Hello- I am the recruiting manager of a firm.

Anonymous

January 8,2023 at 5:09PM UTC

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Hello- I am the recruiting manager of a firm. Within my company recruiting and HR are separate departments. I have a recruiting coordinator who is my direct report.

My RC has been working with the company for almost a year and a half, and I've worked with her in terms of playing to her strengths and working with her on her challenges. Unfortunately, she is not the most detail-oriented person and I have been working with her to mitigate this and she has improved a lot.

All of a sudden, things took a turn, when she was about to scan /email docs to HR, she told me while doing it that HR didn't need the hard file copy anymore and that she was told that they would accept copies electronically. We used to give them the hard copy only but they are not in the office at times, so we send electronically and give them the hard for storage. She wanted me to send her all of the emails from candidates with docs so she could put it together to send electronically as she presented it to me as a process improvement. I told her I would ask HR about this and get back to her. Until then, we will keep our current process.

Long story short, I heard back from HR and they in fact need the physical folder for storage.

I am torn because besides from this, she has been a good employee, but all of a sudden she was pushing back on doing the task she has performed for a year and a half. I believe she is being influenced by someone in another dept - don't know exactly why though. Also, another major concern is that she did not tell me the truth, as I value integrity.

I have been with the company for 11 years

Any thoughts on this?

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AnonymousJanuary 8,2023 at 5:57PM UTC
I think you need to talk to her about how you would like her to communicate with you about process improvements and before sharing her thoughts with others outside of the department that she should present those to you in a presentation and have the supporting legal and required documentation to support her findings. Explain to her that being in a Talent team is akin to managing the legal ramifications within a company surrounding employee recordkeeping and if subpoenaed the company does have to provide hard copies. Explain that while you appreciate her wanting to streamline things that overall the final decisions are made by you as the leader of the department. Document the conversation and then if behavior does not change encourage her to move to a department that is less regulation centric. I do work in HR so this is coming from a person who knows.
AnonymousJanuary 8,2023 at 6:18PM UTC
Are you sure that the recruiting coordinator lied? Could she have misunderstood a communication from someone in HR? Did the RC provide specifics about how she learned of the work process change (from whom? by what mode of communication?)? If she learned by email, did she copy you on message(s)?
You seem to suspect that the RC is averse to providing HR with the hard copy documents. Are there any reasons this is an onerous task? If so, is there any way to make it a simpler, less burdensome one to perform?
Does your work group have documented work processes for the RC to follow? If there are none, and if the RC has latitude to work largely independently, it seems there is a need to codify the work processes. Standard operating procedures would guide the RC, particularly during times that you might be unavailable, and they would help you when you review the RC's work performance.
Regarding the possible collusion between the RC and someone from another department, this seems to be speculation. Maybe two employees who would like to rise in the ranks have been commiserating and brainstorming ways that they might improve their lots. It does not seem to be a stretch of the imagination to believe that after 1.5 years on the job, the RC, whom you state has been a good employee, is vying for a raise and/or promotion. Are there clear expectations surrounding career advancement in your organization?
Beyond delving into possible explanations as to why the RC is connecting with someone outside of your department, it would seem to be important for you to address why this bothers you. It seems cross-functional collaboration should be viewed as a positive, not a negative. If certain work processes cannot be identical across departments, perhaps this matter is what needs to be addressed with the RC.
AnonymousJanuary 8,2023 at 6:18PM UTC
I'm glad you checked with HR. The first thing I would do is ask her where that information originated. It could have been from someone in HR who misunderstood themselves or thought they had authority they didn't have to change processes. It could have been a misunderstanding from her side - maybe someone said they didn't need hard copy for one specific thing and she interpreted it as applying to everything. I can't imagine her thinking she'd get away with making something like that up, though I guess stranger things have happened.
The second thing I'd look at would be the entire process in general. You mentioned emails and scanning things. Are these documents being physically mailed to your office with original wet-ink signatures? Understandable if HR needs those originals. If they are coming in via email or through an online portal, it would be quicker, easier, and more eco-friendly to create PDF files and place them in a shared drive that's accessible by your office and HR. If HR truly needs hard copies, they can print them out when they are in the office (so you also save courier/transfer time). If it's more of a hybrid thing (a few pages are physical but everything else is electronically transmitted), maybe look at the PDF in shared folder option and just scan in the few pages that have original signatures since they can be added to the existing PDF file.
When I started as a support person in my current company, they were printing out emails and emailed documents, making multiple copies of everything, and sending it all out via courier. Some things did need original wet ink signatures, but I was able to update processes to minimize printing and scanning. In this case you would need to look at your own internal process and also coordinate with HR to come up with a solution that meets both your needs.
Finally, if you talk to her and she just came up with this because it feels like busywork and doesn't make sense to her, you have an entirely different problem and you may need to initiate disciplinary action. Proposing new ideas is one thing, but for lower-level staff to just make major process changes without any input shows a serious misunderstanding of their role and scope of authority. That strong of a mismatch in expectations (delusion?) may be difficult to overcome.
Peggie Arvidson * Career Consultant | Adoptee Advocate | RecruiterJanuary 9,2023 at 2:48PM UTC
maybe she misunderstood - I'd see if you could have a quick "triage' meeting with her and HR. No need to worry about outside influencers (heck, maybe she saw a tick-toc about taking initiative and this is how she did it!)
Liz MilneJanuary 15,2023 at 4:25AM UTC
Ask her. @I