Misconduct: Can employers dismiss an employee who has committed a criminal offence - Case Study Example

HRM INCIDENT Should He Be Fired? due: Introduction Employee termination occurs when an employer fires an employee. This may be at any time, with or without any reason. Termination for cause can occur in situations such as violation of the company’s code of conduct or policy, failure to follow the company’s policy, violence in the workplace, harassment, constant lack of performance, unaccepted behaviors and so on. It ought to be done in an appropriate manner; as there is never an easy way to share hard information (Amos, 2008).

This paper will analyze the criteria for deciding whether an employer should fire or discipline an employee based on the professional misconduct.Background There are certain situations that an employer needs critically to evaluate before deciding whether to fire or discipline an employee (Paetkau, 2007). Firing an employee means that an employee has to leave his or her job, while disciplining might mean suspending the employee with or without pay or resorting to corrective action based on the offence.

Statement of the problem Toni Berdit, area supervisor for Quick-Stop, a chain of convenience stores in Washington D.C was on his normal supervisory duty on one of the Sundays in the Center Street Store. According to the company’s policy, when the safe is being emptied, the manager has to be present, and the employee present has to place each $ 1000 in a brown bag and leave it on the floor next to the safe until the manager checks to be sure that the amount is accurate. That day Bill decided to save the supervisor’s time, as he was not there when the safe was being emptied; so he had counted the money before he arrived.

The store got busy, and Bill accidentally mistook one of the moneybags for a bag that contained the customer’s groceries while packing, so he put the money in with the groceries. The supervisor arrived later on, and after noticing the money was missing, they began searching. Lucky enough the customer came back and handed the bag of money. Bill had violated the money-counting procedure, so he was prior to losing his job. He complained to Toni how this would have a bad impact on his family and even promised to be the best store manager they could ever get in case he’s not fired.

Toni then called his boss and after his approval, Bill was not fired.Addressing the problem I agree with Toni’s decision of not firing Bill. This is because although the company’s policy was to terminate anyone who violated the procedure, it happened once and for the first time. Firing employees is not healthy for an organization because if Bill were fired, the company would have been forced to invest time and resources advertising for his position, interviewing job applicants, hiring and training and waiting for that person to catch-up.

Bill was obviously good at his job it’s only that he did that one mistake but was lucky enough the money was returned. Assuming that the customer fled away with the money, Bill could have lost his job as the case could have been treated as theft because clearly, he would have no evidence that he mistakenly put the money in the customer’s bag. Addressing this problem triggers the principle of disciplinary actions for specific offenses which I think for Bill, the corrective action was taken and that acted as a warning to him.

Conclusion Termination of employment should be dealt with in the most careful manner. Yes, it can be the most effective form of officially telling the employees that you do not approve of their actions but then again this move can present some risks to the business. Before the management decides on this decision, they should measure the disciplinary reasons with the standards of conduct to decide on the best action to take keeping in mind the risks the company could face.ReferencesAmos, T. (2008).

 Human resource management. Wetton, Cape Town: Juta.Paetkau, T. M. (2007). Hiring and firing. Irvine, CA: Entrepreneur Press.