Dealing with rule breaking
Featured in the Discipline and Grievance: 30 case studies and activities training manual
By Gill Hardy & Gill Kelley
Category: Conflict Resolution
Credit price: 3 download credits (Single user)
Introduce this training activity by asking the participants to imagine that they are the manager of a small, close-knit team of hard-working individuals who all work very well together, and even socialise outside work. Ask them how they think they would feel, if they had to consider disciplining a member of the team who had committed a fairly minor offence, but had done it more than once, despite their having stated clearly, during a private, informal chat, that the behaviour was not acceptable.
It is never easy to deal with matters that might appear trivial, when people are performing exceptionally well in all other aspects of their job. However, it is important that managers do respond to rule breaking immediately, and in a way that sends the clear message that company rules must be adhered to. Sometimes delay, or trying to make excuses for inappropriate behaviour, can contribute to future rule breaking, as this case demonstrates. The training activity requires participants to read a case about rule breaking, then put themselves in the position of the manager of the rule breaker and decide how they would tackle this behaviour. The trainer facilitates by introducing the topic of rule breaking, and co-ordination the group working and feedback session. This case requires very little experience or knowledge of managing discipline and grievance, so it can be used early on in a training course. The training activity requires participants to work in groups of three or four. There are also instructions for using the case as a brief for a role-play between the manager and the rule breaker. This alternative training activity, with timings and resource list, is described in the final section, headed ‘Variation’.
Who is it for: This training resource is intended for use by trainers with supervisors, team leaders and managers who are responsible for managing themselves and others.
- Themes:
- Informal discipline,
| Resource Type: | Activity |
| Min Group Size: | 4 |
| Max Group Size: | 20 |
| Typical Duration: | 00:40:00 |
| No of Pages: | 11 |
Resources: View standard resources for Fenman training activities
Purpose: This training resource is intended for use by trainers to emphases to participants the need to respond in a timely and unambiguous way, to send a single message that breaking the rules is not acceptable behaviour. The training activity can be run as a role-play between the manager and the rule breaker.
Download the training activity, Dealing with rule breaking as featured in the Fenman training manual; Discipline and Grievance: 30 case studies and activities