Post-pandemic shifts have left many workplaces short-staffed. Between health concerns and lifestyle changes, employees are frequently resigning or requesting flexible work. While many employers respond by internally recruiting or extending existing roles, changing employee job descriptions without careful planning can lead to hefty legal repercussions.
The Risks of Significant Role Changes
If you decide to change an employee’s role, the adjustments must be reasonable. This means additional tasks should be similar or fitting to the original role.
When you change a role drastically without a new agreement, you invite two major risks:
- Redundancy Claims: In some circumstances, an employee can claim their original role no longer exists, potentially resulting in substantial redundancy payments.
- Unfavourable Treatment Claims: Employees may feel they have received unfair duties compared to their peers, leading to discrimination claims.
Best Practices for Employment Agreements
It is in your best interest to draft and sign a new Employment or Enterprise Agreement to reflect major role adjustments. Alternatively, you may need to adjust an employee’s classification within an Award.
To reduce the need for constant paperwork, employers should draft initial agreements with flexible wording. Anticipating the “crossover” of duties in the original contract can protect you against future unfair claims.
Employee Consultation Requirements
Most Awards and Enterprise Agreements require ’employee consultation’ before you make major workplace changes, such as job restructuring or roster shifts. If you ignore these requirements, you risk breaching contracts and paying compensation penalties.
Documenting and reviewing every change is vital. Even if a change doesn’t require a brand-new award classification, you must keep a clear paper trail to protect the business.
How Assurance HR Can Help
The team at Assurance HR excels at developing business-specific position descriptions and flexible employment agreements. We help you create documents that manage role expectations while attracting top-tier talent.
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