Human Resources Principles and Practice When Handling a Redundancy Situation with Employees - Essay Example

Redundancy Teacher’s ID Introduction Redundancy can be one of the most critical situations for employers as well as employees and require a well-designed approach that would cover all legal, moral and ethical areas concerning redundancy. In order to handle such situations effectively, it is essential that employers have a sound policy model handling redundancy considering present legal and social requirements and also having flexibility for catering future requirements. Therefore, HR managers should recognize instances that may lead to redundancy along with designing a thorough procedure of redundancy management. Furthermore, HR managers need to recognise approaches that may have positive and negative impacts on organisation’s overall image and also on its existing workforce along with workforce it is aiming to recruit in future. Other than having procedure meant for handling redundancy, HR managers need to design strategies that would assist workforce being made redundant to overcome economic and social problems that emerge from being jobless while assisting them in getting prepared for job search and new employment. a) HR Principles and Good Practice When Handling a Redundancy Situation with Employees Redundancy may commonly appear in situations when the business has ceased completely or partially at employee’s site or work conditions require reduction in work force or cessation of specific tasks. However, irrespective of the cause, employers need to consider their statutory and legal obligations and employee’s rights in order to avoid any liabilities. One of the good practices includes having a formal procedure or an agreement in place between employers, employees and trade unions when redundancies are not expected. Doing so would allow both parties to consider repercussions of the agreement in the long run instead of dealing with the imminent issues (Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service, 2008, p. 13). Another best practice while dealing with redundancy is to involve employees through informing and consulting them. This practice has a special significance in a collective redundancy process. Since redundancy is inevitable in any form of business irrespective of cause and nature (individual or collective), it is important for employers to have a concerned policy in place that would allow employees to be aware of respective redundancy practice and procedure being used by the employers (Hosken, 2014). Such policies should be readily accessible to the employees in employees’ handbook or policy manuals and should cover areas concerning consultation arrangements, avoidance of redundancy, selection criteria for redundancy, severance terms and appeal procedures available to the employees (Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service, 2008). Doing so ensures fair treatment for employees and also defines circumstances in which redundancy can be avoided or is inevitable. Secondly, redundancy management should not be solely considered as a task of HR department and should also involve senior management in the due process. Thirdly, the effectiveness of the whole process depends on the personnel’s skills that are involved in redundancy management process. Therefore, managers and representatives handling these cases should be well trained before time. Fourthly, employers should consider critical areas like employee’s benefits, time off and adequacy of arrangements to facilitate employees facing redundancy and such arrangements should be made a part of policy or trade union agreement (Armstrong, 2003). It is also important to note that employers should consider necessary statutory requirements such as consulting with employees’ representatives before the implementation process commences. However, the reason for dismissal of more than 20 employees should be unanimous for such collective informing and consulting whereas individual cases should be handled in a different manner. In collective cases, employees usually use a formal policy or agreement with trade unions as a guideline to proceed whereas adhoc approach appears to be more suitable for individual cases (Labour Relations Agency, 2007). During these collective and individual informing and consulting phase, HR personnel shall conduct interviews and discussions with employees being laid off and record their concerns regarding given situation (Hosken, 2014). A critical analysis should also be performed simultaneously to examine if current employer’s practices are catering financial and emotional needs of such employees (Guest and Pecce, 2007). In some organisations, multiple meetings are conducted to ensure that grievances of employees are mitigated to a reasonable extent. These good practices indicate that redundancy procedures used by employers may take a positive or negative outlook in front of employees. Instances where employers chose to inform employees about their termination without giving them reasonable time and financial assistance to handle redundancy often face legal consequences. In addition to that, employers lacking a uniform approach to handle employees being made redundant may face lack of motivation and uncertainty in current employees along with failure to fulfil statutory requirements (Campbell, Worall and Cooper, 2000). Such negative approach may cause employers to lose their competitive edge that comes from having a skilled labour. Another negative aspect of unplanned redundancy may come from losing a part of workforce that may not have any commercial value addition presently but may fulfil organisation’s need in future. Therefore, it is important that instead of following a Last In-First out policy, employee’s current and future economic value for employer is considered. As far as the positive approaches are concerned, it is important that HR managers, line managers and senior management adopt humanistic approach in dealing with such employees along with fulfilling legal requirements. b) Good HR Practices In Preparing Staff For Redundancy And Their Commercial Advantages Another best practice while preparing staff for redundancy is to ensure that all the procedures and policies concerning redundancy have enough flexibility to cater economic and industrial changes in order to ensure fair operations in the due process (Armstrong, 2003; Labour Relations Agency, 2007).Other than statutory requirements for formal information given to employees and their representatives, the good practices requires employers to consider options of transfer or downgrading for the employees collectively or individually. Such discussion should cover change in pay and nature of expenses covered by employers in case of relocation or travelling. Another important area is to ensure that employees have a right to use company’s benefits during the notice period when their redundancy is confirmed. Also, it is suitable for employers to offer a trial period to employees that would assist them in finding new employment. Other than statutory requirements, employers can chose to extend the given period as a gesture of good will. Another important industrial relations practice and statutory requirement is to ensure that employers have a policy concerning protective award when facing redundancy. In cases where protective awards are not known, legal tribunals make a decision. Such grace period allows employees to have a normal week’s pay which would reduce their financial grievances however the length of such period depends on employers’ default and also its size (Labour Relations Agency, 2007, p. 15). Another good practice that also covers major statutory requirement is the treatment of employees’ representatives. Since such employees are more susceptible to undue pressure or coercive treatment from employers, the law protects their rights of employment protection and availability of necessary facilities during the process of consultation. It is also important to note that treating such employees fairly not only assist employees in maintaining effectiveness of the due process but also in managing employers’ good will and industrial relations. Good practices and HR principles also require employers to ensure that employees are treated not only during their employment but also when they are expected to face redundancy. For this purpose, the selection criteria should be agreed upon, known and uniformly applicable on selected segment of employees. Hence, no criterion concerning religion, political opinion, sex, marital status, race, disability, sexuality, age, health, activity involving trade union, being employees’ representative or taking part in elections for it, maternity reasons, refusal to work on public holidays etc., shall not be exercised (Labour Relations Agency, 2007, p. 17).Good practices further require employers to ensure that employees that consider their redundancy as unjustified are given are due chance of appeal and being heard. Other gestures of good will can be to facilitate redundant employees in preparing for job search process, communication with their family and considering a wider variety of jobs and professions (Armstrong, 2003; Labour Relations Agency, 2007, p. 25). Where above mention practices shall assist in preparing employees for redundancy and assisting them in handling these difficult situations financially and emotionally, good HR practices also bear benefits for employers as well. It is important to note that previous employees perform substantial branding and marketing of their employers through word of mouth and even via online presence. Testimonials of previous employees also play a vital role in attracting fresh and potential talent from the market (Campbell, Worall and Cooper, 2000). Therefore, treatment of current employees has a substantial effect on future recruitment. Employers are required to ensure that employees who have been made redundant are leaving on amicable terms by giving them substantial reasons for organisations’ decisions and steps taken by them along with facilitating them to get through financial difficulties and emotional trauma. Employers while making an attempt of getting access to potential talent present in market, aim for acquiring a status of preferred employer. Today, when the labour is well aware of their rights and organisations are striving to get the best employee base in order to have competitive advantage, employees not only look for complete compensation and benefits model covering their current needs but also want sufficient assurance for safety of their future (Guest and Pecce, 2007). Employers offering substantial benefits before and after employment are the ones that are preferred by today’s workforce. In such cases, organisation’s existing policies concerning redundancy avoidance and handling play a major role along with their previous history of employee management. Other than that, current redundancy policies also bear substantial commercial benefits for the employers. Employees that feel unsatisfied and unheard during redundancy management often raise their voices at public forums in the form of protests and legal suits that bear substantial costs as they may not only cause defamation to the employer but also put business operations to halt. Managing industrial relations effectively allow employers to have commercial advantage over other market players. Conclusion Redundancy is one the most common situations that employers come across. Such situations require HR managers and employers to ensure that their policies answer collective and individual cases of redundancy. Another important aspect of having suitable redundancy policy is to fulfil legal requirements along with areas covered under corporate social responsibility. Redundancy policies and procedures also give employers an opportunity to build a reputation of preferred employer that would not only help in retaining current workforce but in getting access to future potential talent. Having predesigned policies also allow employers to include industry’s best practices and legal requirements in their redundancy management procedures which also facilitates in crisis management when such situations arise. References Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service- ACAS., 2008. Redundancy Handling. [online] Available at: http://www.acas.org.uk/media/pdf/4/7/B08_1.pdf[Accessed 10 May 2014]. Armstrong, M., 2003. A Handbook of Human Resource Management Practice. Kogan Page Publishers. Campbell, F., Worrall, L., and Cooper, C., 2000. The Psychological Effects of Downsizing and Privatization. [online] Available at: https://www.wlv.ac.uk/PDF/uwbs_WP001-00%20Campbell%20Worrall%20Cooper.pdf Guest, D., and Pecce, R., 2007. Employee Involvement. Human Resource Management Journal, 2(3), 34-59. Hosken, J., 2014. Informing and Consulting during a Collective Redundancy Process. [online] Available at: http://www.xperthr.co.uk/good-practice-manual/informing-and-consulting-during-a-collective-redundancy-process/99432/ [Accessed 10 May 2014]. Labour Relations Agency., 2007. Improving Employment Relations. [online] Available at: http://www.lra.org.uk/microsoft_word_-_advice_on_handling_redundancy_2.pdf [Accessed 10 May 2014]. Read More