Academic institutions are not immune from labour problems
It is not only corporate employers who mess up their disciplinary, labour relations and performance management procedures. We have been asked to assist in more and more cases where academic institutions have breached labour law provisions because they have ignored their own policies.
It is understandable that academic institutions do not always have the budget to hire labour law experts. However, they should do so before they run the risk of making an error that lands them up at the CCMA.
4 Types of errors academic institutions commonly make
- Poor investigation of alleged offences;
- Unfair discipline because of insufficient proof and serious breaches of disciplinary procedure;
- Unfair promotion and demotion practices; and
- Grossly insensitive handling of staff-related problems.
3 Cases where academic institutions landed in “labour-related” hot water
In the first case*, academic institution A investigated a senior administrator, N, for five alleged breaches of institutional procedure, which were outlined in the institution’s guidelines.
As the allegations were serious, the investigation was carried out by another senior member of management, W, who alleged that, because of the five violations, N had incurred substantial costs for institution A.
However, at his disciplinary hearing N was able to bring proof of the fact that he was not guilty of any of the five violations. After all evidence was presented, N was found not guilty.
The facts N brought to clear his name had always been freely available to W, the investigator.
Before the hearing, N had in fact submitted a detailed written explanation of the case’s true facts. Despite having access to these facts before the disciplinary hearing, W did not look at or consider them.
Therefore, W not only ended up with a red face at the hearing but also incurred a great deal of unnecessary cost for the academic institution. The investigator was therefore guilty of the very offence she had mistakenly brought against N!
The second case* is one where employee G was promoted, after a series of panel interviews, at a well-known academic institution - B.
Two weeks after G was given his signed promotion contract, and two weeks after he took up his new post, he received a letter cancelling his promotion. He was ordered to return to his old post and to attend a new panel interview.
G received this written instruction because one of the unsuccessful candidates for the post lodged an objection against his promotion, saying that the selection process was flawed.
Without properly investigating the matter to establish if these allegations were valid, the head of the institution demoted G without even consulting with him on the matter.
Because of this insensitively implemented, unnecessary and unfair demotion, the institution had to pay G a settlement amount exceeding one year’s remuneration.
In the third case*, academic institution C promoted an employee, D, five times in five years. At the end of the five years (when things began going wrong) she occupied the position of acting head of one of the institution’s campuses.
After more than a year of outstanding service at this level, D was led to believe that her acting position would be made permanent. Instead, without giving any logical reason, institution C demoted D all the way down to the position she had filled five years earlier.
There was no retrenchment procedure in progress and no disciplinary hearing. There was only a “strategic decision” made at the top level to redeploy C. As she was never brought to a hearing to face charges, institution C had no right to implement the demotion.
Academic institutions need to set an example!
Academic institutions are in the public eye because of the crucially important role they play and most are funded from our taxes. They therefore need to avoid unnecessary costs and ensure that their reputations are not damaged by actions of senior officials who are uneducated in the science of labour law management.
* This example that has not reached the arbitration stage thus I have not mentioned the names of the parties.
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Ivan Israelstam is the Chief Executive Officer of Labour Law Management Consulting. He is known as a leading practitioner in labour law and pragmatic labour relations management with many years experience in corporate human resources management. He has an honours degree from The University of the Witwatersrand and an IPM diploma in Personnel Management and in Training. Contact Ivan: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. . |
