Deck 16: Managing Employee Discipline

Question 1

Objective
The primary objective of this exercise is to permit individuals to decide whether actions taken by management are legally defensible under the employment-at-will concept. The exercise illustrates the importance of considering state laws when making termination decisions.
Set Up the Exercise
1. Form groups of six to eight students to analyze and discuss each of the following situations.
2. Groups should first identify employment-at-will exceptions recognized by courts in the state in which their college or university is located or in a state assigned by the instructor. To do this, students can use Exhibit 15-7 and Web sites such as FindLaw, http://www.findlaw.com, which contain state law information.
3. Each group should then determine whether the terminations described in the situations below are legally justified in their state. Then each group should prepare a brief statement explaining its decision and discussing any applicable employment-at-will exceptions.
4. Review each of the group decisions with the entire class.
Mr. Torosyan
Mr. Torosyan was hired as a chemist in a pharmaceutical company. At the time he was hired, the company's employee handbook clearly stated that employees would not be fired without just cause. The handbook further detailed a process for appealing adverse employment decisions. The company later modified its manual to include a statement that employees were terminable at-will. Mr. Torosyan was sent to a training seminar out of state and upon returning, he submitted an expense report that contained some undocumented items that the company suspected were personal. He was subsequently fired for falsifying his expense report and was denied the option to appeal the termination decision as outlined in the employee handbook.
Ms. Pressman
Ms. Pressman worked as a medical imaging technologist for a chemical company for four years. During her employment, Ms. Pressman learned that her supervisor was involved with a competing company's medical imaging business on his own time. Because Ms. Pressman felt that this created a conflict of interest, she confronted her supervisor about it. Her supervisor became angry, gave her negative performance evaluations over the next year, and she was subsequently terminated for poor performance. During the previous three years, Ms. Pressman's evaluations had consistently indicated that her performance exceeded the company's expectations.
Mr. Mansfield
Mr. Mansfield was a technician in the machine shop of Millfield Corporation. During his employment, he met at lunchtime, during breaks, and after work with employees, attempting to persuade them to start and support a union. After six months of meetings, Mr. Mansfield was informed by his supervisor that he was fired. He was told that he had violated union organization procedures and was using the company premises without permission to organize a union. Therefore, because he had violated the rules about union organizing, he was terminated.

Answer 1

not answer

Question 2

In developing an EAP, what role should managers play?

Answer 2

EAP's (Employees assistance programs) came into existence in 1950 in the United States. These programs started to appear in organizations when substance abuse was addressed as a major problem. These programs came into existence with a standard procedure, under which the employees were given two options either to correct the problem or to leave.
EAP's are applicable to half of the workforce of the U.S. These programs clarified that the organizations cannot interfere with the lives of the employees but, certain standards could have been imposed so that the employees will perform in a better manner.
Managers of the organizations are provided with special training and are instructed to follow certain procedures whenever they feel that the performance of the employees is declining. They are responsible for the identification of the performance declining of the employees. They must refer the employees to the EAP's under such circumstances. They may introduce the programs to the employees so as to evaluate the problem of the employee. Here, it can be concluded that the identification of the problem of the employee and referring that employee to EAP's entirely depends on the managers and this is the reason that why manager's role being so important in EAP's.

Question 3

Can violence in the workplace be totally eliminated? Why or why not?

Answer 3

Human resource management jobs of managing misbehaving employees is time consuming and worrisome. Employees creating problems in jobs due to in-disciplined approach, mis-behaving, negative attitude causes violence and lowers productivity. The HRM faces difficulties to handle such mis-behaved employees as it can cause arbitration and disciplinary action.
Discipline in the system and work culture of organization needs to be given priority, and management should make employees understand and follow discipline at the workplace. In order to prevent the undesirable behavior of employees, from happening again, the hot and stove rule can be applied. This rule of discipline is discussed in a way, to make employees what happens when one touches a hot stove. The result is, warning system, where managers warns and communicates about the consequences or undesirable attitude. Immediate burns, where employees can see the link between his act of misbehavior and discipline. Consistency, where the rule of discipline is same for everyone conducting the same offence of misbehaving. Impersonality, discipline action is towards undesired behavior and not to any person.
The hot stove rule assumption that discipline is impersonal is not correct. Moreover, the discipline is same for equal misbehavior is also not understandable, as misbehavior cannot be measured. People, situations and misbehavior differs. Hence, there are limitations to apply the hot stove rules for employees in any organization.

Question 4

What are the limitations of applying the hot stove rule to all employees?

Question 5

How serious a problem is the substance abusing employee at work? How should the substance abusing employee be handled?

Question 6

Discuss the legal implications of conducting drug tests on employees. Are impairment tests treated differently by the law than drug tests?

Question 7

Why is employment-at-will treated differently in various states?

Question 8

How serious is the problem of an employee who violates criminal laws? How should the employee be dealt with?

Question 9

Describe the key elements in the discipline process.

Question 10

What actions can an organization initiate to better control employee theft and fraud?

Question 11

Can employers require applicants/employees to sign mandatory arbitration agreements as a condition of employment?

Question 12

Should Castulon Corporation establish a drug-testing program? If so, recommend a specific policy for the program that includes disciplinary procedures for dealing with employees who test positive for drug use.

Question 13

What are the most difficult challenges facing an organization in establishing a drugtesting program? Discuss.

Question 14

Some observers assert that, since alcohol abuse is more prevalent in the workplace and its effects are just as costly, companies should also test for alcohol use. Do you agree? Explain.