Huge Confidentiality Violation

I know your not going to like my advice... However, I am not one for keeping such things confidential. What was the purpose of it? Walmart announced that they were doing a similar practice. Reducing many full time employees down to part time. It's kind of a regular business decision. Now it may have hurt the staffer's feelings. However, not sure why the possibility of such action was not discussed with them prior.

Seems instead of a confidentiality violation, you have someone who felt it much better to give a "Heads up" to the potential affected parties...

Since when does your management company control what your directors discuss about your staff?

The "rumors," as you call them, exist only because your board is trying to keep something secret from the owners and the staff member. It sounds like one or two of the board members has decided not to aid and abet this plot against the owners. I say good for them. You are not the Pentagon building nuclear submarines. You are just a condo association that no one else cares about.

Thanks for your replies so far. Clarification: The staffer involved is an employee of our MC. The issue there has to do with a part of employment law, not with our HOA per se. Can't say more about that.

The directors who breached confidentiality were indeed trying to keep this MC employee with us even though h'owners would pay quite a lot less per month in dues if the position is 1/2 time. To me, the harm is they'll keep paying higher dues to keep the person F-T, when our PM, who supervises the staffer, has said P-T is sufficient.

My own approach is close to Tim's- this is a budget matter. Our current prez seems to want too much in ES. The position's hours would have been cut in half. Now, the MC's CEO, via the PM, promised that a F-T place would be found in the MC--locally-- for this person.

We do have a Code of Ethics, which includes keeping ES matters confidential, which means we don't give a "heads up" to personnel who are being considered for a change--disciplinary reasons or not, and certainly not to homeowners until the Board has discussed it.

But I'm taking the general advice of cooling my heels. I may just place the topic on the agenda for general discussion.

This is not an employee. He/she is employed by a vendor. How does this become your association's personnel issue if he/she is not your personnel?

I agree with Tim that the issue from the association's standpoint is budgetary and should be discussed in an open meeting. It was improper to put this item on the ES agenda.

Director#7 didn’t attend? Maybe it was him/her?

Anyway, it’s my understanding that employee issues can be executive session topics, provided the employee is a direct hire of the association. Since this person works for the management company, I would agree this issue didn’t have to be an executive session issue. That being said, I agree with Melissa it would have been better to discuss this possibility with the employee first – if job performance wasn’t an issue, perhaps that employee can be reassigned elsewhere within the management company and keep the full time status.

(Yes, AugustinD, it is the HOA’s right to cut back service hours and it’s true that being told one’s hours are being reduced or eliminated altogether is never pleasant, but there is a compassionate and careless way of doing things and this wasn’t it, so I don't really blame the CEO for getting annoyed because this sort of thing IS bad for employee morale - the same folks who may called upon to perform certain tasks for YOUR association!)

Kerry, I doubt anyone will confess spilling the beans, so I would simply remind everyone as to why executive sessions are to be held (and why they should be few and far between). You could also discuss the CEO’s email and let people say whatever they wish on that. Tell everyone the point of the discussion isn’t to accuse anyone specifically (even if you have your suspicions – and they may be right!), but to consider if this should have been an executive session agenda item in the first place.

If not, it may be time to clarify exactly what will and won’t be discussed in an executive session and not deviate from that. Directors should be reminded if an ES is held, they have a duty to keep those discussions confidential. If, for some reason, they feel they can’t do that or don’t want to, it would be best that they not attend and explain why.

If non-attendance of one or several board members puts the quorum at risk, you’ll need to reconsider if the topic is truly appropriate for executive session. Sometimes people want to go to ES because they don’t want others hearing them sound off on an issue. That’s not appropriate either when you’re on the board – personally, I want to know what you’re thinking and why. We don’t have to agree, but if you can look me in the eye and explain why things are or aren’t happening, I don’t think I want you making decisions that will ultimately affect me.