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Serious insight for serious situations.

Serious insight for serious situations.

Make it your policy to review your policy: Identifying policy issues that affect workplace investigation reports

In most of our workplace investigations, the organization that retains us asks us to measure our findings of fact against one or more of their policies. This means that, once we have made findings of fact, we must decide whether the respondent’s conduct has breached a policy or policies that the organization has asked us to apply.

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Lexicon for bilingual investigations

Recently, while drafting an investigation report in French, I surprisingly struggled to find an appropriate way to translate “counter-complaint.” In the context of civil litigation, in French, a counterclaim is “une demande reconventionnelle,” but a quick internet search also suggests terms such as “contre-plainte” or “contre-recours.”

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Investigating counter-complaints: A roadmap

So, you found yourself dealing with what appears to be a counter-complaint in the investigation you are conducting. Before embarking on this bend in the road, the first step, and likely the most obvious, is to confirm what you are dealing with and whether it affects your mandate.

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Feuille de route sur comment enquêter les plaintes reconventionnelles

Ainsi, vous retrouvez face à ce qui semble être une plainte reconventionnelle (« a counter-complaint » en anglais) dans l’enquête que vous conduisez. Avant d’aborder ce nouveau virage, la première étape, et probablement la plus évidente, est de confirmer ce à quoi vous avez faire et si cela affecte votre mandat.

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One-party workplace investigations: What to do when a party won’t participate

An investigation usually involves a complainant and a respondent. The basic premise is that as workplace investigators, we hear what each party has to say, collect other relevant evidence, and then weigh the evidence to decide whether, on a balance of probabilities, the allegations are substantiated.

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