Zimpapers Logo

Davis Sibanda Labour Matters
Many employers struggle to identify the indicators of bad management of labour relations. They end up dealing with problems when they have become too difficult to handle, very costly financially and in terms of time as well as other hidden costs.The given indicators are not exclusively caused by bad labour relations management but largely they reflect on bad labour relations management meaning that the employer has to keep an eye on them.

When employees fail to meet set performance targets, it could be a result of labour relations problems such as poor relations between subordinates and supervisors, defective communication and others. This means the employer has to interrogate the causes for failure to meet set targets by each employee when tools and equipment have been provided.

There are times when there are too many disciplinary cases in a department to an extent that almost all employees are sitting on warnings and the largest number of disciplinary cases come from the department. In such instances, it is highly probable that managers will not be trained in labour relations management as there would be working in the wrong belief that all that is there in discipline is using the code of conduct yet there are many other tools that are available and are more labour relations appropriate.

Also, when there is a high staff turnover in a department and in some cases people moving to other departments running away from a particular supervisor, it indicates labour relations problems in that department requiring urgent attention in the form of counselling or training for supervisors.

A major indicator of bad labour relations management by line managers or supervisors is when their subordinates frequent the human resources department without the knowledge of the supervisor. Once this happens, the employer has to act swiftly by empowering line managers to be able to look after their subordinates human resources needs. There is no reason for workers to go to human resources as human resources practitioners in an organisation are there to service line managers who in turn have to service the human resources.

Where there are too many grievances in a department, it could be an indicator of bad labour relations management either the supervisor has problems leading the team or is failing to deal with potential labour relations problems. In such cases, the supervisor has to be put through training or counselling to be able to manage his people and work better.

There are cases where line managers avoid presiding or participating in disciplinary cases, this is also an indicator of a team that is not trained in discipline handling and is a labour relations problem.

Other indicators of bad labour relations management include high litigation costs incurred by the organisation, too many workers being reinstated, threats of collective job action, frequent work stoppages related to labour cases issues, frequent conflicts with the workers committee and many others.

In conclusion, the employer needs to invest time and money in engaging in labour relations audits so as to take the labour relations temperature and where there are gaps appropriate measures used.

Davies NdumisoSibanda can be contacted on: email: [email protected]; Or cell No: 0772375235