Effective Employee Discipline

Employee rights and organizational rules provide the backdrop for a discussion of employee discipline because employee rights often are a key issue in disciplinary cases. Discipline is a process of corrective action used to enforce organizational rules. Problem employees are most often affected by the discipline system. Common disciplinary issues caused by problem employees include absenteeism, tardiness, productivity and quality deficiencies, safety violations, and insubordination. Because of legal concerns as well as justice perceptions, managers must understand discipline and know how to administer it properly. Effective discipline should be aimed at the problem behaviors, not at the employees personally, because the goal is to improve performance. These managerial decisions influence employees’ sense of organizational justice and can lead to lowered commitment and engagement. Training in counseling and communication skills provides supervisors and managers with the tools necessary to deal with employee performance problems, regardless of the disciplinary approaches used.