A very stressful part of being in a leadership position will be when you are faced with having to issue a written warning letter to an employee in an effort to insure productivity stays and high and morale is maintained. Although it is very hard to believe, but the fact is that your staff is paying close attention to see what you will do if someone is breaking the rules.
Ever since Adam and Eve were put in the garden employees have pushed the rules. Therefore, if they notice that nothing happens to an employee that calls in sick all the time they will quickly understand that it is ok when rules are broken. So if you do nothing there is a good chance that your production rate will fall dramatically.
One of the very first and most important things you must do before ever considering issuing a written warning letter to an employee is to inform your staff of your workplace rules. The very best way to accomplish this is to create an employee handbook that covers each one of those rules and what the consequence are if they are not followed. These rules should include topics like attendance, misconduct, sexual harassment, discrimination, insubordination, stealing, fighting, etc.
One very important factor after you have produced an employee handbook is to make sure that everyone signs for their own copy of it. If you do a quick search online you will learn that you can get a simple template for an employee handbook for a little under fifty dollars. On the other hand if you really want to get something with all the bells and whistles you can spend much more.
Another very important aspect of any employee discipline program is to make sure that you are treating everyone the same. More law suits are filed over companies that treat one employee differently than another when violating the exact same policy. You may try to justify your actions by stating that one employee is a better performer than another one, but the bottom line is if they violate your policy then treat them the same. Selective enforcement will get you in big trouble.
Facts and facts only should be contained within the written warning letter itself. Never use words that refer to emotions like "I think" or "I believe." When finally sitting down and composing the written warning it should have the following elements; what rule they violated, specifically how they violated it, if they have been disciplined before, how they must improve, and then what will happen to them if they violate the policy again.
As you consider how your disciplinary program will be designed I would suggest that you begin with the least amount of discipline and progress to more severe penalties until finally terminating the employee, if their behavior doesn't improve. In some cases, like fighting or stealing, you may want to jump to immediately terminating the employee. This should all be outlined in your employee handbook as we discussed earlier. If you follow your own procedure and treat everyone fairly and consistently you shouldn't have any problems.
Ever since Adam and Eve were put in the garden employees have pushed the rules. Therefore, if they notice that nothing happens to an employee that calls in sick all the time they will quickly understand that it is ok when rules are broken. So if you do nothing there is a good chance that your production rate will fall dramatically.
One of the very first and most important things you must do before ever considering issuing a written warning letter to an employee is to inform your staff of your workplace rules. The very best way to accomplish this is to create an employee handbook that covers each one of those rules and what the consequence are if they are not followed. These rules should include topics like attendance, misconduct, sexual harassment, discrimination, insubordination, stealing, fighting, etc.
One very important factor after you have produced an employee handbook is to make sure that everyone signs for their own copy of it. If you do a quick search online you will learn that you can get a simple template for an employee handbook for a little under fifty dollars. On the other hand if you really want to get something with all the bells and whistles you can spend much more.
Another very important aspect of any employee discipline program is to make sure that you are treating everyone the same. More law suits are filed over companies that treat one employee differently than another when violating the exact same policy. You may try to justify your actions by stating that one employee is a better performer than another one, but the bottom line is if they violate your policy then treat them the same. Selective enforcement will get you in big trouble.
Facts and facts only should be contained within the written warning letter itself. Never use words that refer to emotions like "I think" or "I believe." When finally sitting down and composing the written warning it should have the following elements; what rule they violated, specifically how they violated it, if they have been disciplined before, how they must improve, and then what will happen to them if they violate the policy again.
As you consider how your disciplinary program will be designed I would suggest that you begin with the least amount of discipline and progress to more severe penalties until finally terminating the employee, if their behavior doesn't improve. In some cases, like fighting or stealing, you may want to jump to immediately terminating the employee. This should all be outlined in your employee handbook as we discussed earlier. If you follow your own procedure and treat everyone fairly and consistently you shouldn't have any problems.
About the Author:
Learn more about how to discipline an employee. Stop by Gregory Covey's site where you can receive free discipline form and how to use it.
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