How Human Resource Managers Can Deal with Difficult Employees

Violations of Organizational Policies

Figure 01

To start with, most organizations do not take kindly to employees who violate their organizational policies. These violations can range from as simple as using the official internet access for personal work, as medium as filing incorrect expense claims, and as severe as sexual harassment and outright violation of the organizational rules governing ethics.

Also, there are the everyday cases of employees who are not happy with their managers and hence, complain to the HR Managers about issues ranging from dissatisfaction with their present role to that of protesting the low bonuses or inadequate pay hikes. (Waida, 2021)

Response of the HR Manager

Figure 02

Thus, each of these challenges requires a different response and involvement of other stakeholders that can range from the immediate manager to the topmost executive. For instance, if an employee is found to be using the official internet access for personal work, then he or she can be warned by the HR Manager, and at the same time, the employee’s immediate manager informed about the transgression. (Novakovic, 2017)

In these cases, the employee typically is kept on watch and his or her browsing activities monitored for compliance or otherwise. In most cases, such employees cease their activities and fall in line with the organizational rules.

In cases where it does not happen, the HR Manager has to take a call about more serious action against the employee, and this is where the GPM or the Group Project Manager comes into the picture. In our experience in the corporate world, we have found that some employees are also fired for these transgressions since the need to maintain organizational discipline overrides other concerns such as the performance of the employee and his or her value to the organization.

The Central Theme of this Article

Indeed, the key theme that this article is examining is how far the organization would go in maintaining compliance with organizational rules, and there are cases of employees who are fired for even apparently simple things as filing wrong expense claims since most organizations place a premium on ethical conduct and integrity of their employees.

In addition, there are instances where even if the immediate manager was tolerant, the HR Manager drew the line and insisted that the employee has to go. Indeed, it is a fact that most HR Managers are often hired and expected to uphold organizational norms and rules and also ensure that violations are punished.

Conclusion: HR Managers are expected to be Law Enforcers

Lastly, the way in which the HR Manager deals with these cases of violations and transgressions speaks volumes about his or her capability and skill. As mentioned in the introduction, how adroitly and how astutely the HR Manager responds and reacts to the situation makes a difference to the organization. In most cases, the HR Manager is expected to behave as a law enforcer wherein his or her job is to ensure that the organizational policies are enforced and norms upheld at all costs and this attitude reflects in the way most organizations expect their HR Managers to override the line managers.

References,

Novakovic, A., 2017. Dealing with difficult employees. Leadership and management, 1(14), pp.74-86.

Waida, M., 2021. wrike. [Online] (4.1) Available at: https://www.wrike.com/blog/working-with-difficult-team-members-infographic/#What-is-a-problem-employee [Accessed 06 May 2022].