The conclusion of the employee complaint investigation

Different problems discovered in the employee complaint investigation will require different remedies

Training and Counseling
When you’re concluding the employee complaint investigation, some remedies like training for whoever strayed off the path is often very appropriate. It doesn’t have to be in the discrimination-harassment-retaliation context. It can be accounting training. It can be safety training. It can be whatever the issue is to help whoever needs help – getting educated, get to the point they need to be.

Sending somebody to an individual counselor may be appropriate for any number of issues. Transferring people from one department to another, separating people between whom there’s great animosity may be essential.

Changes in work schedule could be the result of an employee complaint investigation. Another way to separate people without perhaps removing them from the same physical premises is to have them just work in different times of the day.

Progressive discipline
Disciplinary warnings. that follow an employee complaint investigation, sometimes fall short of including the key phrase ,which lawyers always like to see, “up to and including termination of employment”. It makes it a lot easier to terminate a repeat offender with that phrase.

The other technique that works very well is to title the memo to the offending employee a “Last chance agreement”. That way there’s no doubt in the mind of any arbitrator or court or jury at a later date about whether this person got fair notice. It was their last chance. That’s effective technique.

Terminations
Some employee complaint investigations may result in terminations. Don’t forget to follow your own practices and procedures and policies when you do the termination. So there can’t be for example inconsistent treatment. People terminated in one case but given a severance package where as in another pace, in case they’re not in there and there could be an allegation of discrimination on basis of age or race or gender as to that differential treatment. So be careful when you’re terminating to be consistent with how you’ve done it in other cases.