Are you, like many of our clients, seeing an increase in grievances raised, disciplinary procedures being invoked and employment tribunal claims? If so, it is time to consider a new approach to managing your workplace conflicts.

To be fit for purpose, the modern business needs to have a joined-up conflict resolution strategy.  The traditional, established grievance and disciplinary processes are, it is suggested, tired, cumbersome, and rarely successful in meeting the demands of the 21st Century business and its people. Grievance procedures, all too often, fail to address the heart of the issues in many cases, take too long, are seen as token steps to be taken along the conflict road, and frequently result in outcomes which leaves those involved, feeling dissatisfied, wearied, and isolated. With disciplinary procedures, whilst it is sometimes entirely appropriate for the business to intervene to uphold standards of conduct and performance, they provide no effective means of achieving a long-term solution, become battlegrounds, where the parties lose sight of the original issues, and distracted instead, into focusing on concluding the procedure at all costs, regardless of the facts, the time spend and the impact on the business and the individuals of the whole process.

Introducing a new policy, a resolution policy, which focuses on, and primarily offers, alternative dispute resolution methods – mediation in particular – with grievance and disciplinary processes available secondarily, is a recommended way of ensuring you have the right tools for managing and resolving workplace conflicts.

A resolution policy re-sets the priorities for conflict resolution: it encourages your people to embrace the principles of mediation in their everyday working lives and in relationships with colleagues and puts mediation at the forefront of workplace dispute resolution, with grievance and disciplinary procedures available if for whatever reason, mediation is inappropriate or has not succeeded for the parties.

Six reasons for introducing a Resolution policy are: 

1. It encourages the use of mediation as the bedrock of your internal processes, which all workers are encouraged to embrace, ahead of grievance and disciplinary processes.
2. It empowers your people to take control of their actions, behaviours and conflicts and to find their own solutions.
3. The outcomes secured in mediation are more likely to be accepted by the parties and be a longer-lasting solution to the problems.
4. It can save considerable workforce time, money and energy spent by the employees involved, business management as well as HR.
5. Its introduction and application will greatly reduce the risks of legal claims, by offering early intervention in a conflict before the parties’ positions become hardened.
6. A resolution policy is only good for the health of your people, your organisation, and your culture.

The transformative qualities of mediation should never be underestimated. Do get in touch for more information.

Michael Farrier

Hexagon Mediation