- Jurisdiction
- Connecticut
My company has a bonus pool that is earned based on performance, which is rated by an employee's direct manager. Each employee's bonus and merit pay increase is based on his/her rating. To keep it simple, let's say that there are three possible ratings: Needs Improvement (the employee needs to take specific steps to improve); Fully Acceptable ( the employee meets the high expectations of the job) and; Exceed Expectations (employee performs above the level of expectations and the performance level of others in the same job). The company expects a certain percentage of employees to fall within each category, and they allocate the bonus pool accordingly. For 2018, the percentage of employees in the Exceeds Expectations group was higher than expected. In order to make sure that the high performing individuals were compensated, the company arbitrarily chose individuals who were in the category of Fully Acceptable and dropped them to the Needs Improvement category, despite glowing managerial reviews. They did not do this across the board to all Fully Acceptable employees, just certain individuals. For the individuals arbitrarily selected for this downgrade, they will receive significantly less bonus money, as well as less of a pay increase. In addition, employees in the Needs Improvement category cannot be considered for promotion or lateral job change in the company. Since the selection of the individuals to be downgraded was arbitrary and seemingly capricious, do those individuals have a case against the company for selecting them for punishment without reason?