Reference no: EM132239369

You’re the Human Resources Manager for Millennial Engagement, a company that enrolls students in various schools, colleges, and universities. This company is based in Denver, Co and is an at-will employer. At this company, most employees work at the engagement level. This means that employees primarily make phone calls across the country, in attempts to enroll students.   In fact, 90% of the workers at Millennial Engagement work as “Admissions Counselors”.

The Scenario

Jake is employed as an admissions counselor and was recently caught in falsifying work records. Jake was manipulating the phone system so that it appears as though he was making the required amount of calls.

Jake was purposefully calling numbers that he knew were disconnected so that it would appear as though his call-log was complete.   Jake was auto-dialing these disconnected numbers and allowing the system to record it as a legitimate call, Jake could have instead selected an option that tells the calling system that the number is disconnected – this is to ensure calls and time isn’t wasted by dialing inoperable numbers. Jake made a comment to his manager, in which he stated “I thought for sure I was calling actual leads”.

Jake has otherwise been a loyal and productive employee for Millennial Engagement in the past. As an admissions counselor, he’s held “Worker of the Quarter” by enrolling the most students for that particular timeframe. He’s never received disciplinary action of any kind, nor is there any negative remarks documented on his employee appraisals. Jake has witnessed this exact scenario on two separate instances. One employee was verbally reprimanded by his manger (that no longer works there) and nothing more. The other, was terminated.   Managers and supervisors have shown leniency for this practice in the past, as some managers have not been clear on when and how to properly identify a number as disconnected or inoperable.

Employees must correctly and immediately document all calls they make to prospective students because a certain amount of calls are mandatory for each admissions counselor to make every workday. Fraudulent phone logs have been a problem for Millennial Engagement in the past; therefore each admissions counselor must sign an agreement which specifically states that he will not engage in falsifying phone logs. Weekly training is conducted for admissions counselors to reiterate the proper use of phone logs and to provide updates to admissions protocol.

Before making any decisions, consider the following:

Always indicate what questions you’re answering

1. As HR manager, what 5 questions would you ask Jake? Explain the reason why you’d ask each question.

2. In one paragraph, explain how Jake’s offense(s) could hurt the organization overall?

3. In one paragraph, explain the importance of a company’s obligation to uniformly enforce rules and regulations.

4. In one paragraph, explain the importance of investigating each case involving falsifying work records. Explain, in your own words, what each step means in the disciplinary model (figure 13.11, page 467). Follow the order of the logical sequence as you answer this question.

Proposal:

Based off of your responses to the questions above, which one of the legal actions will you propose his manager take?   

Progressive Discipline

Positive Discipline

Discharge/Termination

Respond in one paragraph as to why you’d make this recommendation to Jake’s manager.