Employee Complaint-When is enough enough?
4620109
1 Post
Just curious on how far we should take the employee complaint issue. When is enough enough? I fully understand the seriousness of employee complaints, but where do we draw the line? How do we determine what is frivolous or not serious enough to merit a company response? For example, how should the company respond to a complaint about a picture on an employee's coffee mug, or bumper stickers?
Anybody have an opinion or any good resources on this?
Specifics...- Yes an employee complained about what was on the coffee mug. The bumper stickers is just a proactive illustration. The Coffee Mug has a picture of a woman in a bikini top on it, and the bumper stickers would be of a political nature. Both seem very trivial to me, and it brought up the question in my mind about when to say when. If we always respond correctively to employee complaints, at what point do we stop? It could get quite ugly. We handled the situation for now (we talked to the offending employee and he has taken the coffee mug home), but I am more concerned about future concerns. Obviously the offendee thought it was rediculous (he knew who the offended was because she had already made an offhanded comment to him before the complaint was officially made).
Comments
The answer is really going to be on a case by case basis. Employees are going to complain about things no matter what you do. Some more then others. Some for what you think might be the stupidest (is that a word?!?) thing. What I have found is that I look at each complaint by itself and think about the situation from different angles. Sometimes it is a matter of reeducating your employees about what really is sexual harassment or workplace harassment or about another policy that they may be complaining about. Sometimes it is making a change to a policy or procedure. Sometimes it is asking what they think you should do about the situation (I have had employees really surprise me and come up with a great solution!).
You mentioned the coffee mug and bumper stickers. Is an employee saying they are offended by what is on these items? A few more details will help us to give you some advice on how to handle this.
[quote user="IT HR"] You mentioned the coffee mug and bumper stickers. Is an employee saying they are offended by what is on these items? A few more details will help us to give you some advice on how to handle this. [/quote]
Bingo.
This is a case-by-case issue to be determined by the specific facts of the matter.
You said you "handled the situation for now". What did you do?
When a complaint is from a female employee about a picture of a woman on a man's coffee mug, I would not characterize it as "frivolous". You could be setting yourself up for a lawsuit.
OK, I have an employee complaint for you which I am not sure how to handle! We've had numerous complaints about an employee who wears to much perfume. Fellow employees who work in her office area are complaining of getting headaches and feeling ill do to her overuse. We have nothing in our handbook which covers this situation. We need to address it somehow, as the employee who made the complaint is one who expects situations to be taken care of right away, no matter how trival they may seem. What would you do?
I would have the supervisor of the ee who wears too much perfume bring her in and talk to her. Be sympathetic but at the same time explain that there have been numerous complaints about the perfume and that you are asking her to tone it down a little. I wouldn't ask her to not wear it anymore, just tone it down. If you don't think the supervisor will handle this diplomatically then you can do the meeting with the sup'r in the room so he/she gets some experience on the best way to handle this.
[quote user="SandyK1161"] OK, I have an employee complaint for you which I am not sure how to handle! We've had numerous complaints about an employee who wears to much perfume. Fellow employees who work in her office area are complaining of getting headaches and feeling ill do to her overuse. We have nothing in our handbook which covers this situation. We need to address it somehow, as the employee who made the complaint is one who expects situations to be taken care of right away, no matter how trival they may seem. What would you do?[/quote]
I'm going to bet that you DO have a policy on this. If it's making people ill, then it is a safety issue. I'm going to bet that you have a health and safety policy or set of policies somewhere.
In any case, this is the reverse of the employee who doesn't shower complaint. Same methodology with appropriate changes to the script. Be sympathetic but be clear.