Assignment 3 Dismissal Meeting
Spring 2016
Propose three (3) ways that a manager can cope with any negative emotions that may accompany an empoyee
Answer: There are a lot of different ways that a manager can cope with the negative emotions that might be accompanied by an employee layoff. The first way is through communication. The managers can provide the facts about why the employees are being laid off. The managers will need to get ahead of the problem before rumors and gossip gets spread throughout the organization. The managers can help the staff to remain productive and positive about the situation. The managers can reassure the staff that everyone is going to be treated with respect. The managers will be the ones who will set the tone for being able to move forward through all of the changes going on inside of the company. I believe that this is one of the most important ways that the managers will be able to deal with this negative emotion.
The second way is to anticipate the reactions of all of the employees that will remain at the company after the layoff. All of these employees are going to have a variety of different feelings about the layoff. The management is also going to have some mixed feelings about the situation. It is very important that the company acknowledges and responds to all of the feelsings in order to help out the team and allow the company to move forward.
The third way is to manage the transition of the work properly. There are several things that will need to be done to allow this to happen. The first thing is to make sure that you are visible to everyone who might need your help. The second thing is to redesign all of the processes and tasks of the company. The third thing is to ask for input from the other employees who did not get laid off from the company. The fourth thing is to make sure to assign roles and responsibilities to the remaining employees. The fifth thing is to monitor the processes of the company. The sixth thing is to make a plan to handle any of the setbacks that might happen because of the employee layoff (Research, n.d.).
Describe a step-by-step process of conducting the dismissal meeting.
Answer: There are several steps that are involved in conducting the dismissal meeting. The first step is to make sure that the meeting is going to be done face to face with the employee. It is very important that the employee does not receive this news in the form of a letter or email, or over the phone. There should be a third person in the meeting that can serve as a witness. The employer will need to be very direct with the employees stating a clear reason why the employee is being dismissed. This is when the employer will explain the severance compensation that the person will be able to receive. Once the meeting is over, the employee should receive a written summary of everything that went on in the meeting.
The second step is to make sure that the employees have the ability to speak during this meeting. It is very important to tell the employees that the meeting is not the place for questions to be answered and even a discussion on how things within the company can be improved. This is because the employee should just be clearly told what the decision was and that the decision was final. Therefore, any representatives that the employee might have should be able to avoid any arguments or debates regarding the reasons for the dismissal.
It is vital that the employers understand why they have to be a part of the dismissal meeting. The main reason is because it is critical part of the process by human resources. The process is very serious so it is handled with care in order to show respect towards the employees that are being laid off (Findlaw, n.d.).
Determine the compensation that the fictitious company may provide to the separated employee.
Answer: The company does not have to offer any type of severance package to the employees that are being laid off. Most of the time, the severance pay will be granted to the employees through the discretion of the employer. But the employer needs to know that when they offer the severance package to the employees, there are going to be some obligations that will be attached to it.
There are several forms of compensation that the company might be able to provide to the separated employee. The first form is through severance pay. This is the most likely type of compension that the separated employee is going to receive. Most of the time, the severance pay is going to add up to a week or two of the pay for all of the years that the employee worked for the company. It is very important to remember that there is no law that requires the employer to pay the employee any severance pay.
The Fair Labor Standards Act does state that the employer will need to pay the employee when the employee is terminated their regular wages through a certain date or any accued time that the employee might have. Normally, this accrued time is going to be done through vacation time and not the sick days. Most states are going to pay the employee through a lump sum but if the employee prefers weekly payments, then that will be possible for that particular employee.
If the employee requests to have the weekly payments, the number of weeks that the person will receive these payments will depend on the number of years that the person has worked for the company. Therefore, if a person worked for a company for 15 years, then they are going to receive their monthly payments for 15 months. This means that the lump sum that the person receives will be the total of the amount that the person would have been paid over the 15 month period of time.
Using Microsoft Word or an equivalent such as OpenOffice, create a chart that depicts a timeline of the disbursement of compensation.
Answer:
The severance pay will need to be paid in accordance in the standard payrool procedures of the corporation. The terminated employee might elect to receive the severance pay is a single lump sum payment. The terminated employee can make this decision on the day of the termination or before the date when the employee has to sign the required agreement and release of the claim. If the person does not make this decision before the agreement is executed, then the person will automatically receive the lump sum payment. The employee will need to be aware that this type of payment could be subject to withholdings (Guerin, n.d.).
Predict three (3) ways that this layoff may affect the company.
Answer: There are three different ways that the layoff might affect the company. The first way is that it can end up costing the company a lot of money. Even though, a lot of companies might lay off their employees in order to save cash within the payroll and on the benefits that the employees receive. Therefore, the company is not going to save the money that they thought they were going to. For example, if the company is forced to provide the severance pay to the employees that were laid off. The overtime salary to these workers might take up the money that the company thought that they were going to save. If this in the case, then the company would have been better off if they had just kept the workers instead of laying them off.
The second way is that the company might see some of the other employees resign from their current positions. The layoffs might make the workers that have been working for the company for a long period of time leave the company. When these workers see their co-workers leave the company, then they might there are other job offers from some other companies. They might even look for new opportunities for employment. The remaining workers are not going to feel secure with their jobs with the company anymore so the productivity is going to be very low throughout the company. When there is a high turnover within the company, it will lower the performance of the workers and spoil the reputation of the company. These workers might also have some emotional issues when it comes to this layoff. Then there is the issue of the creation of new work relationships because the remaining employees will have to pick up some additional duties, which is going to stress out some of the employees.
The third way is through the customer relations that might be negatively impacted within the company. Each one of the customers are going to be an asset to the company so the company should look for ways to keep them. When a company gets rid of an employee, the customers are going to get a negative message like the company is going through some type of crisis. When there are fewer workers within the company, it could imply there were will be delays in the delivery of products so the customers might be inconvenience. Sometimes the workers will have a direct relationship with the client, so if that worker is laid off when the customer is probably going to leave the company (Sunil, 2014).
References:
Guerin, Lisa J. (n.d.). "Laid Off Employees: What Compensation is Available?" Retrieved on May 10th, 2016, from http://www.employmentlawfirms.com/termination-layoffs/laid-off-benefits.htm
Findlaw. (n.d.). "Employee Rights after a Job Termination." Retrieved on May 9th, 2016, from http://employment.findlaw.com/losing-a-job/employee-rights-after-a-job-term.ination.html
Research. (n.d.). "How Manager can Cope with Negative Emotions Accompaning an Employee Layoff." Retrieved on May 9th, 2016 from http://www.researchomatic.com/assignment-3-183577.html
Sunil, Ramlall J. (2014). "Layoffs, Coping, and Commitment: Impact of Layoffs on
Employees and Strategies Used in Coping with Layoffs." Journal of Management and
Strategy. Vol.5, No. 2, pp 65-83.
