Understanding and Implementing Effective Grievance Procedures in the Workplace

Effective grievance procedures ensure employees can formally report mistreatment, helping address issues such as harassment or unfair pay. Proper implementation enhances transparency, minimizes conflicts, and fosters a fairer workplace environment for all parties.

By Brad Nakase, Attorney

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Table of Contents

1. What is a grievance procedure?

2. Pros and cons of grievance procedures

3. Six-step grievance procedure

4. What is the timeframe for a grievance procedure?

5. To sum up

What is a grievance procedure?

Employees may register a formal grievance through their employer’s formal grievance procedure if they experience unfair treatment at work. We will go over how businesses employ grievance procedures in this article.

A worker has the right to register a grievance with their employer if they believe they have been mistreated for any reason, including sexual harassment, an unjust pay check, or a difficult task. The investigator is required to adhere to certain rules in this formal complaint procedure.

Different businesses follow different policies and guidelines. Grievance procedures are often specified in contracts and must be adhered to.

Companies should ideally look into every complaint, but frequently, staff members don’t care enough to initiate a formal process. It also happens that informal concerns are ignored by Human Resources, a supervisor, or a grievance committee.

But a grievance records that there is an issue. If the employee’s concerns are not addressed by the corporation, they can typically use the documents to file a lawsuit.

Pros and cons of grievance procedures

Like anything else, there are benefits and drawbacks to having a grievance mechanism in place for both the employees and the company they work for. Let’s begin with the advantages.

Advantages

There is a formal, established process. Employees are aware of the actions the business will take when they report a complaint.

Both the complaint and the resolution that followed are recorded.

Companies find it more difficult to ignore or reject complaints when they are filed in writing. Because the documentation will be there, they are unable to claim, “Oh, we weren’t aware that there was a race-related problem.”

The procedure can be very public, although it’s not required to be, so the complainant can understand exactly how the business came to its decision.

To level the playing field a little in union circumstances, an employee may be represented by a qualified union agent or attorney at no expense to them.

Regarding drawbacks, consider the following examples:

Cons

Even if the manager or business should address minor issues, the formal process may deter workers from complaining about them. If a complaint is not documented, a supervisor could become less inclined to consider it seriously.

The length of time it takes to investigate and resolve a matter might vary greatly depending on protocols and contracts.

A worker can use the protocols to cripple a company and create a never-ending backlog of paperwork. It can be used to disparage a person or the company. This is because regulations often call for looking into every complaint (and commonly forbid taking retaliatory action against the complainant).

Six-step grievance procedure

Although grievance procedures vary throughout employers, this is a broad guide regarding what to expect.

A formal written complaint is made by the employee. A worker may write something on an email or by hand, or the employer may supply a form (online or on paper). Whatever the case, grievances are formal, usually written complaints. An employee may file a verbal complaint; however, the HR representative or supervisor will then record the employee’s comments in writing and produce an official document. Throughout the process, this document will serve as guidance. Although an interview is probably in store for the employee in the future, they should nevertheless provide as much info as possible, especially names and dates (though approximate dates are OK).
After the worker submits the complaint, a formal inquiry is launched. The manner in which this happens can differ greatly according on the kind of complaint. A call to payroll and a review of the timesheets can frequently settle an employee’s complaint about an erroneous payout in a matter of minutes. In the event that the employee reports that an executive has been engaging in sexual harassment, a thorough investigation may involve conducting numerous interviews, watching surveillance footage, reviewing communications, and other related tasks.
While certain investigations may call for the assistance of an outside expert, others can be completed by the HR representative or the supervisor assigned to the case.
A conclusion is written by the investigator. This might be a clear-cut case; in the case of unpaid overtime, for example, locating unprocessed time cards proves beyond a reasonable doubt that the employee is correct. The outcome in a lawsuit involving harassment or discrimination may be ambiguous. You might discover that during a dispute with the complainant, the employee’s coworkers used racial epithets. However, it is possible that the complainant also used racist slurs during the exchange. The complainant might not have anticipated the final result.
You can hire a mediator. This is frequently the case when a contract or union specifies the grievance procedure. To find a solution, the mediator works with the company and the employee. Before convening with the mediator, the company might not have a formal resolution in some situations. In this instance, the mediator hears arguments from both parties and assists them in reaching a resolution. In official grievance procedures, the union frequently represents the employee when there is a union contract. The employee would submit their position during mediation with the assistance of the union representative and potentially a lawyer.
There are penalties. The company and worker take some kind of action, whether it’s a formal understanding agreed in the course of mediation or the investigator’s formal suggestion that the employer accepts. Either a straightforward action or job loss could result from it.
The employee may file a grievance with the courts if he is not satisfied and if there is no clause in the contract that forbids a legal action (some contracts provide that mediation is the last resort).

What is the timeframe for a grievance procedure?

This depends a great deal on the particular circumstances. Resolving a complaint that is complex or has a lengthy history may take several months. It is possible to settle a grievance filed over a single occurrence in a few hours.

You should anticipate that the complaints process will take months if you are reporting instances of bullying, sexual harassment, or racial discrimination. It will take a long time and involve many personnel to complete the probe.

If timing is an issue for you, the investigator can provide you with an approximate timeline.

To sum up

All businesses should have a mechanism for employees to register complaints, particularly when those concerns are about illegal activity, even if yours doesn’t have a formal grievance procedure. If your company doesn’t already have one, now is the perfect time to start drafting a basic policy.

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