Today’s is a personal blog post. My father, Dr. Milden Jean Fox, Jr. “Bob” passed away last week. He was born in 1926 and was part of what we rightfully call the “Greatest Generation”. We call them this for a whole host of reasons, not in the least their collective fight against the forces of evil in the world. Name any right you hold sacred as an American and the men and women of that era fought to defend it. Right to vote, freedom of expression, freedom of religion, are but a few. However, there are many other rights that might you might not think of that we owe to these men and women who fought and sacrificed for us during this conflict.
My father served in that conflict and the Korean Conflict as well. Professionally he was a Professor of Industrial Engineering and for over 40 years he served as labor arbitrator. He believed that working people should have due process regarding their jobs and as an arbitrator he has put that belief into practice by requiring companies who terminated employees to follow the due process requirements of termination for just cause. Put another way, if an employer is going to deliver a death penalty sanction in the workplace, in the form of job termination, it must do so fairly and justly. This does not prevent management from exercising its rights or prevent management from running its business. At a bare minimum, it means that a company must have an agreed upon disciplinary process in place and that process must be followed if the company is going to terminate an employee. A company must investigate and it must allow an employee to tell his or her side of the story, the employee must have the right for union or other representation in the process and the final appeal of any termination must be made by someone other than the original decision maker.
Today we call this the Fair Process Doctrine. One of the American freedoms we enjoy today is this right of work place justice because of men and women like my father. It is one of the rights which the greatest generation defended for all of us in that conflict. This concept is so important and so universal that it permeates many facets of the workplace today, specifically including the realm of anti-corruption compliance. I often write about the Fair Process Doctrine as it relates to a part of any best practices compliance program such as internal investigation and discipline. But today I want to write about it as a tribute to my father and all the men and women who fought so we could have this right, put this Doctrine into practice, those who continue to do so and those will do so in the future.
Thanks Dad.
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