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8 Emp. Resp. & Rts. J. 1 (1995)

handle is hein.journals/emprrj8 and id is 1 raw text is: Employee Responsibilities and Rights Jouma, Vol. 8, No. 1, 1995 Damn with Faint Praise The Legal, Practical, and Ethical Implications of Providing and Not Providing Employee References Deborah S. Kleinert In the past decade, there has been a multiplicity of lawsuits by employees against former employers based on defamatory references. Many of these lawsuits have proven to be successfid and have caused wary employers to use great care in providing references. A number have gone so far as to refuse to provide references at all, instead adopting a no-comment policy, often on the advice of legal counsel. This article reviews defamation laws within the context of employee references. Recent cases and trends are analyzed, guidelines to avoid liability are suggested, and a critique of the traditional legal advice of no-comment is provided. Finally, business-related and socioethical aspects of the problem are considered. KEY WORDS: employment law; references; defamation. Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer, And, without sneering, teach the rest to sneer; Willing to wound, and yet afraid to strike, Just hint a fault, and hesitate dislike. Alexander Pope, Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot 1.193 INTRODUCTION Regardless of the size of its work force, every employer must deal with the issue of providing a reference for a former employee. In a small business, the re- quest for a reference may arise only infrequently; in a larger enterprise, the em- ployer, in the guise of proprietor, president, supervisor, or manager of a personnel department, must deal with this problem on a regular basis. Of course, if every person employed has achieved the platonic ideal of em- ployee, then every reference would be a rave review. In that case, assuming the accuracy of the employer's praise, the legal pitfalls are minimal. However, most 'St. John's University, Colleges of Business Administration, Jamaica, New York 11439. 1 0892-7545/9510300-0001$07.50,0 0 1995 Plenum Publishing Corporation

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