4 minute read
Management Counsel
MANAGEMENT COUNSEL: LAW PRACTICE 101 By: Heather Shubert
Summit Medical Group
DON’T JUST TALK TO ME: THE IMPORTANCE OF COMMUNICATION BETWEEN IN-HOUSE COUNSEL AND HUMAN RESOURCES
Communication between attorney and client is the key to a successful relationship. As in-house counsel for Summit Medical Group, I have approximately 2000 clients who can call at any time with any number of issues. Physicians, advanced practitioners, office managers and staff have access to the legal department whenever they need us. In addition to those clients, I am available to the C Suite, operations, customer relations and most importantly, human resources. The relationship with human resources is the foundation of all other client relationships. If we don’t communicate, the entire system can fail costing the company employees, time, and money, so let’s communicate.
Within the human resources department are many people that I interact with daily. I work with recruiting to offer letters of intent to new providers and begin the contracting process. When recruiting has a potential new provider, our initial contact with that person sets the tone for their future with our company. Often, I am the second person from the company to have contact with the new provider. Recruiting puts together the details of the letter of intent for me to send out securing a commitment to Summit. If we misstep on this initial letter, it gives the appearance of a lack of communication which conveys an unfavorable impression of our company. We must ensure the details are written as the provider expected from negotiations and communication is the key to making this happen. Human Resources provides information needed for amendments to employment agreements for salary and benefits. Contracted employees require an amendment to make changes to the original agreement and no salary changes will be made until the fully executed document is delivered to payroll. Human Resources works with the office managers to ensure the accurate salary, bonus change or benefits adjustments are relayed to legal to write the amendment and send for electronic signature. Communication in a timely manner with accurate information is important in employee satisfaction and retention. Our benefits coordinator assists me in providing much needed information for new employees with questions about their insurance and other provided benefits. Each employee who joins either an existing Summit office or comes into our company via acquisition must be informed of the benefits Summit offers. Being the person who sends out new contracts, I am often asked about those benefits. Having a great relationship with our benefits coordinator allows me to pass along basic information or forward them to her to get all the details.
The director of human resources works with the C suite and the legal department on higher level issues concerning companywide changes. Policy changes can be as simple as dress code and visible tattoos or as complex as handling social media, nepotism, or disciplinary step changes. Termination of higher-level employees demands communication and confidentiality between human resources and the legal department. Our director stated her communication with legal and the C suite is very different. She can say things to me, be more candid and blow off steam about issues that are difficult to deal with, whereas the approach with the C suite must be more professional and straightforward. If we don’t laugh over the craziness, we won’t make it out of this in one piece. This open communication between she and I is critical and cathartic at the same time. We have to talk, and we know that. There is a group in human resources that must work closely with legal, the compliance division. We have two compliance specialists who handle internal investigations, dive into anonymous compliance line reports, and meet with staff to understand issues arising at their location. The specialist will do an initial assessment of a situation and determine if legal should request the investigation to protect attorney client privilege and attorney work product should they feel it could have legal implications at some point. Of all the divisions within human resources, this one requires the most communication with legal. If we do not protect an investigation, everything will be discoverable, the good the bad and the ugly. As much as we want our employees to always do the right thing, it is not possible for that to happen in a company of this size or any size. Communication is essential to protect the company from future litigation or employment related complaints to the EEOC or THRC.
It is our nature as attorneys to talk, to clients and colleagues alike, but how well do we communicate? Talking is the uttering of words or phrases to get a message across. Communicating takes that a step further by listening and understanding what is being said. Developing a relationship with another department involving trust and reliability requires communication. We do have to talk, we talk every day, but we communicate as well. Could we do better at communicating between our departments, always. We can work to develop both our talking and communicating skills to protect the company and our employees. So don’t just talk to me, let’s communicate.
