Janet Allen free essay sample

Whats a single mom to do? Janet Allen struggled to raise her child, Amanda, as a single mother in Arizona. She performed well in part-time positions in a couple of the Mojavi County departments when, from 1996 to 2002, she was able to accumulate a substantial amount of sick leaves to use in case she or her daughter ever become ill. During that time, she was also able to complete her Associate of Arts degree as an accountant technician, which allowed her to persue, in 2002, a higher paying, full-time job in the another of the countys departments, a much needed career move considering the increasing amount of bills to pay and lack of child support assistance from the ex-husband. The new job, however, was more strict and did not offer a flexibile schedule. Due to an asthmatic condition Amanda developed, Janet ended up depleting all her accrued sick leave by the end of 2003, her supervisor was unsympathetic of the situation, having expressed disapproval regarding to it. We will write a custom essay sample on Janet Allen or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page Amandas condition kept on getting worse deteriorating Janets attendence as a result. In the mean time, a Sick Leave Management Policy was promulgated, established the premises in which employees could make use of sick leaves. At that point, Janet had already received her first Letter of Warning for overutilizating the benefit in January 2004, and by March of that year, she had received two Letters of Repriment for the same reason. Nevertheless, not having any extended family around, she had no choices other than taking care of her daughter herself. In hopes of being able to count with a more sympathetic supervisor, Janet got voluntarily transferred to another division of that Department in May 2004. As Amandas condition, became really severe and Janets overutilization of sick leave combined with her failure on following the requirements established by the Divisions Handbook (which required proper procedures when taking sick leave) had leaded to both verbal and written warnings, predisciplinary hearing concerning her excessive absenteeism and a five-day suspension without pay as a disciplinary act, which was later, at a grievance hearing, reduced to two and a half days. Still, Janet was not able to improve her attendance. In this context, an initial predetermination hearing was scheduled for November 4th, 2004. Her pernonnel profile indicated that from February to November of that year, Janet had used 213 percent of her accrued sick leave. By the occasion of the hearing it was suggested that Janets pattern of sick leave usage could be considered abusive. She was not accompanied by a union representative for not knowing she was entitled to one. At the conclusion of the hearing she announced intention to take a leave on November 12th, and was informed by the county administrator that her termination was been considered, based on indications that she was not motivated to change her pattern behavior. In her defense, Janet stated that her daughter was frequent sick and childcare undependable. She expressed her opinion that the county should be more family friendly and understanding to the fact that she is a single mother raising a child with medical needs all by herself and that a flexible working schedule would be very appreciated on her side. To that, the administrator reinforced the fact that the treatment given to her was the same as to all the other employees and stated that, besides not being a productive employee herself, the divisions productivity had been affected by Janets absenteeism. Subsequently, the county terminated Janet, the Letter of Termination stated that the measure was the appropriate action to be taken as progressive discipline. Janet, disagreeing with those terms, which she considered too severe as a disciplinary action, decided to grieve the decision based on the premises that except for sick leave overutilization, her performance was satisfactory; the County Administrator had exceeded his policy-making authority, back in February, when taking away sick leave rights for the countys employees; she had suffered disparate treatment; and that she was denied due process rights by not being informed of her right to have a union representative present at the predetermination hearing. Does Janet Allens absenteeism present any mitigating circumstances that should be considered by management, or should she be treated the same as all other employees regarding attendance policies? Janet Allen is a single mother, who instead of sit around regreating her isfortune of being abandoned by her husband and living on welfare, made the hard choice of going back to school and working part-time while raising her daugher by herself, it is important to recognize that during six years before the girls health condition present itself she had been cautious in accumulating sick leaves, never using them unapropriately, which shows her good faith. There are definitely mitigating circumstances to Janets absenteeism rates, even though all the countys employees were subjected to the same restrictions and conditions regarding sick leave, it is undoubtly a major hardship for single mothers to comply with them and these unequalities must be aknowledged. I strongly believe Janets family situation (as well as any other employees facing similar issues) should be taken into consideration when it comes to attendence management. The fact that labor itself has a social role once it provides individuals with means to support their families should be taken into account on this matter, rather than the blindfull application of rules. In your assessment, does Janets use of sick leave represent overutilization or abuse of sick leave? What is the significance of both and what difference does it make? The circumstances Janet faces in her personal life caused her to overutilizate her sick leave benefits indeed. Use of 213 percent of her accrued sick leave definitely characterizes overutilization, however, this does not necessarily configures abuse as the county suggests at a point, neither justifies her termination. One thing would be taking advantage of the benefit in order dedicate time to leisure activities, that is an excusable reason for termination of employement and it was not the situation on the case under our analysis. Janet was not being able to attend to work due to illness related issues, even though she did not present a health condition herself, as a mother it is her responsability to take care of Amanda, specially when there was nobody else around that could help her in this task. A supervisor should not be using his discretion to compel his employees to neglect their sick children in order to be able to keep their jobs, the fact that her was uneasy on the conception of use of sick leave to care for family member demonstrates how unsupportive her workplace was regarding this matter. That may, even, have disencouraged her to seek for HRM in order to work together on different options to adress her necessities, which could have avoid the overutilization of sick leaves. Has management acted in a punitive manner with Janet? What other options, if any, might be applied by management? Management has definitely acted in a punitive manner with Janet Allen by not taking into consideration the particularities of her situation and also by making no efforts to improve work conditions for her. Instead of being cooperative and act on finding a solution that would avoid such a high rate of absenteeism, they chose to simply terminate her, disregarding the impact that one-income family would suffer. It is true that she failed to properly follow the departments policies regarding to proper requests, notices and approvals, but is it that hard to understand how overwhelmed a single mother of a child facing delicate medical condition can be? Is it so outrageous to expect that a workplace may offer a family-friendly culture? Prior the termination, Janet had suffered several disciplinative acts including unpaid suspention already, the assumption that a change of behavior should necessarily occur does not take into consideration the root of the problem the uncontrollable illness of her daughter. They could have agreed upon specific conditions for upcoming leaves such as establishing that they would be credited as FMLA (Family and Medical Leave Act) leaves which are unpaid if they are covered by it, or just offer unpaid leaves instead if they are not covered by the FMLA. It is just unreasonable to assume that she just did not care about her job the only source of income her family could count on rather than to realize that as a mother, she is willing to make sacrifices to take care of her daugher which may include facing penalties for doing it so. Focusing on positive incentives rather than punitive measures would certainly reflect on the agencys productivity on the long run so why not start by being less technical regarding the application of rules and become more willing to deal with the peculiarities of each case? Initiatives allowing employees to accomodate their work requirements without having to sacrifice their parenting responsabilities, such as the option of a flexible schedule, suggested by Janet herself; implementation of parental leave policies; working from home options; subsidized childcare service; after-school programs there are many reasonable possibilities to be explored that would provide a supportive workplace environment leading to ore job related satisfaction, loyalty and consequently better performance from the employees: When there is a will, there is a way. The situation of single mothers in the workplace There is a greater social issue at play when it comes to this subject. We already analysed, in the classroom, many ways in which women face unequal employement opportunities, despite being increasingly relied upon to be the sole financial provider for their families, they are still paid inequitably for the work. Side by side with employment opportunity, guaranteed paid sick days are crucial to help single-mother headed households thrive, considering that there is no national standard for paid sick days, the usage of sick days to care for ill family members represents an even bigger issue, many times subjected purely to management discretion. The social impact of this reality is that families headed by single mothers represent the poorest sector of society. Even so, not much is done to improve their situation. Not being able to rely on dependable quality childcare, paid sick days, or equal pay, single mothers struggle to face the challenges of raising their children. It would probably help the situation if Congress would pass some legislation that are pending to be voted, such as the the Healthy Families Act, ensuring employees to receive at least seven paid sick days per year, and the Paycheck Fairness Act, to ensure that women receive equal pay for equal work would allow great changes. A country that emphasizes, so fiercely, the importance of family values should have a system of social protections more specific than sick leave that assures single parents, specially single mothers, means to deal with unexpected events and conditions that are beyond their control such as illness, granting them security to care for their children without jeopardizing their familys economic security. It is true that there are different sectors of society demonstrating concerns regarding the issue, a petition addressed to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, to support single parents, the Single Parent Employment Discrimination (SPEDA) is available on the internet as an attempt to draw some attention to the matter (http://www. gopetition. com/petition/33958. html). Also, initiatives such as the website momsrising. om, a resource center single mothers turn to for information, counseling and research under the premise that together we can build a nation where children, parents, and businesses thrive; and end discrimination against mothers are phenomenal tools, however, it is necessary more than just sympathetic organized social groups. Should not be a concern of a governmental agencies to successfully launch single mothers into economic self-sufficiency? They should be doing their share in providing flexible schedules for that group as much as possible since employment helps to alleviate the poverty rates, contributing to a better economy. Public agencies should, by all means, serve as a role model to the private sector by creating opportunities for single mothers to earn adequate wages and benefits and be able to provide quality care for their children while doing it so. Implementation of affirmative actions to reduce discrimination against single mothers at the workplace would benefit society as a whole. Human Resources Management (HRM) departments should attent to the fact that maintaining a single parent household is a difficult task and it should not be complicated further with discrimination at the workplace. Guided by this philosophy, the Montgomery County Commission for Women, in Maryland, elaborated an excellent document: Single Mothers and Poverty, which is an action agenda with the purpose to advance womens equal anf full participation in the benefits, responsabilities and opportunities of society. Initiatives as such, should be implemented in federal level and stimulated throughout all government levels. The public sector should be more proactive towards improving this situation by promoting integrated actions and estimulating the private sector to follow its lead. When it comes to stimulating self sustaintable single mother headed families, employement plays a very important role. Promoting family-friendly practices and implementating affirmative actions targeting this group should definitely be a concern of HRM in the public sector considering that its broad spectrum of benefits goes beyond the agencys productivity. Integrated measures to raise single mothers’ and their children’s living standards, estimulates their independence from govern support, which beneficiates the whole society.