Every company that employs people needs to set out guidelines, policies, and procedures for employees to follow.
Policies are guidelines that outline a company’s plan for tackling issues while procedures are about explaining specific courses of action for carrying out policies. So, procedures tell employees how to handle specific situations.
By providing employees with guidelines, policies, and procedures, companies can ensure employees know what behavior is expected of them.
When coming up with guidelines, policies, and procedures for your business, it can be helpful to look at how large companies enforce their rules.
Why You Need to Enforce Policies and Procedures
Before we look at ways in which companies enforce guidelines, policies, and procedures, it is worth taking a moment to explain why they need to enforce rules and why you need to do the same for your company.
Having policies and procedures in place will certainly help your workplace to run efficiently.
Enforcing the rules ensures your company is not at risk, too.
For instance, if an employee comes forward with an allegation, having guidelines, policies, and procedures in place can help to strengthen your case.
To give an example: by having an anti-discrimination policy, you can strengthen your case against someone who claims you did not hire the person due to his or her disability.
Another example would be this: an employee attempts to get reimbursement for a first-class airplane ticket to a work-related conference. If you have a written rule that first-class travel is not eligible for reimbursement, you can avoid facing a legal challenge.
How Large Companies Enforce Their Guidelines, Policies, and Procedures
Now you know why enforcing guidelines, policies, and procedures is so important, let us take a look at several ways in which large companies go about enforcing their rules so that your organization can follow suit.
They Publish Workplace Guidelines, Policies, and Procedures
By having guidelines, policies, and procedures written down in employee handbooks, and ensuring every member of staff has a copy, it is easier for companies to enforce the rules.
Typically, large companies get their employees to sign a document to acknowledge that they have received an employee handbook and understood the guidelines, policies, and procedures that the handbook contains.
Also, large companies ensure their employees sign for any new copies of a handbook that contains revised guidelines.
You should review guidelines, policies, and procedures on a regular basis, such as once a year.
Thankfully, it is easy to edit existing text in PDF documents with the right PDF editor, which makes content revisions quick and easy.
They Post the Most Important Guidelines, Policies, and Procedures Around the Workplace
Large companies enforce their guidelines, policies, and procedures more by posting the most important rules around the workplace. Your company should do the same.
For instance, you could post policies related to workplace safety and fair employment practices in common areas like entrances, exits, locker rooms, and break rooms.
When your employees are continually reminded of the rules, they are more likely to ensure they are followed.
They Train Supervisor and Managers
Enforcement is easier to achieve when supervisors and managers are trained properly.
Large companies make sure that their supervisors and managers are up to speed. They ensure supervisors and managers know the rules and take appropriate action when they spot employees not following the guidelines that are in place, such as carrying out disciplinary reviews.
They Ensure New Employees Are Trained in Company Guidelines, Policies, and Procedures
Training employees is obviously just as important as training supervisors and managers.
Large companies ensure that they make new employees aware of rules during orientation. They also encourage new hires to ask questions during orientation sessions. It is then much easier to enforce company rules.
They Construct Disciplinary Reviews
Large companies construct disciplinary reviews and corrective action forms that contain a list of guidelines, policies, and procedures, with consequences for each violation.
When any employee does not follow the company rules, those reviews and forms can be used to help enforce the rules.
Often, large companies adopt policies like three strikes for disobedient workers, which means the employees receive warnings for the first two breaches and are fired for a third breach.
Summing Up
By following the lead of large companies, you can come up with the right guidelines, policies, and procedures for your business, and ensure you enforce those rules appropriately.
To recap, you can enforce policies and procedures by:
- Publishing Employee Handbooks
- Posting the Most Important Guidelines, Policies, and Procedures Around the Workplace
- Training Supervisor and Managers
- Training New Employees During Orientation
- Constructing Disciplinary Reviews