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Formalizing Behavior Standards, Consequences, and Procedures

LEARNING OUTCOMES
  • Discuss laws relating to employee rights
  • Discuss disciplinary factors and guidelines

Photograph of a smiling manRemember when you helped Freedom Inc., the rapidly-growing company that sold products with superabsorbent material for incontinence?

Your brilliant decisions helped them hire an HR director, Michael, and an assistant director, Stacia. Well, your diligence has paid off, and the company is humming along.

Now you get to help them with some additional work regarding employee rights and responsibilities. 

Ready to help them?

 

Photograph of a woman at a laptopThe company’s rapid growth and its unique culture have meant that the HR group—which, you will remember, includes Maurice, who is a member of the original Freedom Inc. team from before it’s expansion—needs to formalize a lot in terms of employee behavior, consequences, and procedures. 

Freedom Inc. is still in hiring mode. In fact, the CEO, Annalise, jokes that she sees at least one new face every day.

While Michael and Stacia have been scrambling to onboard new employees and complete their paperwork, they haven’t had much time to check in on the interview processes that take place within the departments. 



Photograph of a woman holding a tabletStacia gets a call one day from Eleanor, a friend from grad school who got hired as a marketing manager at Freedom Inc.

Eleanor asks if they can meet. When they do, Eleanor looks troubled. “I was in a meeting yesterday with Stuart, the Marketing VP.

We were going over some of the application packages we’ve received for a Marketing Research Director, and he said something that’s not only unethical,

I’m pretty sure it’s illegal.”

PRACTICE QUESTION

Which of the following could Eleanor tell Stacia that would indeed be unquestionably illegal?

  • “He’s going to check their social media to see whether they’re drinkers. Since it’s a travel-intensive position, he wants to make sure the person will stay in control around outside colleagues.”
  • “He’s going to check people’s resumes, and if they’ve held any job for less than two years, he won’t hire them.”
  • “Since it’s a travel-intensive position with a high-limit AmEx card, he wants to run credit checks and then interview only the people whose score is 750 or above.”
  • “Stuart said he would ask about salary history in the interview and hire whoever was cheapest.”
Answer

  • “Since it’s a travel-intensive position with a high-limit AmEx card, he wants to run credit checks and then interview only the people whose score is 750 or above.” No matter what state Freedom Inc. operates, in to do this would violate the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FRCA). It is mandatory to get written permission from the applicant before checking their credit. Eleanor is right to bring this to Stacia’s attention before Stuart’s actions get the company in trouble. 

One of the tasks Michael and Stacia have to accomplish as soon as possible is to establish policies and procedures for handling underperforming employees. While they will have to work out the details, they definitely want to follow a four-step progressive discipline process. What are the four basic steps they will follow when an employee needs disciplining?

  • Personal warning, demotion, HR warning, termination
  • Verbal warning, “hot stove” procedure, union intervention, termination
  • Verbal warning, written warning, suspension, termination
  • HR discipline, retraining, suspension, termination
Answer

  • Verbal warning, written warning, suspension, termination. This is the proper order for progressive discipline. Of course, each step will be somewhat different depending on the issue, the company, and whether or not the employee belongs to a union.

Photograph of a man crossing his arms.Just as Michael and Stacia are wrapping up the document for disciplinary procedures, one of the plant managers, Juan, comes to them to discuss an underperforming employee, Chad.

It seems that Chad spends a lot of time wandering around trying to look busy without actually doing much work.

He’s also been antagonizing some of the female employees who work on retooling the machinery. 

Juan is frustrated, and he wants HR to fire Chad. Michael says that’s not how the process works. Instead, he lays out a plan for Juan to follow.

PRACTICE QUESTION

What first steps represent good HR disciplinary practice?

  • Capture video of Chad messing around when he should be working. Then confront him with the video and ask him to justify his actions.
  • Train Juan in becoming comfortable with difficult conversations, then give him a template for documenting his verbal warning conversation with Chad.
  • Send Chad to HR to talk with Michael, who will carry out the verbal warning process. Then send Chad for sexual harassment sensitivity training.
  • Have Juan call a meeting of the entire tool shop team and give them a general warning about productivity, then keep an eye on Chad until he messes up again.
Answer

  • Train Juan in becoming comfortable with difficult conversations, then give him a template for documenting his verbal warning conversation with Chad. Yes. It’s HR’s responsibility to train managers and supervisors to undertake difficult conversations when their direct reports are not meeting performance expectations. Since Juan knows both what Chad’s job requires and how Chad has been messing up, the initial conversation will be more meaningful if it’s just between the two of them. In addition, since Juan knows what the job involves, he should be the one working out an improvement plan with Chad.

You’ve helped Juan make the right decision about how to proceed. Now he needs to prepare for this conversation. Michael has talked to him about the FRISK model. In this case, what should Juan’s notes for following the FRISK model look like?

  • Present the Facts around Chad’s unsatisfactory conduct; show where the Rule of authority has been violated; discuss the Impact of his conduct on the women in his department and on productivity in general; outline Suggestions for improvement for both of his issues; verify his Knowledge of Chad’s right to respond to corrective documentation in his file.
  • Instill Fear in Chad that he may lose his job; give him a chance to Ruminate on his failings and discuss any problems; see what Ideas he has for keeping his job; examine any Sticking points that might get in the way of improving; Kill any impulses Chad may have to justify or explain his behavior. 
  • Outline Chad’s Faults, including both his lack of productivity and his sexism; discuss Retraining possibilities; discuss his Insubordination as a personal affront to Juan; calculate the impact his issues will have on his Salary; reiterate that Chad has the Knowledge to fix his problems.
Answer

  • Present the Facts around Chad’s unsatisfactory conduct; show where the Rule of authority has been violated; discuss the Impact of his conduct on the women in his department and on productivity in general; outline Suggestions for improvement for both of his issues; verify his Knowledge of Chad’s right to respond to corrective documentation in his file. In this case, this is how the FRISK model works, and the capitalized letters spell out the correct words in the acronym. For Juan, the FRISK model should work well to keep the verbal warning meeting on a positive track and let Chad see that there are ways to improve that will let him keep his job. 

Once again, you’ve helped to keep Freedom Inc. on the road to profitability and smooth productivity. As you learned, the discipline process is a delicate balance of several factors: honoring a candidate or employee’s right to privacy and protection from unethical—or illegal—prying; giving a struggling or underperforming employee the tools to improve; and protecting the company from litigation while also ensuring that employees are working well.

Having written policies and procedures for intervening with problem employees is the best first step in avoiding larger issues down the road. Thanks to Michael and Stacia, Freedom Inc. has a good foundation for dealing with all of it.

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