Question

Carrying out terminations usually is the responsibility of the manager. However, the manager may not always be involved in determining who should be let go. Do you think direct managers should have input into which of their workers should be laid off? Why or why not? If a manager and HR staff disagree on who should be laid off, how do you think the disagreement should be resolved?

a maximum of one-half typed page for answer

Answer 1

Solution -

Termination is a tricky process and needs to be handled with care so that the existing productivity of the team is not jeopardized. Now let us understand that when an employee takes any action who are the major stakeholders -

1. The direct manager

2. The team

3. The external clients

4. The overall organization.

In the above list the direct manager is the most affected and interestingly the direct manager is also the best judge of the feasibility of such actions. Now it is also necessary to note that the direct manager also realizes the requirements and criticality of a particular resource in terms of their contribution to the organization. It is necessary for the manager to give inputs in the termination of the employee and that should be given maximum weightage as well. This is necessary because the direct manager will come in with a holistic approach for the organization and would be able to give due importance to business. The HR would ensure to bring in the organisational perspective in terms of the policies but the direct manager would enforce the perspective of business which is the lifeline of any organization.

Another factor to be noted here is that violation of organisational policies is also not a possibility so even if the manager is interested to have an employee retained but the organisational policies will always have presedence.

Now if there is a conflict between the direct manager and the HR then this is a case that should be brought to the higher management. It is necessary in such cases that the management takes a much broader view of the situation and not only consider the past history of the employee but also the future value of the employee to the organization. The higher management must take note of all the organisational policies involved and carefully analyse the effect that the other employees would face with the decision. The higher management decides the kind of precedence they wish to set and take a holistic decision. Such decisions are mostly binding and are never open-ended. Such decisions give due importance to all aspects and bring about a sense of fairness in the matter.

The necessary factor here is that such decisions are free from any ambiguity and do not leave room for any conflict. These decisions basically address all the issues and justification is given on all aspects. These decisions are views critically by other employees and hence a certain amount of fairness and global vision is necessary.