How "Timely" Should A Disciplinary Action Be?
Crout
1,238 Posts
[font size="1" color="#FF0000"]LAST EDITED ON 10-22-02 AT 02:24PM (CST)[/font][p]One of our Supervisors just issued a Verbal Warning to an EE for turing in an inaccurate timesheet. The EE called in sick for a shift, but had done her timesheet in advance and did not correct it. This happens fairly often, and we usually issue a discipline because it's against policy. The problem is that the discipline was written on 09/19/02, but not issued to the EE until 10/21/02. A difference of one month and a few days. Now the Union is squawking to me that the discipline was not "timely" and should be recinded. I wanted to get a sense from my fellow HR folks what an appropriate amount of time would be for a discipline of this kind. How long is too long? Thanks. One more thing: When asked, the Supervisor said that she was "too busy" to attend to this issue sooner, which I know is nonsense.
Comments
The amount of time you describe is too long for administering discipline for what appears to be an administrative issue. Under your circumstances in this type of case, I suggest no more that a week should go by since that is probably the latest that the infraction might be caught via the processing of payroll.
Cinderella
But I wouldn't necessairly withdraw it (unless your contract with theunion indicates that it should).
The are a couple of considerations here to help decide...
1. At the time the supervisor talked to the employee, what was really said about a written warning. Did the supervisor at all indicate that there would be a written warning forthcoming or did he just leave it at "And don't do this again. Get back to work"? In short, is the written warning truly unexpected by the employee or was he just hoping it wouldn't be issued after th esueprvisor said that it would be?
2. Did anything happen between the date of the conference or incident upon which the written warning was based and the issue date of the warning that would have been impacted by the warning had it been issued sooner? Hopefully not.
3. How important or serious was the incdient upon which the warning is based? Is there a resonable chance th eemplyee may do it again?
4. Can you settle for a written counseling -- whihc in essence would do the same thing as the written warning --and withdraw the warning or is it all or nothing?
I don't think that there is any specific time period that can be set --"reasonable time period" comes to mind but saying a specific number of days would be wrong. A lot depends on what the superivsor or other managers are doing. In the intervening time, the employee should have been left with the impression that a warning was forthcoming. In this case, the supervisor's explanation doesn't bode well for saying the one month was reasonable. If he had been on vacation, been pulled away for special assignment, been invesigating the incident, etc., that should there was some constant activity that was properly engaged in to prepare for the issuance of a warning or that prevented the supervisor or other manager from writing it, the case could be made that the 30 days was reasonable in that circumstance.
Unless your contract requires the discipline to be rescinded or the employee is somehow prejudiced, I would keep it in place. From the facts, it sounds like the employee is not disagreeing that she violated policy. If you can resolve it by issuing a lessor discipline, you might want to do so.
Even if you keep the discipline in place, you may also want to counsel the supervisor about timely discipline. I would explain to the supervisor that the failure to give this discipline timely cost the company time and money in dealing with the union and lowers the morale of employees.
Good Luck!
>loud argument just two days before the Supervisor got around to
>issuing the Verbal Warning. The Supervisor is adamant in claiming
>that the argument had no bearing on the timetable, but the Union is
>not buying it. Also, our Union contract does not address the timeline
>issue. Thanks to all for the feedback.
Well, that supervisor should be admonished...because it doesn't look good. It looks like retaliation for the argument. NO amount of denying from the supervisor is going to change the mind of the union on this. If there is no provision from the union, make sure that the verbal warning is documented for what it is and kept in the file. If the union wants to grieve it, let them...just have all your ducks in a row (facts).
Withdraw the warning memo; issue it as a counseling memo; doesn't go into the employee's official file. If there is no repetition of the condicut in that first incident, it won't be referenced in the evaluation for the period and everyone moves on.
I am also wondering what the argument was about and why the employee thinks that it is okay to get into a shouting match with the supervisor. Sounds to me like you need to get with your supervisor and find out what occured. Unless the employee was asserting some sort of unlawful discrimination in the "shouting match", I would not excuse the employee's behavior. The employee may be lucky that he or she has not also gotten written up for disruptive behavoir or insubordination.
Good Luck
Where it has become a difficult to support a severe disicplinary action for "insubordination" either because the instruction was given verbally or it was clear that the employee was really being defiant but may have just failed to proerly do the job, it is possible to charge a less onerous offense, such "failing to follow instructions" with a less exacting disciplinary response (one more keeping with the concept of progressive discpline, perhaps). It's probably in this second group that most day to day situations occur where the supervisor thinks of "insubordination."
I would still settle once the greivance had been filed. Look you can play the games of reqiring to go through all three levels before seetlling, or even playing "chicken" by denying the grievance at th third level and requiring arbitration to be filed and then settling. But, obviously you will need to settle. A position that the warning needs to stand is untenable
Clearly the union has a strong case of retaliation to make. The superivosr's write up is untimely given the intervening incident and lack of reasonable explanation for the 30 day turn around time.
Your statement that the incident has not been denied is interesting. I really don't understand it. Has the employee denied the occurrence any incident similar to what is described in the warning or has he just not commented on whether any type of incident occurred or not? And if the latter, why didn't the superivsor talk to the employee (investigate)and others (f any witnesses, which I suspect don't exist) before he decided to issue a warning? Why didn't the supervisor know the employee's position on the allegation BEFORE he wrote the warning? Just what WAS written in the warning?
Is the union saying, the incident didn't occur and if it did occur (assuming the fact finder during a grievance step or even the arbitrator rules that it did), the warning that was issued was not in response to the incident, as demonstrated by the long time before the issuance but by the intervening alleged act of disagreement between the superivsor and the employee? Thus the warning should be rescidned, the union argues, because the incidnet never occurred and if it did occur the warning was in retaliation for the disagreement (the superivsor had no intent to issue the warning until after the disagreement occurred.)
We don't know what he said. He may have said that "the counseling was sufficient and don't engage in the behavior again." Or, he may have said nothign about what he was going to do in the future, leaving the emplyee with the reasonable belief that the meeting was the end of the issue. Then when the second incident occurred, knowing that the practice has been not to discipline employees for that they of behavior, to issue the warning for the earlier behavior, "recanting" his original closure with the employee.
I wouldn't be surprised if the employee's account on that basis differs from the supervisor's -- that the employee essentially says, the conference meeting was the end of it as the supervisor didn't indicate anything about a written warning later and that the counseling was all that was needed; while the supervisor says that he would be issuing a written warning in follow up to the meeting within the next few days.
If an arbitrator is going to hear both sides of that isse, who do you think is going to look more credible? A supervisor who had no reasonable explanation for delaying the issue of a warning memo for 30 days and idd so only after an intervening incident between the two, the nature of which isn't disciplined? I don't think so.
OK, back to reality now....
James Sokolowski
Senior Editor
M. Lee Smith Publishers