Federal Contract Compliance Issues

An affirmative action plan is a strategy used by the human resource managers in an organization to ensure equal employment opportunities for all. According to Doverspike (2006), affirmative action refers to the procedures that tend to increase the representation of underrepresented minority groups in employment. A complete affirmative action plan ensures that after a specific amount of time, without discrimination, the employees of a certain contractor or subcontractor will show the ethnic, racial, and gender profile from which the said contractor or subcontractor selects their employees (US Department of Labor, 2016). Besides, affirmative action programs include a diagnostic component which has several analyses that are quantitative in nature and aid in the evaluation of the current employees of the contractor or subcontractor. The analyses are also called to make a comparison with what composes the relevant workforce. Therefore, this diagnostic tool can be used to conduct a survey in order to see if the contractor’s workforce is offering equal employment opportunities for all.

Furthermore, an affirmative action plan also includes action-oriented programs which outline the way to fix a certain issue in the affirmative action that needs to be addressed. For example, if a number of women or even minorities in a specific company have not been employed at the rate that they should, given their availability in the labor pool, the company’s affirmative action plan needs to include the steps that the company should take in order to fix the underutilization. Therefore, an effective solution will be provided to address the issue at hand with the purpose to ensure that after the affirmative action runs its course, the issue will have been addressed.

Additionally, an effective affirmative action plan should incorporate internal reporting and audit systems which are essential components since they measure the progress of the contractor or subcontractor in achieving the labor force that would be anticipated in case there was no discrimination. Apart from the audit and reporting systems, an effective action plan should also make sure that there are similar job opportunities by dictating how committed to the equality the contractor or subcontractor is in each detail of the employment process. Consequently, an effective affirmative action plan shows how the company in question studies and monitors the decisions it makes regarding employment.

Moreover, an affirmative action plan controls the compensation schemes that test how the said decisions impact the minorities or women. Therefore, an affirmative plan outlines in detail all the policies, guidelines, and steps that a certain company must implement to guarantee that all employees as well as the applicants qualified for the job receive equal chances of recruitment and advancing in their careers. Thus, a contractor or subcontractor should develop a good affirmative action plan since it links the goals of the organization with the organization’s strategic human resources plan.

A good affirmative plan should expand on the goal-setting process which involves creating goals that are the scorecards by which one measures the overall performance of the company. This process also includes identifying the overall goals of the organization, setting timelines to achieve the goals, creating milestones to achieve, developing plans that help to attain the outlined goals, building a tool to track the goals, and the overall monitoring of goals. During the development of an affirmative action plan, the plan should expand on the goal setting process to ensure that providing equal opportunities for all employees is among the overall human resource goals set by the company. This would guarantee that there will be no potential problems when it comes to employee discrimination.

Equal Employment Opportunity Compliance is a federal law under Title VII of the Civil rights act of 1964. Equal opportunity means offering the same treatment and opportunities for all employees, including those who belong to the minorities (Berrey, 2008). This law is applicable for each company that has at least fifteen employees and works for more than twenty weeks in a year. The EEO compliance requires that a contractor or subcontractor follows certain guidelines in their workplace. First, the employer must treat their employees fairly regardless of their gender, race, religion, genetic information, age, or even sexual orientation (Buckley, 2015). This also means that the same treatment must be shown to any worker who decides to marry someone of any of the stated categories. In compliance with the EEOC under age discrimination, older employees must be treated in the same way as the younger employees.

Besides, the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs also prohibits any contractor from discriminating against the protected veterans (OFCCP, 2013). In order to avoid discrimination, the employer must in compliance with the EEOC have a zero-tolerance for harassment because it creates a hostile working environment. Therefore, following this policy means disciplining employees who discriminate other employees. Acting on any discrimination cases means that discrimination never becomes an issue in a company’s workplace. The EEO compliance also requires the employer to keep accurate workers’ records one year after a worker’s services have been terminated. Consequently, for the plastics company subcontracted by the federal government, the EEOC should be followed strictly. The organization should not discriminate their employees, hire workers based on their qualities and skills, provide the possibility of any job positions for the public regardless of their gender, race, age, genetic information, or religion, and keep accurate records of their workforce. The above-mentioned measures ensure that the company does not lose the contract from the federal government.

The goals of an affirmative action plan should relate to the company’s strategic human resource goal. A complete human resource strategy plays a huge role in ensuring that the organization achieves its overall objectives and goals. In order to develop a good affirmative plan that corresponds to the company’s human resource goal, various ideas should be captured. The plan should guarantee that it has the right people for the job and that the opportunities for employment provided have been on merit only and not due to any bias. Besides, the plan needs to control that the workforce displays the right behaviors and attitudes, and that equal opportunities for growth are offered. Moreover, a good plan should incorporate some common themes which would help the company to achieve its goals while also addressing the most likely issues that might occur and their possible solutions.

In conclusion, whenever an organization is contracted or subcontracted to perform any task by the federal government, it needs to comply with the affirmative action plan and the Equal Employment Opportunity law. This would guarantee that the organization does not discriminate its employees based on age, sex, religion, sexual orientation, or even any form of disabilities. Besides, it would give each employee equal chances of getting promotion in the company. It would also provide a good working environment for the employees, eliminating any hostility that might arise due to discrimination. The affirmative action plan must also go hand in hand with the human resource strategies in order to achieve more benefits for the organization and ensure that the ultimate goal of the organization is reached.