"Let me make sure that I understand what you are telling me.
"Mary, you are concerned that if we mention that an employee is being referred to counseling for depression, that we will have made ourselves unable to deny later that the person has a disability. As a result, you'd rather handle the matter as vaguely as possible and hope that the employee is able to get help but your primary interest is in providing us with a legal defense rather than in helping the employee.
"And Ed, you are concerned that if we simplify the employee complaint process, more employees will file complaints. You believe the more complicated process helps to prevent complaints.
"Now both of you wish to protect the organization, but do you see how your proposals may miss the bigger picture?"
4 comments:
Interesting scenario, Michael, and way too familiar ...
What I see missing is the humanity element. If an employee needs help and it can be provided through organizational resources, we should do so. To me, that's just being human beings together.
Unfortunately, those who are only concerned with the corporate image, HR regulations, liability, and the like, ultimately do much more damage to their organization than an employee who is struggling with a personal issue.
We need to stop being afraid of helping others, in my opinion.
John
John,
I believe you are correct. Too many workplaces fall into a game of emphasizing the law instead of setting a standard that meets legal requirements but also considers the needs of people. There are many thoroughly legal practices which are shabby ways of treating people.
Michael
They are just scared of providing the ammunition for litigation, or scared of non compliance police. If we concentrate solely on the process, we can forget we are human.
But society is the loser when we encourage people to use litigation as an investment strategy or seemly pseudo lottery.
Bob,
The lawyerization of our society has sometimes produced managers who fear doing the right thing instead of the ultra-safe thing.
Michael
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