Workplace Investigation Training: What the Three-Day Certificate Program Covers

Workplace Investigation Training at a Glance

Session dates and cities change through the year. The current list is on the Internal Investigations Certificate Program page and the HR seminar calendar.

Day One: When to Investigate, Strategy, and the Law

The first day answers the questions that come before any interview.

Evaluating whether an investigation is needed

The agenda opens with why employees complain and what they complain about, the effect of social media on complaints, how to tell a complaint that requires an investigation from one that does not, how to set boundaries on what HR does and does not own, and how HR obtains investigative authority.

Developing an investigative strategy

This block covers pre-planning, choosing an appropriate investigator, when you must recuse yourself, the skills an investigator needs, selecting team members, and anticipating organizational politics before the case begins. For a preview of the planning stage, see our HR investigation process, step by step.

Federal labor and employment law

The agenda includes a review of Title VII and anti-discrimination and harassment law, quid pro quo and hostile work environment harassment, other laws that come into play, employer obligations on when and how to investigate, and when remedial action is necessary.

Common law obligations

The agenda lists retaliation, including the Supreme Court case that redefined it; negligent hiring, supervision, retention, and investigation; assault and battery; defamation; privacy and search policies; and electronic communications and social media. Our article on workplace retaliation covers the retaliation standard in depth.

Day One includes two interactive exercises: one on social media and employee rights, and one on telling "frosty" behavior from retaliation. It ends with a skill-building practice investigation of an allegation of FMLA abuse.

Day Two: Interviews, Findings, Evidence, and the Report

The second day is the core of the method.

Conducting witness interviews

Topics include preparation, choosing and setting up the interview space, virtual interviews, Weingarten rights in union settings, a structured questioning technique the program calls "Bulls Eye," assessing whether a witness is being truthful, gaining cooperation from reluctant witnesses, and handling aggressive ones. Two exercises follow, one on the questioning technique and one on reluctant witnesses. For background reading, see our guide to interview questions and technique.

Case management and the findings meeting

This block covers how to present findings to leadership succinctly, stand behind your work, check current policies and past practice before decisions are made, recognize decisions that could lead to negligent retention claims, and know when to bring in internal or outside legal support. An exercise deals with organizational politics when presenting findings.

Organizing evidence

Topics include using software to collect and collate documentation, aligning each allegation with the applicable policies and laws, building a fact pattern and timeline, and deciding whether you have enough to conclude. Our post on evidence collection and storage shows what that looks like in a case file.

Writing the investigative report

The agenda covers memo versus formal report formats, what belongs in a report and what does not, evaluating credibility and documenting corroboration and inconsistencies in "he said/she said" cases, closing out with complainants and witnesses, security protocols for investigative documents, and avoiding liability for disclosing or destroying evidence prematurely.

Day Three: Practice Investigations

The third day is a workshop. According to the agenda, participants work collaboratively on three mock investigations, taking each fictitious case from documenting the initial complaint through witness interviews, gathering evidence, and learning how to write a final investigative report. Each case involves a different sensitive issue.

The agenda recommends bringing a laptop, tablet, or notebook on Day Three for note taking during the practice interviews and for a classroom activity on preparing an executive summary. The day closes with a program wrap-up and action steps for after the course.

This is the part that separates the program from reading about investigations. The course page describes the approach as practical, built on realistic scenarios and real court case studies, with templates intended for immediate use.

What You Take Away

The course page lists these materials and benefits:

• A participant workbook of about 300 pages
• Sample investigation forms and templates
• Witness interview guides
• Documentation and chain-of-custody forms
• Real court case studies
• Checklists and administrative recommendations
• 18 SHRM and HRCI recertification credits; confirm current approval on the Credits tab
• A frameable certificate showing you completed the training

Seminar participants also receive access to the online Internal Investigations Training and Certification Program. The agenda tab describes it as a self-paced course with administrative tips, procedural recommendations, interactive quizzes, a bookmark feature, and its own recertification credit. The agenda states eight hours. It includes an optional online test for the provider's "Certified Administrator" designation. Updates to the online materials are free for one year from enrollment, and the page states that an annual renewal fee applies after that.

A certificate, not a license

Be clear with yourself and your employer about what this is. The program does not confer a license or an accredited professional certification, and it does not by itself satisfy any legal training mandate. You receive a certificate documenting that you completed three days of training, and, if you take the optional online test, a designation issued by the training provider. Its value is the skill you can demonstrate afterward and the record that you were trained. Our comparison of workplace investigator certification options explains how certificates and third-party credentials differ.

Who This Program Suits, and Who Should Choose Something Else

The course page names its intended audience: HR professionals building investigative skills, managers and supervisors who handle employee relations issues, compliance officers, legal and risk management professionals, and organizations with centralized or decentralized investigators that want a consistent process.

It is a good fit if you:

• Conduct or will soon conduct investigations yourself and have had little formal instruction
• Learn better by practicing interviews and report writing than by reading
• Want a repeatable process and ready-made forms for your organization
• Need recertification credit and would like it to come from skills you will use

Another option may fit better if you:

• Already run investigations regularly and want harder material. Compare the two courses in Basic or Advanced: Which Investigations Program Fits You?
• Cannot be away for three consecutive days. The self-paced online program covers the subject on your own schedule, without the live practice cases.
• Need to train a whole team on one process. For six or more people, the course page says the program can be brought to your location; see custom onsite HR training.
• Handle only a few complaints a year and most are high-stakes. Training still helps you manage the process, but some cases belong with an outside investigator or counsel whatever your training.
• Want a credential from an independent professional body. That is a different product with its own eligibility rules, covered in the certification options article above.

If the question is budget approval, making the case to your employer sets out how to present the request.

How to Prepare

1. Read your organization's complaint, anti-harassment, and anti-retaliation policies, and bring your questions about them.
2. Think of one or two closed cases, with identifying details removed, that you found difficult. The exercises are more useful when you have a real problem in mind.
3. Bring a laptop or tablet for Day Three, as the agenda recommends.
4. For virtual sessions, give a mailing address at registration; the agenda states that course materials are mailed to it.
5. Check the early registration terms. The page says an "Early Bird" discount is offered for registrations made 30 days before the seminar date.

Frequently Asked Questions

The Bottom Line

Three days of workplace investigation training is worth it when the time is spent the way this agenda spends it: one day on when to investigate and the law that shapes the work, one day on interviewing, evidence, and report writing, and one day running practice cases from complaint to report. If that matches what you need, review dates and formats for the Internal Investigations Certificate Program or browse the HR seminar calendar.

If you are still deciding, the Workplace Investigations Guide links to every stage of the process, so you can test your current practice against it first.