We were having a function with some top government dignitaries in my organization, and my Managing Director said “This one”, holding me “is the military man of our company. He is very strict”. Then he added, “…for the type of workers we handle, we need such a person.” Even till now, I don’t know if that is a compliment or not. Well, he isn’t the first to use such to describe me. My colleagues and some of my subordinates have also said I am too rigid and mean. Well, let me say I am firm and less tolerant of certain unacceptable employee behaviors. That is why, my advice to Managers and Leaders in various organizations is ‘to crush any unacceptable behavior from an employee at the very early stage’. If this is not done, it would germinate into a monster and influence others .
Some unacceptable employee behavior are but not limited to the following: Dress code not consistent with the corporate culture, poor hygiene, Absenteeism, Poor work ethics, Insubordination, Improper behavior toward colleagues, Unprofessionalism, Failure to meet remote work expectations, Use of company properties for personal gains, Social media misconduct, Breaking confidentiality of company information, Alcoholism, taking hard drugs, Involving in theft, bullying and violence. There are more that even boarders around financial misconducts but we sometimes don’t come back to such daily.
How Then Do You Deal With Unacceptable Employee Behaviours?
First, have an Employee Handbook. The importance of this is that it erodes all forms of ambiguity and makes it easy for reference purposes. As much as possible ensure that your Employee Handbook is robust and captures basic offences like absenteeism, late coming, insubordination, failure to meet deadlines etc to advance offences like theft, embezzlement, fraud, disclosure of confidential data, sabotage etc. When a staff joins a company newly, it is advised that he or she should be given a copy of this and such person should be made to sign off that he/she has collected, read and understood it clearly.
Communicate effectively whether verbally or when written. Communicate in and with the language your audience would understand better. Know how and when to communicate the company’s objectives as it concerns certain behaviors. Often give briefing, maybe daily or weekly. Do well to type the basic rules and place them at strategic places where they are visible by all concerned parties.
One of the benefits of discipline is that it creates deterrence. To achieve this, discipline for any offence should be swift, consistent and measurable to the offence committed. Part of the dangerous things I see some managers do is to let issues slide without using it as an example for others.
This practice isn’t healthy for the growth of any organization. Also, some organization lacks consistency in giving discipline to her staff. When people in an organization sees that staff A, B and C were punished, the staff watching would understand that there is consistency in discipline and would most likely not commit same offence others were disciplined for.
When dealing with unacceptable behavior from staff in your organization, follow due process. In some organization, they don’t take this seriously. Recently, one of the places I worked before gave two of her staff indefinite suspension. When I tried reaching out to the current Human Resource Manager, she was justifying it on the grounds that they stole. Well, I told her, if he have established that they stole, simply terminate or issue a summary dismissal in line with the Labour Law and your company’s policy. Some organizations gives warning letter without even a query. All these are very unhealthy practices that exposes the organization to legal suits.
Documentation is key to any organization. Failure to document could expose an organization to some legal litigations. No matter how minute the offence is even when as little as verbal warning is to be issued, it is advisable that it is documented. When such is documented, one of such copy should be in the employee’s file so that if need be, it can be traced. So things like query, warning letters, staff Disciplinary Committee proceedings, Policies should be documented properly.
By Ikenna M. Okafor(SmeDoctor).
Human Resource Manager @ Ammasco International Limited
Deputy Registrar @ Integrated Institute of Professional Management
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