Terminating the Employment Relationship

Ideally, the Skelly officer should be “reasonably impartial,” and not involved in the underlying action. But Courts have found that it is not a violation of due process for a manager who conducted an underlying investigation to serve as the Skelly officer. 20 The Skelly officer should:  Consider making a record of the Skelly meeting/conference by audio taping it;  If the employee does not reveal the information on their own, consider asking questions to ascertain: (1) whether the employee denies the commission of any of the alleged conduct; and (2) the full range of defenses that the employee may be claiming, including the existence of past practices adverse to management, claims of disparate treatment, and (particularly if the employee is represented by counsel) any legal impediments to the imposition of discipline; and  Get the names and contact information of all witnesses who would corroborate the employee’s position.

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d. Final Notice of Termination After conducting the Skelly conference, the Skelly officer must decide whether the decision to terminate should be sustained, modified, or rejected. If the decision is to uphold termination or modify the decision in such a manner that significant punitive action will be imposed (e.g., reducing a termination to a demotion), the employer must provide the employee with written notice describing the disciplinary action that will be imposed. This notice is commonly referred to as the “Final Notice of Termination.”

Additional charges that were not included in the Notice of Intent should not be added to a Final Notice of Discipline after the Skelly conference; otherwise, a new Skelly conference will be required. If newly discovered evidence is gathered supporting new charges, then the new charges and supporting evidence should be included in a new or amended Notice of Intent and the employer must provide the employee with the right to another Skelly conference.

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Terminating the Employment Relationship ©2022 (s) Liebert Cassidy Whitmore 21