Few business decisions pack as much risk into as little space as a termination for misconduct. If the conduct is real but the file is weak, the practical result is the same as if the conduct never happened: the company loses the case, pays, and inherits the internal precedent that sanctions do not stick.
After hundreds of investigations, the mistakes we see repeat are not exotic. They are these.
The mother of all errors. Pressure to "act fast" leads to firing based on a single version of the facts, with the investigation (if any) done afterwards to justify what was already decided. Any court detects that sequence: the dates in the file give it away. The prior investigation is not bureaucracy; it is what turns the decision into a reasoned act.
"Harassment was substantiated" is not evidence: it is a conclusion. A defensible file shows the full path: what specific conduct is alleged, what elements compose it under the applicable policy or law, what evidence supports each element, and under what standard of proof it was weighed. That is precisely the logic of a disciplinary decision matrix: conduct, elements, evidence, assessment. Where a link is missing, opposing counsel will find it.
Firing an operator for conduct that cost a manager a verbal warning is a discrimination claim waiting for a filing date. Before deciding the sanction, the mandatory question is: how have we sanctioned comparable conduct? If the answer is "differently," a documented, legitimate reason for the difference must exist.
The respondent has the right to know the facts alleged against them and to answer them before the decision. Skipping this is not only an ethical problem: in several jurisdictions in the region it directly voids the sanction. And there is a less visible effect: sometimes the respondent’s version changes the case, and hearing it in time prevents sanctioning the wrong person.
In Mexico, Chile, Colombia and Peru there are deadlines (statutes of limitation, procedural terms, notification windows) that can extinguish the power to sanction or taint the process. The clock starts when the company learns of the facts, not when it decides to deal with them. A perfect case filed out of time is a lost case.
None of this slows the decision: with method, the full cycle is measured in weeks. What does make it slow (and expensive) is making it without a file and defending it in court for years.
Thirty minutes with the firm’s leadership, at no cost: we review your situation against what the law already requires.
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