Use exit interviews to reduce your facility’s risk
Use exit interviews to reduce your facility’s risk
Many health care providers still lack a systematic method for conducting exit interviews. While there is no single method for performing these interviews, they should be an integral component of every compliance program, says Vicki McCormick, special counsel with Halleland Lewis in Minneapolis.
"Sometimes, it is a resource issue," she says. "There are not always enough resources to exit-interview everyone."
That means some organizations will have to look at their population and focus their resources for exit interviews on people who might be aware of possible compliance issues, says McCormick, who was, until recently, the integrity officer at United Health in Minneapolis. Companies also may opt to interview only voluntarily terminated employees. "There are numerous issues with involuntarily terminated employees that may make them less credible," explains McCormick.
At United, McCormick says only involuntarily terminated employees above a certain grade level were interviewed before they departed. She says that organization uses an on-line exit interview process that asks about possible violations of law or company policies using examples. "You want examples in the question that are relevant to your particular organization," she says.
According to McCormick, if the interviews are conducted by human resources staff, there must be an effective method in place to forward responses to the compliance department. "Otherwise, somebody may raise a legitimate compliance issue and it gets filed away," she says.
Beyond that, companies must pay attention to standard compliance program activity. "If there is a problem, you need to fix it."
One thing few organizations do is plan in advance for key personnel or sole-source personnel leaving the organization suddenly or without having the opportunity to put a transition plan in place if somebody quits or is terminated. "If the organization has not planned for that transition, they have a huge gaping hole in the organization," warns McCormick.
Another important issue is employees who leave with a separation or severance agreement, which should include provisions that require disclosure. "It may be that they don’t know about it or think about it until after they leave the company, so you want it to be an ongoing obligation."
"The idea here is that you don’t want to have somebody leave the organization with a separation or severance agreement who then also turns into a whistle-blower," says McCormick.
Companies want to make sure they are aware of what this person knows. "If there are problems that this person is aware of, the company wants to place that obligation on him or her to let the company know so they can fix it," she says.
According to McCormick, one unclear area regarding severance and separation agreements concerns provisions that prohibit someone from becoming a whistle-blower. "A court would probably invalidate such a clause," she says.
Less clear is the validity of a provision in a separation or severance agreement that allowed the former employee to become a whistle-blower but prohibited him or her from collecting any remuneration, says McCormick. But she says that a clause that releases employees from claims under the civil False Claims Act and other applicable laws is another possible consideration.
For the vast majority of employees, all you are doing is an exit interview. "That makes it important to look at your exit-interview process, because that is where you are going to address most departing employees," she warns.
For most organizations, the exit interview primarily is a human resources function, she adds. "Even though it is primarily a management tool, it is also a key juncture to find out if they are aware of any compliance issues," she says.
"If you fail to give the person the opportunity to let you know about something they are concerned about, you may also have a whistle-blower in the making," she concludes.
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