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Discipline
You as J Franklin have returned from a visit to Eastern Europe following discussions with
the team that you have chosen for the opening of a German subsidiary. The new business
plan had involved further expansion in Continental Europe, a development that had put
pressure on the availability of skilled manpower within the company. The potential skills
shortage had been relieved by the creation of priorities in the training budget, with a
concentration in the short term on the maintenance and development of technical skills
within the organisation.
It had been seen as crucial that as a small company improvement in management and
administrative skills could be left for the next couple of years. The essential priority was the
further expansion of the main core competence of Burke Engineering, that of the design
manufacture and installation of increasingly complex valve systems. Such an emphasis
had enabled the company to make available technically skilled staff to establish a new
subsidiary in Germany without weakening the skills available within the main production
facility.
The rapid growth rate of Burke Engineering over the past 3 years had however created
other problems. It had meant that not only was the organisation becoming more diverse,
the complexity of operation and the speed of change meant that Burke staff had been put
under considerable strain. Though the industrial relations atmosphere was such that it was
unlikely that there would be serious trouble, with the great increase in discussion and
involvement throughout the organisation, you have been concerned about the rise in
disciplinary action. High levels of disciplinary action had been a major feature of the
company when you had joined as managing director, but during your first two years there
had been far fewer problems that needed disciplinary hearings.
Part of this reduction had been due to the training that management had received in all
aspects of personnel policy. Recently this downwards trend had been rapidly reversed with
increases in disciplinary action in specific areas of the company. Two departments were
particular problems sales and marketing and production.
Now that many other areas of the company are working effectively, you consider that it is
time that the way in which the disciplinary process works should be reviewed in detail. You
have asked for recent disciplinary cases to be brought to your attention with the action that
managers have taken. The following list had been prepared by the departmental heads
and is supposed to include a description of the problem followed by the action that each
manager has either taken or proposed to take. There are also some other issues that
require decisions which will involve discipline and these have also been included in the file.
Item one
From Belinski To Managing Director
Mrs Gravotti. You will remember that we discussed the issue of unpaid leave at our weekly
meeting earlier in the month. We were agreed that unpaid leave should only be given in
exceptional circumstances. I have taken this also to include overtime worked to replace
normal contractual hours (or time off in lieu). We recruited Mrs Gravotti as you know, to be
our main technical support engineer for the Italian market. For the first 18 months, there
were no problems, though as you know I consider that the selection of foreign staff to
support our European operations is likely to cause problems.
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