Treaty Oak Employers’ Law Blog

What do you do if someone is being abusive to you during an interview? This has come up with me on phone interviews and also in person interviews. At the end of the day, you are not being paid to be abused. That being said, the nature of workplace investigations

What do you do when somebody keeps repeating themselves? This can be hard because people do this when they’re nervous. And so if somebody keeps repeating themselves and it’s irrelevant, make sure you ask them what the relevance of their comments is. And that might be a hard question for

What do you do if you are investigating something really traumatic? Unfortunately, as workplace investigators, we occasionally have to investigate some really awful stuff. People get killed at work. People get raped at work. Some truly awful things happen at work and workplace investigators get called into some of that

How do we investigate gaslighting? So gaslighting, to my knowledge, is not a crime anywhere, but the effects and the reasons for gaslighting somebody can be awful in the workplace, right? So gaslighting is the use of psychological means to make somebody doubt their own sanity. And if someone is

What do you do if you, as the investigator, get really embarrassed? Pull yourself together. You are there to be a neutral, unbiased, third party. And as such, you can’t be judgmental. And a lot of embarrassment comes from judgment. And so, your work is about appropriateness and inappropriateness in

What do you do if the person you’re interviewing is represented by an attorney? The answer is probably whatever your client wants you to do. So, if the client allows its employees to have legal representation in their interview that is up to that client and you need to handle

What do you do if the interviewee asks for a witness? As attorneys always say, it depends. If the interviewee is a member of a union, they have a right, according to the Supreme Court of the United States, to have a witness. And so they need to get a

What do you do if your interviewee does not participate in the investigation, or does not know what you are asking them? That’s kind of two different issues. So, if the person does not participate in the investigation, you need to, again, remind them that their employer expects them to

What do you do if an interviewee asks you about privilege for your investigation?A lot of investigations are done under privilege. I am not a litigator, I’m an investigator. So, I don’t pretend to be an expert in privilege and I know, across the country, perspectives on the way privilege

What do you do if intuition is the only reason you want to take some investigative steps? I think if you’re a young investigator, you need to check in with somebody else and check that intuition. This is because every move you make is expensive for your client. And so