44 Human Resource Executive®
Santa Monica, Calif.-based Cornerstone OnDemand and Aon Hewitt, of Lincolnshire, Ill., have formed an alliance in
which Aon Hewitt will provide global
deployment and administration
services to clients implementing
Cornerstone’s software. Aon Hewitt
will also provide post-deployment
operational services, ranging from
supporting one-time projects to full
administration of Cornerstone’s
integrated talent management suite.
Monster, headquartered in New
York, and Boston-based recruiting
software provider Bullhorn
Inc. have partnered to integrate
Monster’s Power Resume Search
and SeeMore cloud platform into
the Bullhorn applicant-tracking
system and customer-relationship
management application.
SAP, headquartered in Walldorf,
Germany, has acquired Fieldglass,
a Chicago-based provider of vendor-management systems services,
in a deal designed to complement
SAP’s cloud-based SuccessFactors
HR applications and its Ariba
procurement network.
Diebold Inc., a Canton, Ohio-based self-service technology,
security systems and related service
provider, has reached a business-process outsourcing agreement
with Dublin, Ireland-headquartered
Accenture, in which Accenture
Supplier Briefs
will manage Diebold’s finance,
accounting, HR and procurement
operations on a global scale.
Philadelphia-based Comcast
Corp. has selected Randstad
Sourceright, headquartered in
Atlanta, and Pinnacle Technical
Resources, of Dallas, to co-manage
Comcast’s managed services
program and support Comcast’s
contingent labor-acquisition
program.
Urbandale, Iowa-based BettrLife
has entered a partnership with
Phoenix-headquartered Viridian
Health Management, in which
BettrLife’s mobile health software
will be integrated with Viridian’s
Maestro population health-management platform, allowing
users to interact directly with
Viridian health coaches.
Hoboken, N.J.-headquartered
John Wiley & Sons Inc. has
acquired Profiles International,
a Waco, Texas-based provider of
employment assessment and talent-management platforms.
Maitland, Fla.-based HRsoft and
Equifax Workforce Solutions, of
St. Louis, have partnered to create
an interface between HRsoft’s
applicant-tracking system and Equifax
Workforce Solutions’ Compliance
Center, designed to move new
employees from the recruitment
stage through onboarding.
End-to-End Recruiting
Workday Inc. has
unveiled Workday
Recruiting, an
application that joins
with Workday HCM
to support all parties
involved in the hiring
process, including
candidates,
hiring managers,
interviewers
and recruiters,
according to
Workday.
The new
application includes
features that allow external applicants
to access a career site to apply for jobs,
while internal candidates can apply
using their profile already in Workday.
Recruiters can share candidate
resumes and provide real-time
feedback from screening interviews
with hiring managers. Interview
teams can track candidate progress
and communicate about next steps,
while recruiters can set up automated
processes to promote job postings
across a variety of
social channels.
In addition, hiring
managers can
boost referrals and
recommendations
with buttons for
employees to share
job postings with
people in their
social networks.
Price varies.
Workday Inc., Pleasanton,
Calif.
www.workday.com
Workforce-Assessment Portfolio
Mercer has introduced
enhancements to Talent Impact,
According to the company, the
newest release includes more than
100 new features and functionality,
including expanded compensation
benchmarking capabilities, an added
ability to simultaneously interact with
multiple jobs and make job-scope
modifications in real time, and a new
visualization for its internal labor
markets map that includes employee
data, updated projections and a
step-by-step tutorial for creating an
internal labor markets map.
Price varies.
Mercer, New York
www.mercer.com/talent-impact
The Law By Paul Salvatore/Legal Columnist
In recent weeks,
there has been
much discussion
concerning
the Society for Human Resource
Management’s decision to offer its own
HR certification program independent
of the HR Certification Institute. The
attention this move has brought to
certifiable HR competencies got me
thinking about just competent HR
professionals are when it comes to
employment law and where they would
do well to hone their compliance skills
and reduce their organizations’ risks.
Three of these areas are: 1) internal
investigations, 2) whistleblowing and 3)
diversity initiatives.
Internal investigations can be fraught
with risk because botched ones can lead
to litigation, whereas good ones can win
the day. To combat the potential pitfalls of
a shoddy investigation, HR professionals
Keep Honing Your Legal Competencies
should—among other things—promptly
initiate and complete the investigation,
maintain confidentiality to the extent
possible, avoid omitting important
witnesses, pursue all contradictions
that emerge in witness accounts, take
appropriate remedial measures, and
document thoroughly and communicate
the results of the investigation.
Whistleblowers need attention as
they are increasingly protected in the
workplace. An HR professional must
know how to respond or the employer
could end up defending a retaliation
lawsuit. On June 3, the Securities and
Exchange Commission issued an order
that awarded two whistleblowers $437,500
each, a full 30 percent of the monetary
sanctions collected by the SEC.
It’s also imperative that employers
prohibit retaliation against whistleblowers
and maintain reporting procedures and
compliance programs that encourage
employees to report issues internally.
HR must serve as a liaison to the
whistleblower, starting as soon as the
HR professional receives the complaint.
The HR professional should assure the
whistleblower that the company prohibits
retaliation, explain that the company takes
good-faith complaints seriously, and assist
in fielding the complaint and facilitating
the investigation. HR should continue to
serve as a resource to the whistleblower
even after the investigation and should
encourage feedback from employees to
help keep complaints internal.
When initiating diversity programs,
“getting it right” is important. There have
been situations in which an employer
embarks on a diversity program without
fully understanding the law. For example,
in an effort to promote diversity, some
non-federal contractor employers
voluntarily adopt affirmative-action
programs where the employer makes
race- or gender-conscious employment
decisions (hiring, firing, promotions, etc.).
Such programs have been successfully
challenged in court. Another diversity
initiative that is problematic is the
misuse of employee networks for diverse
employees, sometimes referred to as
“affinity groups.” While these groups
are legally permissible, they should
not exclude membership based on an
individual’s protected status.
These compliance areas have to
be viewed against the backdrop of the
constantly changing workplace legal
landscape. HR should partner with
in-house and/or outside counsel in
undertaking investigations, handling
whistleblowers and implementing diversity
programs. Such partnerships will also
help raise the compliance skill level of HR
and will benefit the profession and the
organizations HR professionals serve.
Paul Salvatore is a member of
Proskauer’s executive committee and
former co-chair of its global labor and
employment law department. He can be
emailed at psalvatore@proskauer.com.
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