Disciplinary action

Hiring and firing team members remains part of the management of any team. I have had employees confront me and express dismay that I was dismissing a staff member. The law requires many things of managers and corporations. When someone breaks the law or flouts company policy, they do not get a free pass just because they belong to a persity category. When things go wrong, there are consequences; this does not change because we are hiring a wider range of people. As a manager, you must treat all employees, across all classes and categories of staff members, the same and that includes disciplinary action.

Performance management, merit, and incentive bonuses, and all aspects of personnel management still exist and must be executed with the advanced analytics and AI team.

There are aspects of human behavior that cannot be tolerated, and need to be avoided, or reacted to when they occur. If these aspects cannot be avoided or managed in a professional manner, action must be taken to protect the overall staff and the organization. People who exhibit aggressive behavior, those who are not respectful of others, those who will not listen and collaborate to build upon the offerings and ideas of others, and those that cannot perform their duties even when accommodations have been made and consideration given to their needs must be subject to disciplinary action up to and including dismissal.

Delaying disciplinary action is always an error in judgment. If you feel the need to take disciplinary action in relation to an employee, then you should contact the Human Resources department immediately and move forward. By delaying action, you are putting yourself in jeopardy.

I encountered a situation where an employee was not performing their duties. In this case, the employee was falling behind in deliverables, withdrawing from the group, and acting in a pisive manner. I chose to speak with them directly and explain that they were not fitting in with the team and that the exhibited performance did not meet with the expectations that we had agreed to when this staff member joined the team over a year ago. This employee knew that we were moving toward dismissal and decided to go to Human Resources to file a formal complaint. The reason for the complaint was to forestall the dismissal; there was no factual basis for the complaint. When the complaint was fully investigated, the claim was found to have no merit. However, the employee stalled the dismissal long enough to find another job outside the company. The objective had been accomplished from the employee's perspective. Had I approached the Human Resources department first to start the disciplinary process, rather than being open, honest, and transparent with the employee, the firm would have been protected from this baseless allegation.

Always act in a collaborative manner with the aligned functional groups in the organization, but never delay, when deciding on how to proceed with disciplinary action.