Redundancies are not the easy solution Articles / Good Practice Date: Aug 14, 2008 - 11:16 AM When you need to cut costs most people think slashing headcount is the easy option. Don’t be fooled. Nowadays redundancies must be fair, which requires real planning, setting proper objective selection criteria, genuine consultation and sticking to a proper dismissal procedure. Get any of these wrong and you could be vulnerable - remember in a downturn employees are more willing to fight for their jobs or for financial compensation. So if you want to cut heads the first thing you need to prove is that there is a redundancy situation – in legal terms that there are job roles that either have ceased or diminished, or are about to. And then you need to stick to a fair, objective and well organised process, offering alternatives where appropriate and genuinely considering suggestions from employees, especially those most affected. Your first task is to plan a realistic timetable. Before you start in earnest though, ask for volunteers as this is a way of possibly reducing the need for compulsory redundancies. Remember, you do not have to accept a volunteer if their skills and experience are too valuable to lose. A fair procedure is all about consultation. Having selected which jobs are at risk, build in a minimum of two weeks so that you can consult employees in a series of one-to-one meetings, to explore reasons for their selection and consider alternatives. This involves listening to their ideas and properly responding to what they have to say. Failure to allow enough time can lead to claims that the consultation was not genuine. You cannot confirm redundancy until the end of the consultation period. Key points to remember: 1. Plan a detailed time table 2. Allow enough time 3. Consider volunteers first 4. Use objective selection criteria 5. Don’t discriminate 6. Consult employees genuinely 7. Consider suitable alternative job roles 8. Adhere to dismissal and appeal procedures If you do not get enough volunteers, you may need to select staff from a pool of workers. You must do this objectively, using selection criteria that can be justified. The law recognises that you will want to end up with the strongest workforce, so this is best done by using a variety of selection criteria, or a matrix, based primarily on relevant skills and competencies. Avoid using opinion too much - being a “good team player” and “popular with customers” is just too subjective to stand up. But if you have factual data that measures individual job performance use it. One final point on selection criteria, do not discriminate by making it harder for a particular employee to score highly. So you can use poor attendance as a criterion, but you must exclude genuine long term ill health or maternity-related absence. The law expects employers to minimise redundancy so you have to consider the availability of suitable alternative work within the organisation. Provide full details of any existing vacancies so that employees can evaluate these properly. Whether a job is suitable should be mutually agreed, but be warned - if the pay or job status is less then the employee is entitled to turn it down. If they accept then there has to be a minimum of one month’s trial period (it can be longer) during which either side can decide whether the role is working out. If the trial period is unsuccessful the employee can still be made redundant. If there is no alternative to redundancy then you must confirm this properly in a meeting. An SMS or email will not suffice – follow this process: inform the employee in advance of the meeting allow them to bring with them a work colleague or trade union representative. Confirm the outcome in writing, advising them of their right of appeal. If the employee appeals, the meeting should be conducted by a manager, preferably one not previously involved, who has the authority to overturn the original decision. Again, the employee has the right to be accompanied, and employers must confirm the outcome in writing. Making redundancies is an unpleasant task at the best of times, handle it badly and may not only lead to legal action but it can demoralise the employees who are left. This article comes from BackupHR - http://www.backuphr.com/ The URL for this story is: http://www.backuphr.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=70