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Employment Contract

Short Description​

An employment contract is an agreement/contract between two parties, one of which controls a set of actors (the subjects of the contract), that states (or refers to) all (sets of) rights and duties under which these actors can and/or must work for the other party. This includes rights and duties of both parties, as well as rights and duties of the actor(s) that are the subject of the contract.

Rights and duties pertain to e.g., (groups of) actions that the actor(s) are expected (not) to execute, which policies they would be expected (not) to follow, the conditions under which the actor(s) should work (e.g. times, locations, ...), the provisioning of any means needed to perform, etc. And of course, the contract would also state how the party that controls these actors will be remunerated.

The creation of employment contracts are part of what is called onboarding (of an actor, that is a subject of the employment contract, by the party that wants to deploy the actor as one of its agents. More details are given in the party actor action pattern.

Examples​

An individual may sign a labor contract, that allows it to work for an organization in a designated function, for which it receives a salary. The individual and the organization, which both qualify as parties, sign the contract, which states the conditions under which the individual (as an actor) works for the organization. The function represents the kinds of actions that it would be executing, and there would be a section on working hours/locations, etc.

An individual that is an employee for an employment agency would have a similar contract with that agency that provides it with a measure of control over the individual that enables it to negotiate employment contracts with other organizations. The actor (subject) of such an employment contract is the individual, and the other organization and the employment agency are the parties that sign the employment contract.

Accountants that are employed by an accountancy firm have a contract with the accountancy firm stating the conditions (rights and duties of either) under which they work for that firm. When the firm receives an order from some organization for an accountancy job, it can then assign the accountant to that job. However, while this accountant may work at the premises of the organization, the latter will not have onboarded

The Parties, Actors and Actions pattern describes how this concept fits in with related concepts.

Purpose​

The purpose of having employment contracts is to ensure that expectations that parties have towards one another, and towards actors that work for them, are matched by corresponding obligations of the reciprocal party (for details on matching, see the section Matching of the Governance and Management pattern). An employment contract that is made explicit, and electronically available, may also serve as part of the chain of assets that are needed to determine the right (or duty) of an actor to execute an action on behalf of some party.

Criteria​

An employment contract is an agreement/contract

  • between two parties, one of which controls a set of actors (the subjects of the contract);
  • that states (or refers to) all (sets of) rights and duties under which these actors can and/or must work for the other party;
  • that includes rights and duties of both parties, as well as rights and duties of the actor(s) that are the subject of the contract.