Third-Party Workplace Compliance Investigations

All major corporations have HR departments and policies to combat workplace discrimination and harassment, but as the impact of the #MeToo movement has demonstrated, current systems often fail to meet the needs of both businesses and employees. This Today’s General Counsel article discusses an emerging industry of third-party support services that has arisen to address these vulnerabilities by tackling the work of fact-finding and investigation. “Third parties can use their neutral position, interviewing experience and forensic skills in unexpected ways to accomplish investigations beyond the means of most HR departments,” according to the authors. Among other advantages, they say, are that third-party investigators report directly to decision makers or designated department heads, “thereby avoiding possible conflicts or internal politics that may otherwise influence an investigation.”