It is established jurisprudence that an international organization has the right to restructure its departments and abolish posts during the process. However such processes are frequently undermined by unfairness and lack of transparency with staff. There are, of course, departments and units that have genuine organizational and operational needs to restructure and many succeed in transforming their businesses.
Others are not so well-versed.
We know the drill by now: a staff is problematic, underperforming, not loyal, deadwood, not wanted, too cooperative with staff union, too uncooperative with management… and the list goes on..
Administrative issuances, rules and regulations are not helpful tools for management in this respect. The alternative course of question is almost always recourse to a consultant, review of structure (also sometimes referred to as restructuring, realignment, streamlining of resources, improved approach of conducting business, etc…) which in turn leads to reassignment and/or abolishment of post and most often termination of contracts.
This leads to a flurry of disgruntled staff, low morale and the inevitable lengthy and draining process of appeals.
To the sorrow of many and the content of others, those appeals frequently fail for want or proof: meaning staff are unable to provide the applicable evidentiary standard supporting their appeal and claims, because they have very little information available to them with respect to the irregularity of the decision. Apart from senior management and senior HR staff, very few staff have access to HR analytics, budget documents, GA draft propositions, dates of approval…
The Organisation almost always holds most, if not all, of the information and therefore the evidence relevant to the grounds for its decision. At best, the staff member holds relatively little. The information power imbalance is pronounced.
On the applicable evidentiary standard, Judge Graeme Colgan, in one of the cases, took time to detail his criticism of the application of the presumption of regularity standard, in cases of abolition of posts:
“… The principles at issue include the “presumption of regularity” of administrative decisions; the imposition of an onus of proof resting on an affected staff member of establishing irregularity or other unlawfulness once the Organisation has met a very low threshold of regularity….. In such situations, the Organisation almost always holds most, if not all, of the information and therefore the evidence relevant to the grounds for its decision. At best, the staff member holds relatively little. The information power imbalance is pronounced. Yet the jurisprudence expects the staff member to make out a case to a high standard against the Organisation that holds unilaterally the relevant information and may naturally be reluctant to divulge it all. It is little wonder that such cases fail for want of proof.
It is difficult, if not impossible, to prove what one may be unaware of”.
Some things need to be changed and it’s certainly not the staff members.
