Treaty Oak Employers’ Law Blog

What do you do if a client wants you to alter your investigative findings? I’m sad to say that this has come up. And this is sad, right? This is a lack of ethics. They hired you to be a neutral, independent third-party investigator. And then they try to control

What do you do if your client contact has already told you what your investigative outcome should be? This happens an awful lot. It is rare that a client is thoughtful and experienced enough to truly download a situation without expressing their opinion on the outcome.  It is just human

What do you do if you don’t think your client contact is taking your investigation, or your investigative results very seriously? It’s incredibly frustrating when somebody makes a bad decision with your investigation. It is also frustrating when they make no decision with your investigative results. But, at the end

What do you do to maintain Goodwill and a positive opinion of your firm with a client after you’ve made an adversarial finding? That’s a hard one. Hopefully, you have a good relationship with your client contact and hopefully, your client contact is a decision-maker. And within that relationship that

What do you do if somebody gets mad during your interview? Obviously, if it’s a safety issue in the meeting, you get out of there or you end the meeting. If not, short of being a safety issue, ask the person why they’re getting agitated. Could be that you’re on

What do you do if somebody has company information related to your investigation on a personal device? We ask if we can have it! It can be a big issue because of ownership of intellectual property as a whole thing, but as a neutral, unbiased, third-party investigator, you should not

What do you do if the client asks you to stick around after the conclusion of your investigation to remedy the situation you investigated? You tread lightly because once you start reaping money from the situation you investigated, you start to whittle away at your own bias, right? So if

What do you do if you get evidence that can be used in litigation? Basically, everything you’re doing could be used litigation. So, this certainly applies to everything. Your report, your interviews, your notes, your communications with your client. You need to assume everything can be used in litigation. But,

What do you do if someone will not tell you the name of a witness or the name of somebody else who’s experienced similar behavior? There is this idea, that I think starts for us at the playground, that we shouldn’t be a tattletale or we shouldn’t be a nark.

What do I do if I just cannot reach a conclusion as a result of an investigation? Maybe find a new career? It’s really not very good if you can’t do that in the vast majority of the issues and sub-issues. It’s incredibly unsatisfying to clients who are paying you