5-1 Final Project Milestone Two-Performance Management-Employee and Labor Relations PDF

Preview

Summary

milestone two...

Description

Organization Employee Discipline When looking at workplace discipline supervisors are typically the ones who are responsible for maintaining corrections on behavioral deficiencies to ensure employees follow guidelines that are set in place by the organization. There are no perfect employees and at times, disciplinary actions are needed in order to correct behaviors. There are two approaches to employee discipline, punitive and non-punitive. There are some similarities between the two approaches, however they are both geared to guide and lead an employee in the right direction to ensure a previous infraction is not repeated (Campbell, Fleming, & Grote, 1985). Most common employee problems will come from misconduct or incompetence, neither of these behaviors are most likely not to be intentional. Punitive Punitive discipline is considered the traditional means of discipline. This practice has been a tradition since the 1930’s, it has also been known as ‘progressive discipline’ (Watson, 2014). With this discipline, you should not take privileges or incentives away nor require them to work extra hours or difficult shifts. These practices have a record of not working, examples of this kind of discipline range from punishing a child for bringing home a bad grade from school, or altercations within the workplace that ultimately end with jail time or loss of job. According to Campbell et al, (2015), supervisors can possibly face apathy, hostility, reduced output along with an uncomfortable work environment. The problem with punitive discipline is it an adversarial method and creates “labor vs. management”, or better known as “us vs. them”, this can cause a counterproductive work environment, a supervisor can and will be known as the “bad guy”, most

supervisors do not see this type of discipline a being corrective. It can be preserved as being made to jump through hoops in order to terminate an employee (Watson, 2014). Non-Punitive This approach is meant to represent a more realistic, more adult and more positive way of encouraging a disciplined work force, the system is set to recognize that workers must be the real source of discipline. In order for this for this to work, the system needs to be linked with a consistent manner that is set with the human resource management programs (Campbell et al, 2015). There are steps that need to be taken in order to implement this type of discipline. The first step with this discipline is to issue an oral reminder: this is where a meeting takes place with the offender to talk about the issue at hand. The goal of this meeting is to solve the problem at hand. This is an alternative to warning of more serious actions to come, instead, management needs to remind the employee they have a responsibility to meet the reasonable standards of their performance and behavior. The meeting should be documented well and be kept in a working file, it should be explained to the employee that although it is the first step of the discipline process and will not be kept in the employee’s permanent file unless the problem persists or arises again. If the problem come about again, then the second step of a written reminder comes into play. The manager will need to meet with the employee again in a serious manner, however this must be done without threats. The conversation should include business reasons why it is important to follow the rules and standards that are put in place while discussing their failure to follow the original agreement, they then discuss again an agreement to help solve the issue and work towards an action plan. After the meeting, the manager then needs to puts together a written memo that is sent to the employee and then it is placed in the employee’s personnel file. In both meetings, an agreement should be determined with the employee being in agreement with the

discussion of the change that needs to be made. The employee is more likely to improve their performance and or behavior and if performance and behaviors are not improved per the agreement, then another meeting should take place with the focus being on the problem and their failure to abide by the agreement, finally, if the employee does not agree to expectations it should be documented and placed in the permanent file, this will become justifications for termination. Unlike in the punitive approach of the employee feeling as if it’s them vs management, causing overtime, being short staffed and over worked due to punishments being leveled, the nonpunitive approach allows the employee to have the chance to improve their behavior before a termination takes place. This allows, for unnecessary overtime, shortage of staff as well as may increase productivity (Campbell et al, 2015). Performance Management An effective performance management is an ongoing process, not a one-time thing. To be effective there are steps that need to be taken. The first step that needs to be taken is to define performance outcomes, from there employee goals, behaviors and actions need to be developed in order achieve the outcomes. Support needs to be given as well as ongoing performance discussions. In the fourth step the performance should be evaluated which leads to step five where improvements that are needed are identified that leads to step six that provides consequences for the performance results steps five and six both lead back to step one. Continuous evaluation of the effectiveness of the performance management will aide in monitoring the needs that may need to be improved on or changed. It is critical for organizations to execute their talent management in order to identify strengths and weaknesses and drive an employee engagement as well as link appropriate training and developments, they need to offer good performance with incentives and or pay (Noe, et al, 2019).

Employee and Labor Relations When employees are part of a union, filing a grievance needs to be done by following a process that has been outlined in the collective bargaining agreement. They are handled in systematic way and have several steps which starts with an informal review. Sometimes this could be as easy as an employee meeting with a supervisor, the union employee and the union steward in order to discuss the issue at hand. If this issue cannot be resolved then there are other steps that need to be taken that may involved a review by management, written responses and appeals. If a grievance cannot be resolved at the company level then an arbitration could be the final step, at this time an arbiter will be selected to hear the case at hand, issues can range from dissatisfaction with work assignments to unfair treatment within the workplace (Mayhew, 2019). When an employee is a nonunion member the complaint process simpler, however, it can follow some of the same processes as a union member. It begins with a meeting with the employee, supervisor and an HR staff member the goal is to resolve the employee relation issues. If an issue cannot be resolved unlike a union member, a nonunion member can choose to file a complaint with a federal agency such as U. S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) or a state fair employment agency. One needs to remember if filing with a federal agency such as the EEOC it must fall under a low that is enforced by that agency, such as Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Mayhew, 2019). There are a few things that can be done to improve nonunion complaint process. There could be standardized guidelines across all industries. It’s been my experience in most cases a stern talking to without any action taken will not improve a situation. I feel having a Performance Improvement Plan in place would help put in place a commitment in order to help improve employee performance, this would put a standard plan in place with no grey areas (SHRM, 2020).

References Campbell, D. N., Fleming, R. L., & Grote, R. C. (1985). Discipline without punishment--at last. Harvard Business Review, 63(4), 162. Retrieved from: https://eds-b-ebscohostcom.ezproxy.snhu.edu/eds/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=2&sid=1ad61ed5-11ab-4ed5-8e91d588dd4596c4%40pdc-v-sessmgr01 KCY AT LAW. (2019). Discipline in the Workplace. Retrieved from: https://www.kcyatlaw.ca/discipline-in-the-workplace/ Mayhew, R. (2019). Difference Between a Unionized Vs. a Nonunionized Workforce. Retrieved from: https://smallbusiness.chron.com/difference-between-unionized-vs-nonunionizedworkforce-22350.html SESCO Management Consultants. (2020). A Positive Approach to Employee Discipline. Retrieved from: https://sescomgt.com/resources/articles/a-positive-approach-toemployee-discipline/98 Society of Human Resource Management, (2020). How to Establish a Performance Improvement Plan. Retrieved from: https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/tools-and-samples/howto-guides/pages/performanceimprovementplan.aspx Watson, T. (2014). Discipline Without Punishment: A Best Practices Approach To Disciplining Employees. Retrieved from: https://www.watson-training.com/blog2/46-discipline-withpunishment-a-best-practices-approach-to-disciplining-employees.html...