Celebrating 40 Years of Compliance Leadership
June 01, 2026
6
min read
In a candid webinar session with DISA Global Solutions, Mallory Herrin, CEO and Principal HR Consultant of HerrinHR, pulled back the curtain on her experiences to uncover some the unspoken human resources errors that safety-sensitive employers make... and what they can do about them.
For starters, Mallory illustrated the issue with employers who simply “check the legal boxes,” without addressing underlying issues. Employers should treat employee accommodations and performance documentation as parallel responsibilities, not separate processes.
A progressive landscape design firm hired an employee who revealed she had ADHD only after significant performance issues arose. While the company provided accommodations under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), they failed to evaluate whether these adjustments actually helped the employee complete her essential duties.
Because the senior leaders were afraid of saying the wrong thing, they eventually fired the employee without issuing any clear, documented warnings that her job was at risk. The employee was completely blindsided, which ultimately led to a costly discrimination and retaliation lawsuit that the company chose to settle.
The moral of the story: While necessary, providing an accommodation does not eliminate the need to evaluate the effectiveness of these accommodations and proactively recommend actionable strategies if the initial adjustments are not working.
Some companies tend to prioritize their company’s brand reputation over the health and safety of their staff... to their own detriment, as Mallory pointed out.
One architectural firm faced a substantiated sexual harassment complaint against a highly effective sales leader, but instead of requesting an objective investigation to protect the organization, the CEO explicitly instructed human resources to “make it look okay” and ordered everyone to complete harassment training for optics.
In other words, the executive prioritized protecting a high earner over maintaining a safe work environment. And that call for a fake investigation not only betrayed the victims, but also destroyed the company’s trust in their leadership and led to many employees jumping ship.
Compliance and HR team act as safeguards for the organization; an investigation is never legitimate if the outcome is predetermined by leadership.
In contrast to companies that take inappropriate action, however, some companies fail to take any action at all. This is where proactive workplace risk mitigation matters most: delays can create larger operational losses than the original concern.
One company that Mallory worked with noticed a severe performance decline in a long-tenured employee who was responsible for digital content creation. After being warned that terminating the older employee without proper documentation could result in an Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) claim, the company became paralyzed by fear and took no action for over a year.
However, because the executive team was trying to navigate a hypothetical risk (the potential lawsuit) instead of addressing a real one (the employee’s performance decline), the business ended up losing more than 70% of its projected revenue for that specific service line.
The massive financial damage caused by the employee's ongoing poor performance far outweighed the potential cost of litigation, which likely would have been a fraction of the lost revenue.
The most dangerous problems within a business are often the ones no one is openly talking about. For instance: one manufacturing company invested heavily in engagement initiatives, yet employees inexplicably continued to quit while citing management as the primary reason.
During the exit interviews, the company’s human resources team eventually discovered severe manager-level abuse. Supervisors were routinely overworking teams and enforcing unequal standards, but employees were too afraid to report these issues because the complaints had to go directly through those same abusive managers. The reporting structure itself created dangerous culture gaps that prevented leaders from seeing the systemic abuse.
This structural failure is why every company needs a safe bypass channel so that employee concerns can reach the appropriate people without interception. The goal should be early intervention before high attrition creates irreversible damage.
DISA Global Solutions helps employers manage complex workforce compliance needs with solutions that support safer hiring, ongoing screening, and risk mitigation. Through services such as background checks, drug and alcohol testing, occupational health, DOT compliance, and HR compliance support, DISA gives organizations the tools to make informed workforce decisions while maintaining consistent, documented processes.
From pre-employment screening to occupational health services and workplace compliance programs, DISA helps organizations build safer, more accountable work environments. Learn more about DISA’s workforce solutions at disa.com.
A bypass channel is an alternative reporting method that allows employees to submit concerns directly to a compliance team or another designated party without having to go through their immediate manager. This is especially useful when the manager is the suspected source of the complaint.
Clear performance documentation is factual, specific, and tied directly to business expectations. It should completely avoid subjective opinions or emotions and instead focus on observable behaviors and their resulting impact on the organization.
Avoiding risk becomes a bigger threat when decisions are driven by fear of complaints rather than business reality. When leaders avoid difficult conversations, real problems continue to worsen and ultimately cause more operational damage than the initially feared confrontation.
DISA Global Solutions aims to provide accurate and informative content for educational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. The reader retains full responsibility for the use of the information contained herein. Always consult with a professional or legal expert.
