Discussion: Legal Aspects Associated With Performance Management Programs

By Day 5

Respond to two or more of your colleagues’ postings in one or more of the following ways:

• Ask a probing question, substantiated with additional background information, evidence, or research.
• Share an insight from having read your colleagues’ postings, synthesizing the information to provide new perspectives.
• Offer and support an alternative perspective using readings from the classroom or from your own research in the Walden Library.
• Validate an idea with your own experience and additional research.
• Make a suggestion based on additional evidence drawn from readings or after synthesizing multiple postings.
• Expand on your colleagues’ postings by providing additional insights or contrasting perspectives based on readings and evidence.

Classmate 1: (Barbie)

“Legal Aspects Associated With Performance Management Programs

Performance management programs are an essential element organizations must strategize, design, and implement considering the organization’s mission and values in order to be successful in the global community. When an organization implements a performance management system, applying proper strategies must also encompass abiding by labor laws protecting the rights of all employees.

Legal Aspects

Laws may vary from state to state as well as country to country. Although the verbiage is not verbatim, globally organizations must abide by regulations set forth in the geographical location an employee performs work for the organization. When implementing a performance management system, it is crucial procedures are consistent for all employees. Furthermore, all employees are communicated within the organization’s handbook and orientation of the procedures expected. In this manner, through the performance management systems adhering to the procedures and policies set and is communicated to all employees, fair and equal treatment is adhered by and to all employees. In this manner, the performance management system indicates fairness and equality for all. Additionally, the procedures and policies must be in alignment of the regulations governed by local labor laws. There are six legal principles provided by Aguinis (2014) which affect organizations with a performance management system if not in alignment of the labor laws: employment at will; negligence; defamation; misrepresentation; adverse impact; and illegal discrimination. Employment at will permits either the employer and employee termination at any time. Employers may terminate without prior documentation as long as the public policy or procedure violated is clearly indicated within the employee handbook and is of a severe violation. However, in the case of an airline pilot who sought to continue working for another airline during a strike the pilot was employed, the pilot received a poor peer performance review shortly before his probationary period was to end. The company fired him based on the poor performance; however, received legal ramifications due to the organization not adhering to the policy set within the handbook stating employees to received fair and unbiased evaluations. (Aguinis, 2014) This example instills the necessity of a performance management system abiding by the procedures and policies communicated as fair and equal treatment to all employees. Negligence can occur if the organization does not fulfill expectations of the employer not adhering to the policies for the employee. Defamation (damaging to the employee of false statements and misrepresentation (withholding essential information regarding an employee) are also legal aspects an employer must avoid without repercussions. Furthermore, adverse impact (performance not aligned specifically to expectations of a position regarding employees of different abilities performing the same task) and illegal discrimination such as race, religion, ethnic or national origin. “

Classmate 2: (Machele)

“Performance Program Compliant Measures

For performance management to be compliant with the law, there are specific guidelines that need to be taken care of. One of the guidelines is to ensure that the chosen performance management program is within the state roles. If it does not comply with the set regulations, there is a need to avoid it. It is also necessary to create consistency in the application of the program. The chosen program should be applicable across the organization as cases of biases may result in legal issues. There is a need to consider diversity in the organization when choosing a performance program as well as the rules governing diversity. Another essential guideline in performance management is to select a program that offers equal opportunity for hiring, training, and development of all employees (Hellqvist, 2011). The chosen performance program should also cater to the performance of both high performing and underperforming employees with a proper appraisal.

How to Address Employee Performance Issues

Cases of violation in employee performance are common in most organizations. They might arise in areas where the management has no proper knowledge of performance management. In case there are employee issues relating to legal issues in an organization, there is a need for a manager to address the issue with a lot of sincerity and consideration. As a manager, the most efficient way of addressing such issues is to create an open discussion between the management and employees. Such discussion will help employees to air out their complaints relating to the performance program which the management will respond accordingly through dialogue. There is also the need to create open and reliable channels for settling performance issues which put employee consideration first as this builds trust in the program (Van Dooren, 2011). This ensures that issues that might arise are appropriately handled without getting out of hand or violating the set regulations.”