Introduction
There have been incidents of employee fights and incidents at Acme Manufacturing which is a Fortune 1,000 company. The General Manager (GM) informed the Human Resource manager about an occurrence that occurred in the last week that requires immediate attention. The company's manufacturing operations are carried out in three shifts thus the plant operates for 24 hours every week. In the last six months, there have been hostilities between the employees that work the third shift and those that work on the first shift. The hostilities started with criticism and jeering by the workers on the first shift who claimed that they cleaned the mess and completed the work that is left by workers on the third shift. Consequently, the hostilities have escalated to altercations and physical confrontations. Despite the fact that aggressive bantering back and forth is common in the manufacturing sector, the GM admitted that he was concerned when he realized an employee concealed a gun. The memo explains the appropriate disciplinary actions for the employees that have contributed to the situation and identifies the motivational alternatives that can be used to turn the situation around. The memo provides procedures and policies that can be used to guide and manage the performance of shift workers. Besides, the memo provides performance standards for shift workers, the appropriate methods of appraising their performance and the appropriate training to get them on track.
Appropriate disciplinary actions and Motivational alternatives
The first disciplinary action that can be taken against the employees in the company is a verbal warning. The verbal warnings should be issued to the employees that violate the policy on non-violent behavior at the company. The management should conduct a thorough investigation to determine the employees that are responsible for the hostilities before issuing the verbal warnings. The second disciplinary action that can be employed at the company is a written reprimand. The written reprimand should be issued to the employees that have been given verbal warnings but have not changed their ways. The written reprimands should be formal and should outline the repercussions of promoting violence at the company (Wright, Bogan & Wyatt, 2013).
The third disciplinary action is a suspension. The suspension should be issued to employees if verbal warnings and written reprimands have failed to stop the violent behaviors. The suspended employees should not be given wages during the suspension period. The suspension duration is dependent on the severity of the employees' offense. The notice of the suspension is issued to the concerned employee in the form of a formal letter. The employee can resume work after completing the suspension period, and such employee should be monitored closely to ascertain whether he /she has changed behavior (Den Hartog, Boon, Verburg & Croon, 2013).
The last disciplinary alternative is a discharge. This alternative should be the last resort once all the other alternatives have failed. An employee should be discharged when the management feels that the employee is no longer suitable to work for the company. After the discharge, the relationship between the employee and the company is revered. The discharge should be discharged after receiving five warning notices within a time of twelve consecutive months. Accordingly, the fifth discharge should be issued after the fifth notice. In addition to that, the employee should be notified of the discharge through an official letter (De Waal, 2013).
There are various motivation strategies that can be used to remedy the situation at Acme Company. The first motivation alternative that can be used to motivate the fighting employees is the minimization of negative energy. Preventative policies should be implemented at the company by making all the employees sign an agreement on Positive Workplace Environment. The conflicts at the company should be looked at from the employees’ perspectives. The root causes of the conflicts should be identified and solved to make the jobs at the company less stressful (Wright, Bogan & Wyatt, 2013).
The management should inspire harmony between the employees that work in the third and first shift. Peace can be fostered among the employees by focusing the tasks to be completed in various shifts rather than personalities. Common grounds that bring the company's employees should be emphasized and the team behaviors at the organization should be rewarded. The employees in the various shifts should be rewarded depending on the how they perform in their shifts. The work that is carried out in the various shifts should be distributed evenly. In the same way, the work hours should be distributed evenly in the various shifts. The employees should be constantly trained about what the organization expects of them (Den Hartog et al., 2013).
All the employees at the organization should read, sign and understand the Code of Conduct. According to the Reinforcement theory, the employees can be motivated by incentives and rewards. The company should use positive reinforcement to decrease the undesired behaviors of the employees. The shifts that complete the jobs as required should be given incentives whereas that those that do not comply should be motivated by negative reinforcement. Negative reinforcement can be in the form of punishments, and it promotes the required behavior. According to the Equity theories, employees can be motivated to a great extent when they are treated equally. Accordingly, employees that work in the various shifts should be treated equally and management should respond to their grievances should be handled (Daft, 2015).
Performance Management policies and procedures
There are ten performance Management policies and procedures that can be used to manage the shift workers at Acme Manufacturing. To begin with, the management should be aware of the “excessive overtime cycle”. High overtime levels lead to a counterproductive cycle. Excess overtime hours should be minimized because they lead to the fatigue of the workers. The overtime hours should be distributed evenly in all the shifts to minimize the productivity losses. Secondly, the company should establish an annual cap. The aim of the cap is to stop the " excessive overtime cycle" because it is detrimental to the performance of the employees. The cap will distribute the overtime hours evenly, and this will maximize their performance (Wright, Bogan & Wyatt, 2013).
The employees should account for "time of day" impact and the yearly cap it the starting point. The energy ebb of the body is usually low between 3 am and 6 am thus it is usually hard to work at night than during the day. Accordingly, the overtime hours should be tracked by the day and night shift hours. If fixed shifts are used at the company, then the yearly cap for the night shifts should be lower than that of the day shifts. If rotating shifts are used at the company, then not more than half of an employee's working hours should accrue to the night shifts (De Waal, 2013).
Fourthly, the overtimes should be restricted to 12-hour schedules and days off. It is crucial to introduce a policy that restricts working overtime during the work days except in the cases of emergencies. The shifts that last more than 14 hours should be prohibited. All in all, workers should not work more than one shift in a single day. In the same way, double shifts should be avoided on the 8-hour schedules. The double shifts make 16 hours every day, and they are bad practices because they exhaust the employees (Den Hartog et al., 2013).
Fifthly, the management should be cautious when handling the employees on the various shifts. The management should ensure that all the shifts complete their duties before leaving the company. This implies that there should be a strict supervision of the employees in the various shifts. Sixthly, the "overtime hogs" should be monitored closely. The employees that work for excessive hours should be identified. The ‘overtime hogs’ are motivated by large paychecks. Markedly, overworking of the employees leads to carelessness, low productivity, and errors due to fatigue (Daft, 2015).
Seventhly, a formal rotation schedule should be established to distribute the working hours among the shifts. The system of distributing the hours should be formal, and it is instrumental in increasing the efficiency of operations throughout the three shifts. The shift and overtime variances should be kept at a minimum at the company. The minimization of the variances will ensure that the shift workers do not have issues with sleep patterns. The organization should ensure that the shift schedules do not stress the employees and their families. The management should take safety measures throughout the three shifts. The working environments should foster alertness in the employees, and this will increase their outputs in the respective shifts (Den Hartog et al., 2013).
Eighthly, the shift workers at the company should be allowed to structure their jobs. The workers during the night shift should be allowed to break the routines of the monotonous tasks. They should have a say on how their structures should be structured because working at night is different from working during the day. The management should incorporate team-oriented tasks to increase the alertness and participation of employees during the various shifts. Flexible breaks should be given to the shift workers. The breaks are instrumental in re-energizing employees and increasing their activeness. Accordingly, breaks increase the employees' overall productivity (Daft, 2015).
Finally, both the day and night shift employees should be kept in touch with the employees. No employee should miss out on the staff meetings and communication from the management. All the employees should be valued and connected to the company. As such so employees should not be segregated due to the shift they work. The camaraderie and morale of the shift workers should be maintained because they are instrumental in creating employee loyalty and morale. The morale and camaraderie should be maintained by arranging for special get together functions for the employees that work in various shifts (Wright, Bogan & Wyatt, 2013).
Performance standards, Performance Appraisal and Training program
Regarding performance standards, the shift workers should demonstrate work ethic. The employees should have the ability to initiate activities at the company and should be ready to work hard in a bid to contribute to the objectives of the organization. The shift workers should not be absent from work without a valid reason. Also, the employees should be willing to contribute to the growth of the organization. Besides, the shift workers should display a high level of integrity. The integrity should be evident in the manner in which they solve the ethical dilemmas they face in the organization (Daft, 2015).
Also, the shift workers should complete all the work they are supposed to do on a particular shift. They should not leave any mess to be cleaned by the employees reporting for the next shift. The employees should report to work in time; lateness is a sign of non-commitment and indiscipline. Another performance standard that is mandatory at the organization is teamwork. All the employees should have the ability to work in teams, and they should be obedient to their supervisors. The quality of the work performed by the employees should be high. The priority of the shift employees should be a good performance. Furthermore, the employees should develop their skills continuously with the aim of contributing to the growth of the company. Lastly, the employees should be in a position to exercise self-direction in their undertaking (De Waal, 2013).
Various appraisal methods can be used to assess the performance of employees at the company. The 360 feedback appraisal method can be instrumental in appraising employees. Under the method, an employee is evaluated by supervisors, subordinates, colleagues and customers among other interested parties. The method is advantageous because it offers employees a glimpse of how the parties mentioned above view them. In addition to that, the method increases the chances of comparing the perspectives of various during the evaluation process (Den Hartog et al., 2013).
Besides, the critical incidents method can also be used to rank the employees. The approach focuses on critical behaviors that make the difference in the performance of employees. The supervisors record the critical incidents as and when they occur. The method evaluates the employee's performance based on the real job behaviors, and descriptions are used to support the employees' ratings. The feedbacks in this method are obtained easily, and the biases are reduced. Furthermore, the method increases the chances of employees improving their behaviors. Moreover, the behaviorally anchored rating scales can be used to appraise the employees’ performance. The scales have statements of ineffective and effective behaviors that impact on the employees’ performance. The method is advantageous because it overcomes the errors that are associated with rating (Daft, 2015).
The management should introduce a training program to get the employees on track. The goals of the training program should be concise and clear, and the employees should determine the abilities, knowledge and skills to be acquired through the program. The employees should participate actively in the training program, and the program should adopt the problem-centered approach. The program should offer a job description that is well-crafted to remind the employees of their responsibilities. The training should help in meeting the basic competencies of the tasks that are performed at the organization. Through the training program, the employees in various shifts should understand the abilities, knowledge and skills that are required for the organization (Wright, Bogan & Wyatt, 2013).
The training should emphasize on the company's long-term goals and the strategies for attaining them. Moreover, the training program should offer learning opportunities to the employees in their daily tasks. The process of development at the company should be defined explicitly in the training program. Role plays should be included in the program to equip the employees with the proper teamwork skills. The employees should be allowed to reinforce all the things they learn through the program by practicing. The learning environment should be supportive, informal and safe. All in all, the learning process should promote self-esteem in all the employees (Daft, 2
References
Daft, R. (2015). Management. Cengage Learning.
De Waal, A. (2013). Strategic Performance Management: A managerial and behavioral approach. Palgrave Macmillan.
Den Hartog, D. N., Boon, C., Verburg, R. M., & Croon, M. A. (2013). HRM, Communication, Satisfaction, and Perceived Performance A Cross-Level Test. Journal of Management, 39(6), 1637-1665.
Wright, K. P., Bogan, R. K., & Wyatt, J. K. (2013). Shift work and the assessment and management of shift work disorder (SWD). Sleep medicine reviews, 17(1), 41-54.
