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Your palms are sweaty and your mouth is dry You didn’t sleep last night thinking about this moment and your stomach is in knots from anxiety. You procrastinate by cleaning off your desk and emptying your garbage. Time is moving at a snail’s pace but the clock finally strikes on the hour and there is a knock at your door. The time has arrived to have that “Dreaded Discussion”. As you invite them into your office, the last thought running through your mind is “Who would have thought that a disciplinary meeting would be this painful?”

Does this scenario sound a little too familiar? Did you just get a chill down your back as you thought about the last time you had to discipline someone? You’re not alone! In workplaces across the country, managers dread these meetings and have a hard time seeing them as anything but a very painful experience – they might even feel it is more painful for them than for the employee!

In fact, more than just dreading the disciplinary experience, many managers aren’t having the conversation at all. More often than not, what we see in organizations today is a clear avoidance of the entire discipline process. Often there is a clear disconnect between managers and staff, as managers aren’t sure how to address poor performance or inappropriate behaviour and employees aren’t even aware that they are performing below expectation until they are let go, often in the guise of downsizing and layoffs. This is not a pleasant situation for anyone involved.

Thankfully, there are ways to rewrite this story to create a discipline process that is less painful and not nearly as riddled with anxiety. Making this change starts with creating a culture of positive discipline and ends with 7 steps towards accountability.

Positive discipline is the process of orienting employees and/or volunteers to work rules, performance standards and other organizational requirements so that they know:

• What is expected of them (tasks are typically outlined in a job description);
• How they are expected to behave (what are the rules and culture of the organization); and
• What consequences will result from behaviour violations and poor performance.

The biggest difference between the traditional definition of discipline and the concept of positive discipline is that positive discipline occurs BEFORE behaviour or performance becomes inappropriate, essentially giving the employee everything needed for self-accountability. The employee knows ahead of time what is acceptable and what isn’t, which includes both the written and unwritten rules of the organization, and has a clear understanding of their tasks and responsibilities. Because of the clarity of expectations and communication, if the employee isn’t doing what is necessary for good performance, they are doing so by choice. It’s true that sometimes poor performance can result from a gap in the employee’s knowledge, which then might cause them to make the wrong choices. Either of these situations can be easily dealt with because in both cases you, as a manager, can take action.

Positive discipline starts with holding an employee accountable for their actions and there are seven steps to accountability.

1. Clarify expectations of good performance. There are a number of tools that will help you do this, such as the employee’s job description; the organization’s policy and procedure manual; the organization’s mission, vision and values statements; the annual performance management process; and any program guidelines. Anything in the organization that outlines expectations of behavior and performance must be brought to an employee’s attention. Do not rely on them to find it themselves; have a clear orientation process and a performance management process that directs employees to all of this information.

2. Explain consequences of poor performance. The best place to do this is in a meeting where you are providing the employee with your feedback on their performance. At this point you can reiterate your expectations and explain the consequences of not performing as expected. Policy and procedure manuals should also be quite explicit about the expectations of performance and the consequences of not meeting these expectations or of following policy.

3. Provide specific feedback. This should be the case for both positive and constructive feedback. Ultimately, everyone wants to do a good job and the best way to see good performance over and over again from an employee is to make sure that they know what performance is worth repeating! Tell employees what they are doing well and offer constructive feedback on what changes are needed. Be specific so that they are clear about what needs to stop and why.

4. Provide advice for improvement. No one likes to be handed a problem and then be left hanging to figure out a solution. If you are asking an employee to change their behaviour or improve their performance, often times they are at a loss as to how to do it. The best support you can give them is to provide some advice on what they could do better. Or, take a few minutes and do some brainstorming with them so that you can come up with some ideas for improvement together. Doing so will create a sense of commitment for both of you, and it also helps the employee move from feeling negatively about the situation to feeling positive and empowered about how to make the necessary improvements.

5. Explain consequences if there is no improvement. Discipline meetings can be full of information and often the employee is a little overwhelmed by the end of it. This is why is important to reiterate the consequences for not progressing towards meeting the required expectations. You want to strike a balance between making them aware of the seriousness of the situation without causing them to be completely paralyzed with fear that they are about to lose their job. Balance the improvement discussion (where your tone should be hopeful and positive) with a reminder of the consequences if there is no improvement.

6. Monitor behaviour and provide time to improve. Often discipline has been left until there is just no more tolerance for the poor performance and there is an urgency for immediate improvement. This isn’t particularly fair to the employee. Once you have addressed the situation, you need to both monitor that progress is being made and give them a reasonable time to improve. There is no point in pushing for immediate change and then having to back pedal because it wasn’t a reasonable expectation. Give the employee a reasonable amount of time to see there will be improvement.

7. Take increasingly severe steps if there is no improvement. This is an an unavoidable part of the discipline process and of holding someone accountable for their work. If you say you are going to follow through, then it is imperative that you do follow through. Monitor the situation and take ongoing action where necessary, including documentation of any steps taken to address the situation. Ultimately, if you stop paying attention and you stop moving up the discipline ladder, you will have to start the process all over again. And more likely than not, at that point, you might choose to avoid the situation entirely.

Throughout the accountability and the discipline process, there is a need for open, honest communication, active listening and in some cases even a sense of humour! The more proactive you are as a manager, the less often you will need to address these situations.

Denise Lloyd, MA, CHRP (250-385-7784, Denise@EngagedHR.com) is the President and CEO of Engaged HR Inc., a human resource management consulting firm that transforms workplaces by providing essential human resource management services, systems and expertise to nonprofit organizations and small to medium sized businesses. Denise is solution-focused in her approach and knows that a happy, healthy workplace is within every organization’s reach.

Photos (from top) via iStock.com. All photos used with permission.

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