for failing to catch files that were improperly handled, failing to properly manage his staff and failure to turn in reports on time. The problem is that upper management has not ever given him a formal warning verbal or written. I say we should follow progressive discipline procedures and give him a verbal and then a written, etc. Also as I understand it, we no longer have to give an exempt ee a suspension of one week, we can give them one day, two days, etc. for a serious infraction. Your advice on this please.

Crout

[font size="1" color="#FF0000"]LAST EDITED ON 11-09-05 AT 12:50PM (CST)[/font][br][br]You can jump the "chain" of progressive discipline IF....if......the offense is serious enough. You wouldn't give a verbal warning to someone who stole a company vehicle and sold it for crack money in Atlantic City, right? (That's a true story, by the way) On the other hand, it sounds to me like your upper management is having the classic knee-jerk reaction. Everything you mentioned falls into the "performance" category, and typically jumping the progressive chain is reserved for issues of blatant misconduct. The danger of having no paper trail is that your employee can make any number of claims to any Federal or State agency as to why he is being suspended....ADA, EEOC violation, ADEA, whatever. He can make anything up and you have very little to defend yourself with. And keep in mind that a suspension represents real loss. It's not just a warning. It is an adverse employment action. You work for a non-profit, correct? So do I and the problem with our business is that it's always lose-lose whenever an employee files any kind of claim. Why? Because we do not employ in-house attorneys, so even though the former employee may be dead wrong it will always be cheaper to pay off the EE rather than rack up the legal fees.

Crout

[font size="1" color="#FF0000"]LAST EDITED ON 11-09-05 AT 12:50PM (CST)[/font][br][br][font size="1" color="#FF0000"]LAST EDITED ON 11-09-05 AT 12:49 PM (CST)[/font]

Ooops! Went to edit and hit reply with quote instead. My bad.

pork1

NJJEL: I concur with the above. Your senior leaders need to listen to you on this one. Performance issues need to be resolved and a suspension without pay will either get the EXEMPTS attention or it want, which in case he/she will either get on the ball and correct these issues or he will see the hand writing on the wall and resign. Suspending for a week without pay is not necessary, in fact a letter of instruction to the effect of "get it fixed or else" should bring out the appropriate action. Regardless of what some people think we EXEMPT employees are members of the same team and deserve the curtesy of at least following the company procedures. Otherwise, the company is opening itself up to other legal tracks for the x-employee whether voluntary or forced. The result is a hostile work place and termination without cause. " I did not know, and I'm 65 years old, with a dying spouse, and kids that are in trouble with drugs, if I knew these things were a problem I would have concentrated on these things and made things right. I have been a strong leader for 40 years and have never had anything like this happen to me". I can see this going all the way and attorney's pushing the time clock with every breath.

Hope you can get your seniors to listen to you, they only have non-profit funds to loose if they are wrong.

PORK