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dignity: harassment and discrimination
:
Tips and tools
Advice to Investigating Panels
Introduction
The following section is recommended as model guidelines for advising
Investigating Panels about their approach to the investigation. When Centers
have included information about investigating
complaints in their Personnel
Policy Manual, it is recommended that the following section also be included
as an appendix to that information.
Advice to Investigating Panels
1 This advice is to be read in conjunction
with <Center>’s policy for investigating complaints of harassment
or discrimination.
2 Panel members will ensure that they are
familiar with the wording of the policy above. When necessary, they will
ask the HR Manager to clarify any aspects of the policy that are not entirely
clear.
Investigation process
Natural justice
3 Panels shall observe the principles of natural
justice throughout the interview process, i.e. advise any person of an
allegation against them and give that person the right of response to
that allegation. However, Panels will also respect the strict confidentiality
of the investigation process and will not divulge the identity of the
person making the allegation, unless it is the complainant or the alleged
offender.
Interview design and techniques
4 Panels shall undertake their investigations
based on semi-structured interviews of those who are party to the investigation:
complainant, alleged offender/s, and supervisors and other witnesses.
Semi-structured interviews are guided conversations in which the topics
are predetermined (by the Panel) and where new questions or insights arise
as a result of the discussion and analyses.
5 Semi-structured interviews:
- are informal but controlled;
- are based on a list of issues, but not a formal questionnaire;
- use open-ended questions; and
- lead to new hypotheses and new questions.
6 Semi-structured interviews
require careful preparation and sensitivity.
Pre-interview requirements:
- preparing a checklist of questions by the Panel;
- deciding which Panel member will ask which questions and which member will record the responses.
Interview requirements:
- sensitive questioning;
- sensitive listening to responses; and
- judging responses in a way that enables them to separate fact from rumor or opinion.
Note: G&D recommends that a woman member should
conduct the interview when the Panel is interviewing a woman, and vice-versa
for men; or when the Panel is interviewing a person of a specific ethnicity
in discrimination complaints, the Panel member of that specific ethnicity
should conduct the interview.)
7 For semi-structured interviews to be successful,
Panel members need to be conscious of:
- using the “six helpers”: who-what-why-when-where-how;
- avoiding asking leading questions;
- distinguishing between fact, opinion and rumor;
- distinguishing between first-hand information and second- or third-hand information;
- probing responses (e.g. using phrases such as “please tell me more”; “anything else?”; “but why ….?”; “then what happened?”); and
- checking their understanding (e.g. using phrases such as “am I correct to understand that ….?”; “so it used to be …..?”; “but now it is ….?”)
Quality of critical information
8 Where possible, Panels shall attempt to
verify or cross-check critical information acquired during the investigation
by triangulation, i.e. by establishing three separate sources of that
information. This is particularly important in relation to written statements
(e.g. in emails), which should be verified where possible through oral
statements from witnesses.
9 It is acknowledged that this standard may
not always be possible to achieve, e.g. a private verbal exchange between
two parties, an absence of witnesses. Nevertheless, in regard to the potential
consequences of an investigation (i.e. dismissal), Panels need to ensure
they apply the highest possible professional standards to the quality
of information on which they base their analysis, conclusions and recommendations
to the Director General.
© CGIAR Gender & Diversity
Program 2006