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If you are responsible for managing or giving advice on employee behavioural issues for a federally-regulated employer, you already know that in certain cases you are obligated to initiate a formal process to address harassment concerns, which sometimes involves conducting an investigation…
A recent Alberta arbitration decision puts renewed focus on a familiar argument in workplace harassment cases: that conduct must be understood in light of the surrounding workplace culture.
Those who manage internal investigations generally want workplace investigations to feel fair. That usually means making sure people feel heard, allowing input, and trying to keep the process collaborative. However, there can also be an urge to treat investigation reports as collaborative documents that can be substantively refined before they are treated as truly final.
In a recent blog, my colleague Dana J. Campbell-Stevens highlighted that workplace investigations involving allegations of systemic discrimination can be particularly complex. She noted challenges such as understanding what the complainant is truly alleging and determining whether the concern lies in a discrete action or in how an entire process operates.
Dans un récent billet, ma collègue Dana J. Campbell-Stevens soulignait la complexité particulière des enquêtes portant sur des allégations de discrimination systémique. Elle relevait les défis liés à l’identification de ce que la personne plaignante allègue réellement, ainsi que la difficulté de déterminer si la situation dénoncée découle d’un geste ponctuel ou du fonctionnement global d’un processus organisationnel.
A question that has come up in my work as an investigator, which prompted me to research the issue (and now blog about it), is: whether it is racist to not want to talk about race? And, what if someone takes it a step further, and judges or penalizes an employee for wanting to talk about race?
I attended the “HR Leaders Summit Canada” conference last week, and participated in a panel where we discussed how human resources can lead organizations for “clarity, capacity, and care.” My co-panelists (Mark Edgar, Rawan El-Komos, and Momina Javaid, moderated by Donna Gray) had much insight and excellent ideas for HR professionals.
In a previous blog, I wrote about the unique challenges of conducting “C-suite investigations” — in other words, investigations into a member or members of an organization’s senior leadership. It is not unusual that these types of investigations are prompted by a complaint made directly (and sometimes anonymously) to an organization’s Board of Directors.
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