Disciplinary Hearing

[ilikecake]

Hi

I've got a quick question about what to do in a disciplinary hearing I've just been told about.

A month ago my boss put in a written warning against me for not handing over work to a colleague before I went on holiday. An office I look after's phones went down and I was chasing the third party company who looked after this for them. The phones had been down a few days. In my defense I did call on the morning of my holiday to chase this issue up.

A few details: the day before the holiday I was working over an hour late to fix an issue and was feeling really quite stressed at the time. Another point of note - in the past six months I have felt quite unmotivated. This has been picked up on by the boss and mentioned before in meetings. In my appraisal back in July I wrote that I'd like to solve this and would appreciate if I could have some help with motivation. Nothing was done about this apart from asking me how I thought I could motivate myself as they had no idea how to help. Re the stress, this was partly to do with lack motivation but also partly to do with slight victimisation by the boss. Nothing big but things like being patronising, belittling comments, and a frosty air in meetings/the office. He's been accused of bullying before by other people who have left and mentioned this.

Also, between the meeting where I was told the hearing would happen, there was a delay of a month due to holiday etc. Nothing was mentioned of the incident in that time even though he said there would be another meeting as that one was interrupted at the time. Adding to that, I had a meeting two days ago and nothing was mentioned of the hearing again until a letter appeared on my desk an hour later!

Of note, I had a warning about 3 years ago which didn't go through HR which turned out to be a kick up the arse which worked in a certain way. I feel this could be a harsher version of that but obviously I don't want anything on my record.

Any advice on best course of action greatly received as I we don't have a Union where I work.

Many thanks

[ULA]

Re: Disciplinary Hearing

Hello Ilikecake and welcome to the forum. Firstly I need to ask a few more questions as I am trying to establish the order of events. In regard to you detailing that a written warning was put in a month ago by your boss, was this written warning given as a result of a disciplinary hearing at which you attended and were you given a letter confirming that disciplinary action had been taken? You then mention a meeting when you were told a hearing would happen, was this after the written warning was put in by your boss? Did the letter you have recently received detail the nature of the issue/s that the company want to raise with you and what action might be taken if the outcome of the hearing was that disciplinary action was to be taken? Sorry to ask so many questions but I need to get some answers to these before being able to advise what you might be able to do. Even if you do not have Union you are allowed to take a colleague along with you in any event if you wanted to just so you know if they have not given you that opportunity.

[ilikecake]

Re: Disciplinary Hearing

Thanks for getting back. Sorry I think I confused the matter. A month ago I was told I would receive a written warning, this only came this week, as yet there has not been any action taken. The letter details the one incident mentioned above and it says that they may decide to issue me with a written warning which will be kept on file for a maximum of 1 year.

No problem with the question asking, I was not sure what info to put down in the first place! By the way I have requested that my colleague joins me but they have not confirmed this yet although the letter says I may bring someone. This same colleague got a disciplinary the very same day but for a different issue. We also live together so have obviously been talking about this a fair amount.

Thanks

[ULA]

Re: Disciplinary Hearing

Thank you for the extra information. Firstly, they cannot issue you with a written warning without first having a disciplinary hearing. Secondly the letter they have sent to you giving details of the meeting should be very clear about what the incident/misdemeanour was that may result in disciplinary action being taken. The letter also needs to contain any evidence e.g. documents that the company is going to use to rely on when presenting their case. This then allows you time to go through all that they have provided in order that you can put forward your side of events. If you have a colleague who has agreed to go with you then I suggest that you take them - they can be there to take notes and help prompt you on any points you wanted to raise and forget to.

So in terms of their adherence to good process one is your concern about the length of time from the initial notification by your boss that they were putting in a "written warning". It seems like you have been away on holiday so that would account for some of the time and you clearly have an HR department who may have been trying to establish the facts. In my view they could have done this whilst you were on holiday and then given you notice of the disciplinary hearing soon after your return. However I am concerned that there has been a pre-determination of the outcome because your boss told you he/she was putting in for a "written warning" without first having the disciplinary meeting. If you have the date that this was said to you, the rough time of day and where this happened I would use that as a point you should raise in the disciplinary meeting. Both points are worth raising at the meeting but in my view the pre-determination of the outcome is the stronger of the two points, plus whether you find, from the details you have been given in the letter, there are any points to contest.

Hope this helps.

[ilikecake]

Re: Disciplinary Hearing

Yes I'm remember him saying that he saw no other way and a he would have to issue a written warning. The letter is clear in what the issue is the the possible outcome although when they sent it initially they forgot to include the company's disciplinary policy which I had to request. There was no written evidence in the letter of what I had done wrong so I assume none shall be used in the meeting.

The length of time before the letter was sent was a strange one. The boss told me about the disciplinary on a Thursday. The next day he went on holiday for a week. After that I was on holiday for 3 days. When I returned the boss was away with work for a week on a foreign site and then after that I went on holiday again for a week! So he was not on holiday for 3 weeks of the time that nothing was issued so plenty of time for him or at least HR to get moving. My colleague mentioned he was in the office for days but nothing was said.

You are right about the pre-determination of the warning. This could be due to a few years back when I was given a verbal warning for leaving the office on time - there was a problem in the office which I should have stayed to help out on. Maybe they are going straight to written because of this? The two incidents are entirely unrelated.

As an aside, when you look at these two incidents and the warning my colleague has received, they always happen after his boss, the IT director, gets involved. Pressure from above or offsetting his job insecurity perhaps?

[ilikecake]

Re: Disciplinary Hearing

Ps. Should they also mention that if there is a disciplinary issued what the plan of action would be i.e. performance monitoring for half a year or a set of targets or does this come after the decision?

[ULA]

Re: Disciplinary Hearing

If a plan of action is to be put in place then this should be detailed as part of the letter confirming the outcome of the disciplinary hearing and what action if any is being taken. In practice they should not make the decision as to the outcome actually in the meeting again that looks like pre-determination. They should present their case, listen to your responses go away consider everything that was said at the hearing and then either arrange another meeting to let you know the outcome then confirmed in writing or just send you a letter confirming the outcome.

[ilikecake]

Re: Disciplinary Hearing

Thanks for all the help, meeting today so we'll see what happens..