Introduction Employment law in Human Resources (HR) is one of the most important areas of concern for businesses, as firms can be held liable for a number of infringements and may put themselves open to suit if they fail to abide by employment laws, which cover everything from compensation to discrimination.  It is HR’s responsibility to know what the laws are and how to protect the firm from potential violations of the law.  This paper will discuss the ways that HR can predict conditions that increase business risk with regards to employment law.  It will provide suggestions on how to reduce this risk, what the early warning signs may be, and when and how the risk should be reported to governing bodies.

Ways to Predict Conditions that Make Business Risk for HR Employment Law More Likely

Businesses may be more prone to HR employment law risk if they are not taking the necessary steps to guard against violations.  Firms have to protect employees’ personal data; they must not discriminate against employees by favoring one ethnicity or religious groups over another, or by excluding disabled workers from certain opportunities to be part of an in-group, or by denying specific genders opportunities for promotion.  One way to predict whether conditions that increase risk are present is to analyze the organizational culture of the firm (Girling, 2013). Here, one can see the risk appetite of the firm, whether it is comfortable walking a fine line between legality and illegality, or whether it has clearly stated principles and values that serve as the crux of its mission, vision and culture statements.  A firm that has an internal reporting system in place, where problems regarding employment issues can be internally reported up the chain of command, is more likely to be focused on monitoring risk than a firm that has no such reporting system in place (Girling, 2013).  Managers play a large role, too:  management that is aloof and disconnected from the issues of employment law reflect a precondition for risk, while managers who demonstrate a “revealing hand” reflect a firm that is concerned with employment law and wants to make certain the business is operating by the book (Kaplan & Mikes, 2016).

Suggestion on How to Reduce the Occurrence of Said Risk

One reason risk grows unforeseen is that no one talks about it in...