The Employment Relations Authority (ERA) has ruled that a food distributor unjustifiably dismissed its former human resources manager, finding the employer's disciplinary process denied her a genuine chance to argue against dismissal.
ERA Member Claire English found the company had merged its investigation and disciplinary stages, leaving the former HR manager unable to respond to the disciplinary case against her until a decision to dismiss had already been reached.
"She was not given an opportunity to feed back on the findings of that investigation. She was not given an opportunity to comment on whether disciplinary action should be taken as a result of that investigation," the ERA said.
The HR manager also never met the decision-maker, who is the general manager. His evidence showed he continued to discuss his preliminary and final decisions with the two staff who ran the investigation, an HR business partner and another manager. This was not disclosed to her.
"I find this confusion of roles is significant," the ERA said.
The HR manager joined the company in November 2016 as an accounts payable clerk and was appointed HR manager in February 2022, alongside her health and safety role.
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