Employee disciplinary and grievance issues

Every company in the modern world will have to handle employee disciplinary and grievance issues. A disciplinary and grievance policy will guide the management in the challenging situation. Before make a disciplinary and grievance policy, a company should give an answer of several questions which is the meaning of discipline and grievance, explaining the specific tasks of management, employees, and the union and what models are best suitable for the needs of the particular company?

After discovering the response of this query, an organization can begin to type an affordable and usable disciplinary and grievance plan. The phrase “discipline” is produced from the Latina term “disciplina”, which means training, learning and increasing. Discipline is best described as the declaration of concepts, guidelines or any other set down procedure, methods, written or otherwise in the company by the workers or list of workers, to whom these use, for sleek and effective performance of the company.

Grievance is simply a complaint which has been presented in writing formally to a management representative or a union official. The word "grievance” suggests for the most of the people a complaint that has been ignored, overridden or dismissed without having any consideration. According to Michael Jucius , “A grievance can be any discontent or dissatisfaction , whether expressed or not , whether valid or not and arising out of anything connected with the company that an employee thinks , believes or even feels as unfair , unjust or inequitable.

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” Discipline and Grievance both are "two faces of same of coin. The employee is direct to follows the discipline guidelines. Meaning of Discipline is relationship between teacher to a Student, Father to a Son and Employer to an Employee. In an Organization if Employee does not follow the instructions regarding Discipline then there is a Punishment for the particular employee. Whereas grievance is the topic that a reported registered by the worker to take care of by process provided in the union contract. Discipline and Grievance procedure:

Organisation’s aim is to motivate enhancement in individual perform as well as the procedure locations out of the action which will be taken when the company recommendations are broken and provides an affordable, efficient and continuous technique of getting disciplinary problems. Given the opportunity an employee provided with a right to appeal against any disciplinary penalty. The manager or supervisor will solve the problem with an employee as in formal discussion and the formal disciplinary procedure will be implemented if it fails to bring the required improvement. ACAS suggests disciplinary actions in firms include:

Stage 1 – first warning/verbal warning: First or official spoken caution will be apply if perform or performance is discouraging, the worker will be given a written caution or performance note. This warnings will be authorized but overlooked after specify time (e. g. three months) of appropriate service, giving no following disciplinary problems. Stage 2 – final written warning: A written warning will be given when the offences is really serious which will consist of the purpose for the caution and an observation that if no enhancement outcome within 12 months, disciplinary activity need to be considered.

Stage 3 – dismissal The employee may suffer demotion, disciplinary transfer, loss or seniority (as allowed in the contract) or dismissal if the conduct or performance has failed to improve. After investigation employee may be suspended if an offense is strong. Any suspension must be with pay unless the contract allows suspension without pay. Appeal allows employees to appeal against any disciplinary decision in writing within five working days of being informed of the decision.

Grievance procedures are required to offer individuals with an approach of action if they have a complaint (which they cannot take care of through frequent interaction with their line manager) and offer factors of contact and timescales to take care of problems of issues and try to take care of problems without selection to an employment tribunal. Grievance procedure is in place to explain how worker problems are handled. They enhance reasonable and constant therapy of workers and give an arranged process for increasing issues.

It is important to ensure problems are examined thoroughly, it gives an opportunity for workers to speech their complaint and question management but it is then up to someone outside the conflict to provide choices and not straight get involved. The grievance procedure step in firms includes: Step 1- The employee need to inform the employer by writing about their grievance. Step 2-The employee need to be invited to a meeting from the employer to discuss the grievance where the right to be followed will apply. The employee notifies in writing of the decision from the employer and informs the right to appeal.

Step 3- The employee need to inform the employer if they wish to appeal. The employer must arrange the meeting with employee and right after the meeting inform the final decision. The CIPD (2010) finishes that disciplinary and grievance procedures are needed to create sure that everyone is handled in the same way in the same situation, to create sure problems are handled quite and reasonably, and that companies are certified with present regulation and adhere to the ACAS code of Exercise for managing such disciplinary and grievance issues.

Discipline and Grievance issue in two different organisations: Sainsbury’s was founded in 1869 and today it operates over 1,000 stores, including 440 convenience stores and employs around 150,000 colleagues. Sainsbury’s put their customers at the heart of everything they do and have invested in their stores, their colleagues and their channels to deliver the best possible shopping experience. They are strong culture and values are part of their identity and integral to their success. (Source: http://www. j-sainsbury. co. uk/about-us/)

The company preserves a well-structured human resource system that conveys the job performance goals to the workers through records such as job description. It is hence suggested that providing the employees with officially detailed job explanations, expected performance levels and clearly and briefly led goals can save issues and misconception from coming up at the first place. Sainsbury’s follow the three formal warning and all grievance and discipline procedure. Morale and working conditions are reported to be good at Sainsbury. Sainsbury’s employee confirmed its reputation as a good employer in the business.

Management operate an ‘open door’ policy and make an effort to listen to and address staff concerns. There are regular forums for staff to communicate with managers through employee representatives and every three months lunches with the managing director to which manager is invited. Even through Sainsbury has strong discipline and grievance procedure but still there are a lot of unfair dismissal cases going in the employment tribunal. For example there is a case between Mr. Hitt and Sainsbury’s. Mr Hitt was dismissed for suspected of missing box of razors which was found in his personal locker.

But he dined the allegation saying that it had been planned on him where he shares the locker with his another colleague and there is no proper witness which prove that he has stolen the box of razors. Sainsbury’s could not investigate the factor before dismissing Mr. Hitt. The employment tribunal has turn over the dismissal decision because Sainsbury’s failed to provide sufficient evidence against Mr. Hitt. Because of those kind simple mistakes Sainsbury’s loses lots of time and money where they do not follow the disciplinary and grievance procedure properly.

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