the same did not indicate the standards on which her regularization would be
13) Abbot Laboratories, Cecille Terrible, Edwin Feist, Maria Oliva Yabutmisa,
Teresita Bernardo, and Allan Almazar vs. Perlie Ann Alcaraz
G.R. No. 192571 | Perlas-Bernabe
2013 DECISION
FACTS:
 In 2004, Abbott Laboratories, Philippines (Abbott) published in the newspaper
the need for a Medical and Regulatory Affairs Manager, to which Alcaraz
showed interest and submitted application.
 Abbott formally offered Alcaraz the position. In Abbott’s offer sheet, it was
stated that Alcaraz was to be employed on a probationary basis. Later that day,
she accepted the said offer.
 Alcaraz signed an employment contract which stated that she was to be placed
on probation for a period of six (6) months beginning February 15, 2005 to
August 14, 2005.
 During Alcaraz’s pre-employment orientation, Almaraz briefed her on her
duties and responsibilities as Regulatory Affairs Manager, stating that she will
handle the staff of Hospira ALSU and will directly report to Almazar on matters
regarding Hospira’s local operations, operational budget, and performance
evaluation of the Hospira ALSU Staff who are on probationary status.
 On March 2005, Yabut-Misa, Abbott’s HR Director, sent Alcaraz an e-mail
which contained an explanation of the procedure for evaluating the
performance of probationary employees and further indicated that Abbott had
only one evaluation system for all of its employees.
 Alcaraz was called to a meeting with Walsh and Terrible where she was
informed that she failed to meet the regularization standards for the position of
Regulatory Affairs Manager. Walsh and Terrible requested Alcaraz to tender
her resignation, else they be forced to terminate her services. She was also told
that, regardless of her choice, she should no longer report for work and was
asked to surrender her office identification cards. She requested to be given one
week to decide on the same, but to no avail.
 One day, Alcaraz told her administrative assistant that she would be on leave
for that day. However, Gonzales told her that Walsh and Terrible already
announced to the whole Hospira ALSU staff that Alcaraz already resigned due
to health reasons.
 Walsh, Almazar, and Bernardo personally handed to Alcaraz a letter stating that
her services had been terminated effective May 19, 2005.
 Alcaraz felt that she was unjustly terminated from her employment and thus,
filed a complaint for illegal dismissal and damages against Abbott and its
officers, namely, Misa, Bernardo, Almazar, Walsh, Terrible, and Feist. She
claimed that she should have already been considered as a regular and not a
probationary employee given Abbott’s failure to inform her of the reasonable
standards for her regularization upon her engagement as required under Article
295 of the Labor Code. In this relation, she contended that while her
employment contract stated that she was to be engaged on a probationary status,
based.
 On the contrary, petitioners maintained that Alcaraz was validly terminated
from her probationary employment given her failure to satisfy the prescribed
standards for her regularization which were made known to her at the time of
her engagement.
 LA dismissed for lack of merit. NLRC reversed the findings of the LA and
ruled that there was no evidence showing that Alcaraz had been apprised of her
probationary status and the requirements which she should have complied with
in order to be a regular employee. CA affirmed NLRC decision.
ISSUES:
I. Whether or not Alcaraz was sufficiently informed of the reasonable
standards to qualify her as a regular employee
II. Whether or not Alcaraz was validly terminated from her employment
HELD:
I. A probationary employee, like a regular employee, enjoys security of tenure. However,
in cases of probationary employment, aside from just or authorized causes of
termination, an additional ground is provided under Article 295 of the Labor Code, i.e.,
the probationary employee may also be terminated for failure to qualify as a regular
employee in accordance with the reasonable standards made known by the employer to
the employee at the time of the engagement. Thus, the services of an employee who has
been engaged on probationary basis may be terminated for any of the following: (a) a
just or (b) an authorized cause; and (c) when he fails to qualify as a regular employee in
accordance with reasonable standards prescribed by the employer.
Section 6(d), Rule I, Book VI of the Implementing Rules of the Labor Code provides
that if the employer fails to inform the probationary employee of the reasonable
standards upon which the regularization would be based on at the time of the
engagement, then the said employee shall be deemed a regular employee, viz.:
(d) In all cases of probationary employment, the employer shall make known to the
employee the standards under which he will qualify as a regular employee at the time of
his engagement. Where no standards are made known to the employee at that time, he
shall be deemed a regular employee.
In other words, the employer is made to comply with two (2) requirements when dealing
with a probationary employee: first, the employer must communicate the regularization
standards to the probationary employee; and second, the employer must make such
communication at the time of the probationary employee’s engagement. If the employer
fails to comply with either, the employee is deemed as a regular and not a probationary
employee.
Keeping with these rules, an employer is deemed to have made known the standards that
would qualify a probationary employee to be a regular employee when it has exerted
reasonable efforts to apprise the employee of what he is expected to do or accomplish
during the trial period of probation. The exception is when the job is self-descriptive in
nature, for instance, in the case of maids, cooks, drivers, or messengers.
An employee’s failure to perform the duties and responsibilities which have been clearly
made known to him constitutes a justifiable basis for a probationary employee’s non-
regularization.
Abbott had indeed complied with the above-stated requirements. This conclusion is
largely impelled by the fact that Abbott clearly conveyed to Alcaraz her duties and
responsibilities as Regulatory Affairs Manager prior to, during the time of her
engagement, and the incipient stages of her employment.
Verily, basic knowledge and common sense dictate that the adequate performance of
one’s duties is, by and of itself, an inherent and implied standard for a probationary
employee to be regularized; such is a regularization standard which need not be literally
spelled out or mapped into technical indicators in every case. In this regard, it must be
observed that the assessment of adequate duty performance is in the nature of a
management prerogative which when reasonably exercised – as Abbott did in this case
– should be respected. This is especially true of a managerial employee like Alcaraz who
was tasked with the vital responsibility of handling the personnel and important matters
of her department.
II. A different procedure is applied when terminating a probationary employee; the usual
two-notice rule does not govern. Section 2, Rule I, Book VI of the Implementing Rules
of the Labor Code states that “if the termination is brought about by the x x x failure of
an employee to meet the standards of the employer in case of probationary employment,
it shall be sufficient that a written notice is served the employee, within a reasonable
time from the effective date of termination.”
As the records show, Alcaraz’s dismissal was effected through a letter dated May 19,
2005 which she received on May 23, 2005 and again on May 27, 2005. Abbott
determined that she failed to meet the reasonable standards for her regularization
considering her lack of time and people management and decision-making skills, which
are necessary in the performance of her functions as Regulatory Affairs Manager.
J. BRION DISSENTING OPINION 2013
While Alcaraz might have been hired as a probationary employee, the petitioners’
evidence did not establish the employers’ compliance with the probationary employment
requirements under Article 281 of the Labor Code (as amended) and Section 6(d) of the
Implementing Rules of Book VI, Rule I of the Labor Code (as amended). Thus, the
respondent should be considered a regular employee and the case should be reviewed on
this basis.
The ponencia’s reasoning, however, is badly flawed.
The law and the rules require that the performance standards communicated at the time
of engagement to the probationary employee. The performance standards to be met are
the employer’s specific expectations of how the probationary employee should perform.
The ponencia impliedly admits that no performance standards were expressly given but
argues that because the respondent had been informed of her duties and responsibilities
(a fact that was and is not disputed), she should be deemed to know what was expected
of her for purposes of regularization.
This is a major flaw that the ponencia satisfies only via an assumption. The ponencia
apparently forgets that knowledge of duties and responsibilities is different from the
measure of how these duties and responsibilities should be delivered. They are separate
elements and the latter element is missing in the present case.
The ponencia also glosses over the communication aspect. Not only must there be
express performance standards, there must be effective communication. If no standards
were provided, what would be communicated?
The ponencia badly contradicts itself in claiming that actual communication of specific
standards might not be necessary "when the job is self-descriptive in nature, for instance,
in the case of maids, cooks, drivers, or messengers." The respondent, in the first place,
was never a maid, cook, driver or a messenger and cannot be placed under this
classification; she was hired and employed as a human resources manager, in short, a
managerial employee. Plain and common sense reasoning by one who ever had been in
an employment situation dictates that the job of a managerial employee cannot be self-
explanatory, in the way the ponencia implied; the complexity of a managerial job must
necessarily require that the level of performance to be delivered must be specified and
cannot simply be assumed based on the communication of the manager’s duties and
responsibilities.
The ponencia also forgets that what these "performance standards" or measures cannot
simply be assumed because they are critically important in this case, or for that matter,
in any case involving jobs whose duties and responsibilities are not simple or self-
descriptive. If the respondent had been evaluated or assessed in the manner that the
company’s internal rules require, these standards would have been the basis for her
performance or lack of it. Last but not the least, the respondent’s services were
terminated on the basis of the performance standards that, by law, the employer set or
prescribed at the time of the employee’s engagement. If none had been prescribed in the
first place, under what basis could the employee then be assessed for purposes of
termination or regularization?
2014 RESOLUTION
Alcaraz posits that, contrary to the Court’s Decision, one’s job description cannot by and
of itself be treated as a standard for regularization as a standard denotes a measure of
quantity or quality. By way of example, Alcaraz cites the case of a probationary
salesperson and asks how does such employee achieve regular status if he does not know
how much he needs to sell to reach the same.
The argument is untenable. It is not the probationary employee’s job description but the
adequate performance of his duties and responsibilities which constitutes the inherent
and implied standard for regularization. If the probationary employee had been fully
apprised by his employer of these duties and responsibilities, then basic knowledge and
common sense dictate that he must adequately perform the same, else he fails to pass the
probationary trial and may therefore be subject to termination.
The determination of "adequate performance" is not, in all cases, measurable by
quantitative specification. It is also hinged on the qualitative assessment of the
employee’s work; by its nature, this largely rests on the reasonable exercise of the
employer’s management prerogative. While in some instances the standards used in
measuring the quality of work may be conveyed.
In Alcaraz’s case, it is hardly possible for the employer, at the time of the employee’s
engagement, to map into technical indicators, or convey in precise detail the quality
standards by which the latter should effectively manage the department. Factors which
gauge the ability of the managerial employee to either deal with his subordinates (e.g.,
how to spur their performance, or command respect and obedience from them), or to
organize office policies, are hardly conveyable at the outset of the engagement since the
employee has yet to be immersed into the work itself. Given that a managerial role
essentially connotes an exercise of discretion, the quality of effective management can
only be determined through subsequent assessment. While at the time of engagement,
reason dictates that the employer can only inform the probationary managerial employee
of his duties and responsibilities as such and provide the allowable parameters for the
same. Verily, as stated in the Decision, the adequate performance of such duties and
responsibilities is, by and of itself, an implied standard of regularization.
Alcaraz also cannot take refuge in Aliling v. Feliciano, since the same is not squarely
applicable to the case at bar. The employee in Aliling, a sales executive, was belatedly
informed of his quota requirement. Thus, considering the nature of his position, the fact
that he was not informed of his sales quota at the time of his engagement changed the
complexion of his employment.
MR denied.
J. BRION DISSENTING OPINION 2014
Requisites for a probationary employment:
1. The employer must communicate to the employee that he is being hired on a
probationary basis;
2. The employer must convey to the probationary employee the reasonable
standards to qualify for regularization;
3. The probationary status of the newly-hired employee must be communicated
to him prior to the commencement of his employment;
4. The employer must convey these reasonable standards at the time of the
probationary employee’s engagement;
5. The employer must evaluate the performance of the probationary employee
vis the duly communicated reasonable standards; and
6. The employee fails to comply with these reasonable standards before the
completion of the probationary period.
These cumulative requirements are demanded from the employer itself and cannot be
supplied for him by law. These requirements, too, should serve to dispel the wrong
notion that a probationary employee enjoys lesser rights than a regular employee under
the Labor Code. Since a probationary employment is not an "employment at will"
situation as that phrase is understood in American jurisprudence, the only way by which
the constitutional guarantee of security of tenure may be enforced is to ensure that the
employer sufficiently discharges its burden of proving compliance with these
requirements in the same manner that it is burdened to prove the existence of a valid
cause in dismissing an employee.
Inadequate performance of one’s duties" and "failure to comply with
reasonable standards" cannot actually mean the same thing. The ponencia reiterates that
adequate performance of one’s duties and responsibilities constitutes the inherent and
implied standard for regularization. In short, "if the probationary employee had been
fully apprised by his employer of these duties and responsibilities, then basic knowledge
and common sense dictate that he must adequately perform the same." 17 Otherwise, he
may be terminated on the ground that his performance during the probationary period is
"inadequate. If this is the case, then the law could have simply stated that a probationary
employee can be dismissed "if he fails to adequately perform his duties and
responsibilities" if it actually meant the "adequate performance of one’s duties" and
"reasonable standards" to mean the same thing.
In employing its present terms, Article 281 of the Labor Code merely proceeded from
the premise that security of tenure is not merely a statutory but a constitutionally
guaranteed right. To consider an employee’s regularization on the overly broad basis of
"adequacy of performance" alone would practically negate the constitutional guarantee.
Rather, the law employed a qualitative and quantitative measurement of one’s
performance by requiring a probationary employee’s performance to be measured on the
basis of reasonable standards. These standards or measurement of performance serve as
a statutory limitation to the employer’s prerogative to dismiss an employee, consistent
with the constitutional right to security of tenure.
The reason for requiring the existence of reasonable standards that are duly
communicated to the employee is not hard to discern. The probationary period of
employment is not exclusively for the benefit of the employer but of both the employer
and the employee: on one hand, the employer observes the fitness, propriety and
efficiency of a probationary employee to ascertain whether she is qualified for
permanent employment; the probationary employee, on the other hand, seeks to prove
to the employer that she has the qualifications to meet the reasonable standards duly
communicated by the employer for permanent employment.

Abbott’s pre-employment orientation and other documentary evidence

cannot amount to performance standards. The pre-employment orientation the
petitioners conducted for Alcaraz and the office policies communicated to her cannot be
equated with the performance standards required by law. The pre-employment
orientation pertains to Alcaraz’s duty to implement Abbott’s Code of Conduct and office
policies as they relate to the staff she has to manage and supervise. The other pieces of
documentary evidence Abbott presented - Code of Conduct, PPSE and Performance
Excellence Orientation Modules - were likewise in line with its purpose of acquainting
and assisting Alcaraz in her duty in supervising and evaluating the employees assigned
to her department.

Since Abbott failed to comply with the requisites for valid probationary employment,
then Alcaraz should be deemed a regular employee who can be removed only with just
or authorized causes. In the present case, the petitioners failed to show that Alcaraz's
dismissal was for a valid cause. The petitioners also failed to comply with the two-
written notice requirement under Section 2, Rule XXIII, Book V of the Omnibus Rules
Implementing the Labor Code, in violation of Alcaraz's procedural due process rights
under the law.

In addition, the abrupt and oppressive manner by which the petitioners dismissed
Alcaraz from her employment justified the award of moral and exemplary damages and
attorney's fees. To reiterate my earlier Dissent:

The narration of facts of the Labor Arbiter, the NLRC and the CA shows, among others,
that: ( 1) the individual petitioners did not follow the petitioner's prescribed procedure
performance evaluation as, in fact, the respondent's work was not evaluated; (2) the
individual petitioners, through their concerted actions, ganged up on the respondent in
forcing her to resign from employment; (3) the individual petitioners pressured the
respondent to resign by announcing her resignation to the office staff, thereby subjecting
her to unwarranted humiliation; and (4) they blackmailed the respondent by withholding
her personal possessions until she resigned from employment.

Bad faith can also be inferred from the lack of fairness and underhandedness employed
by the individual petitioners on how they informed the respondent of the termination of
her employment. The records disclose that the respondent was lured into a meeting on
the pretext that her work performance was to be evaluated; she was caught off-guard
when she was info1med that her employment had been terminated. Aside from the
abrupt notification, bad faith can also be deduced from the fact that the termination was
made immediately effective; the respondent was immediately banned from the
petitioner's premises after she was informed that her employment had been terminated.

In these lights, I vote to grant the motion for reconsideration.