Employment relationship – what characterizes it?

Personal performance of work and subordination to the employer

An employee working under an employment contract is obliged to perform their work independently. This means that they cannot delegate some or all of their tasks to a subcontractor, for example, or arrange for a “replacement” during their sick leave.

Consequently, the employee remains under the employer’s authority. This means that they must follow work-related instructions. It is therefore the employer who ultimately decides on the deadline for a given task or the priorities of certain issues at the expense of others, and whether or not to accept a given order. The employee obviously has the right to express their opinion (and this should even be considered desirable). However, the final decision always rests with the employer, and the employee is obliged to comply with it. Of course, this does not apply to extreme situations, i.e., cases where a given instruction/task would lead to the commission of a crime.

Fixed place and time of work

The employee is required to comply with the established place and time of work. Employees cannot completely freely decide where and when they work, what time they start work, when they take vacation or work remotely (if this is provided for by the employer at all – it should be remembered that the employer has no legal obligation to introduce remote work in the company).

It is the employer who ultimately decides whether and at what times employees will work, e.g., on New Year’s Eve, December 23 (if it is a normal working day and not, for example, a Sunday) or, for example, May 2 (if it were a Tuesday). The employer also ultimately decides with whom the employee will share an office/room, where exactly they will perform their work, and what their workstation will look like (e.g., what brand of computer or phone the employee will receive).

Continuity of work and careful operation

Work performed under an employment contract is performed on a “continuous” basis and in repetitive patterns. This means that the employment relationship does not consist of separate and independent tasks, but involves the daily performance of the same range of duties. These duties obviously consist of individual tasks that the employee performs. However, the performance of such a task (e.g., designing a house, accepting a passport application, or settling a client’s accounts for a given month) does not terminate the contract, but is only part of the performance of duties under the employment contract.

An employment contract is classified as a so-called contract of diligent action (as opposed to a contract of result). This means that in an employment relationship, it is not the effect of the work for which remuneration is paid that is important, but the diligent performance of employee duties. To illustrate this with an example: in the case of a teacher, the proper performance of duties will be the diligent “teaching” of students (i.e., diligent action), and not “teaching” students a given portion of material (i.e., result), although, of course, a positive result of work may be a measure of an employee’s diligent action.

Remuneration for work

An employment contract is also, by its nature, a contract for remuneration. Pursuant to Article 84 of the Labor Code, an employee may not waive their right to remuneration or transfer this right to another person. This means that an employee receives remuneration for their work on the terms specified not only in the employment contract, but also in the applicable regulations.

The employer is therefore obliged to respect the minimum wage and the obligation to pay additional remuneration for overtime or work on public holidays.

Vacation leave and other absences from work

An undeniable benefit of employment is the right to vacation. Employees have the right (but also the obligation) to take 20 or 26 days off work each calendar year. Importantly, this leave is fully paid. The right to take both vacation leave and other types of leave (e.g., care or parental leave) is guaranteed only to employees working under an employment contract and stems directly from the Labor Code. Therefore, even if these issues are not regulated in the employment contract, the employee will not be deprived of their right to leave.

In addition, in the case of employment relationships, certain types of absence from work (e.g., during required medical examinations, training, or sick leave) are considered justified and are mostly paid (although not always in full).

Employer risk

In the case of an employment relationship, the employer is liable to external entities for any mistakes made by the employee. An employee who has made a mistake in the course of their duties may, of course, be liable to their employer, but the scope of this liability is strictly limited (in most cases to three times the employee’s salary)

Of course, such an error on the part of an employee may sometimes constitute grounds for termination of the employment contract by the employer.