Most HR managers can’t go undercover like the “Undercover Bosses” on television (people are likely to recognize the person that hired them), but that doesn’t mean you can’t do a little thinking about what you’ll find.
Here’s what we think you’d discover in a week undercover:
Unaware Managers
You’ll probably find a lot of supervisors and managers who act with the best of intentions, but who just aren’t aware of the many legal pitfalls. For example:
‘Young, Energetic’
They’ll put out ads that call for “young, energetic workers.” There’s a discrimination suit in the making for sure. Turn down just one older worker no matter how good your reason‑and you’ll be facing a charge that will be hard to refute.
‘Childcare Plans?’
Then you’ll find them asking interview questions about family plans, pregnancy, or childcare requirements. To the uninitiated, questions in these areas may seem logical, but now there’s another discrimination suit in the wings.
In these cases, the jury is always going to wonder, if you weren’t planning to act on this information, why did you ask for it?
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‘Are you depressed?’
Asking about whether someone’s depressed may seem like a caring question, but it’s opening the door to a disability discrimination charge. That person may now be “perceived as disabled.”
Train people to avoid medical questions, and refer issues to HR. If managers want to address situations such as this, they should do so from the standpoint of the work. Is the person coming in late? Failing to get work done on time?
Denying Leave
Untrained supervisors are likely to deny a leave request—”You want leave now? Are you kidding? This is our busy time.” That’s a natural reaction, but a dangerous one. FMLA leave, for example, is absolute—if the employee qualifies, he or she gets the leave. It’s not a judgment call.
Surely they’ll get the message’
People don’t like to discipline, so they put it off as long as they can. That almost always backfires. It suggests that the manager condones the behavior.
‘I’ll give a “good” rating because I can’t deal with the hassle of giving a “poor” rating.’
Giving high marks on performance appraisals to people whose performance doesn’t merit it is always begging for trouble. Again, this usually happens because people don’t want to deliver bad news. And again, it’s going to backfire.
When this later turns into a severe discipline problem, you’re going to fire the person for performance reasons. The person is going to claim, “You fired me because I am a member of a protected group.” And that “good” performance appraisal is going to be Exhibit Number 1 in court—proof that you lied about why you fired the person.
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I was just kidding around’
Kidding around can be very dangerous, especially when it involves sexual kidding and innuendo, or racial, ethnic, or religious teasing. What makes it especially difficult for many supervisors and managers to understand is that even if the person who is the butt of the jokes or teasing seems to enjoy it and participate, it’s still dangerous.
People in that situation are likely to claim that they went along with the behavior because they feared they would lose their jobs.
In tomorrow’s Advisor, some more things an Undercover HR Manager will likely find, plus an introduction to the extraordinary one-stop HR website, HR.BLR.com.