Using Corrective Action Plans as Motivation

Colorado Technical University

Administration in Healthcare Services HAS 320

When an organization ignores one employee’s poor performance, that employee’s poor performance starts to affect other employees. It is like a virus that goes unnoticed; it soon invades the rest of the body. Ignoring one employee’s poor performance can potentially cause other employees to become disengaged and ultimately bring the organization’s performance level to its knees. Allowing poor performance of one employee to go unaddressed creates additional work; requiring the manager to work harder as well as other employees. An organization that does not have a high level of performance is on the track to disaster. In healthcare facilities, an employee’s poor performance can result in a patient not receiving the quality of care that the patient deserves.

Like treating a virus, we must find a medicine that works in the treatment of the virus. Treating an employee’s poor performance requires a solution; a corrective action plan. Corrective action is exactly as it sounds. It is taking necessary steps of action to correct a problem. Corrective action is used within organizations with the purpose of identifying and eliminating causes of a problem by: correcting, molding, or improving performance or behavior that is job-related CITATION Ind10 l 1033 (Indiana University Purdue University Indianapolis, 2010). Corrective action serves as a communication line to bring to the attention to the employee of their performance level. Corrective action should not be considered as a form of discipline, however as a tool to enhance performance of an employee that is not performing at an optimal level set forth by the organization.

A corrective action plan should be built around the premise to correct an employee’s performance habits. In this case the employee is consistently late to work. The goal of the corrective action plan is to discover what is causing the employee to be habitually late and give that employee a chance to correct this performance problem before taking the final step in the termination of the employee. A corrective action plan should consist of a series of steps. The first step of the corrective action plan will be counseling of the employee. Counseling can have two purposes. One purpose is the chance to discover what is causing the employee to be consistently late. There could be a scheduling conflict, such as the employee’s children’s daycare center may not open early enough for the employee to be in on time. So a simple adjustment to the schedule may remedy the situation. It could be the employee is not a morning person and takes them longer to get started in the morning and may need some coaching to develop their own personal schedule to get the employee into work on time. Counseling can also serve as a verbal warning that notifies the employee that their behavior or performance is not meeting the organization’s standards. The next step in the corrective action plan would involve a written reprimand. The written reprimand should contain the full description of the behavior that has been unacceptable as well as the standard or policy that the employee is not adhering to. It will also include any prior related corrective action taken, statement of the circumstances causing the current corrective action, and a clear picture of future expectations CITATION Uni07 l 1033 (University of New Hampshire, 2007). The third step is suspension of the employee without pay. The employee needs to have a clear understanding why they are being suspended and show evidence of their that supports the reason of suspension. End the meeting with a positive note allow the employee to understand that this is not what you want to do, but also allow them to know that their benefits, if applicable, will continue through the suspension. The last step in the corrective action plan is the termination of the employee. This should occur after all other steps have been exhausted to no avail No manager truly enjoys terminating an employee, however a manager is left no other choice when an employee refuses to change his or her behavioral and/or performance issues.

Our job as managers is to motivate and empower our employees so that they are performing at the organization’s performance standards. However, there are times when as managers we must provide tools to our employees to increase their motivation and empowerment. A corrective action plan can essentially be one of these tools. Used in a positive manner, like giving guidance and counseling, instead of threats and punishments. When a situation arises where an employee needs to have corrective action taken towards them allows show the employee with respect. Allow the employee to participate in the corrective action solution to the problem. This may make the employee more willing to correct his or her action, rather than just being told to. I personally have had to use counseling in the form of extra of training to help an employee that was not performing quite at the standard levels of the organization. The employee had a strong work ethic, but their technique in executing needed some polishing. During the extra training, I had the employee identify their strengths and their weaknesses. We worked on the employee’s weaknesses while teaching the employee how to use their strengths to make up for their weaknesses. The key lesson I learned from this experience was that by showing respect and that I truly cared about that employee’s success, the employee became motivated and empowered to become one of the organization’s top performers. The key thing for all managers is to show respect to their employees. Showing respect earns their respect, which in the end makes employees more motivated to perform better for a manager that they respect.

References

BIBLIOGRAPHY l 1033 Healey, B., & Marhese, M. (2012). Foundations of Health Care Management Principles and Methods. San Francisco: Wiley.

Indiana University Purdue University Indianapolis. (2010). Corrective Action: A Supervisor’s Guide to Managing Performance. Retrieved from http://hra.iupui.edu/content/doclib/ProgressiveDisciplineGuide.pdf

University of New Hampshire. (2007). Performance Management Toolkit – Constructive Discipline, Corrective Action & Documentation. Retrieved from http://www.unh.edu/hr/sites/unh.edu.hr/files/pdfs/constructive-discipline-and-corrective-action.pdf