Employer's Guide to disciplinary meetings

Information for Employees on Disciplinary Meetings can be found here

Disciplinary meetings are not hard to complete, so long as you tick two main boxes.

1. The process is fair and reasonable and follows the principles of natural justice.
2. The final outcome on the substantive matter is what a fair and reasonable employer would do, given similar circumstances.

If in doubt, ask. A one hour consultation cost is about a hundredth of the potential cost of having to defend and pay out over a personal grievance action.

The steps you have to take to conclude a disciplinary process are:

1. if appropriate, suspend the employee to get them out of the workplace so they do not cause any more damage
2. issue the employee with a letter calling them to a disciplinary meeting
3. hold the disciplinary meeting
4. either negotiate the exit of the employee, resulting in them signing away their personal grievance rights, or
5. deliver the final outcome of the disciplinary process.

Unless this process is conducted correctly, you will expose yourself to a greater risk of the employee raising a personal grievance against you for an unjust disadvantage and an unjustified dismissal.

Our fees for this type of work are based on our time involved, at a rate of $350 + GST per hour plus disbursements, if any. We can either provide you with the tools to take the employee through the process or we can run the entire process and attend the disciplinary meeting. To engage our help with this, please email me, including copies as attachments of: 

1. the employee's employment agreement and any company policy documents that apply
2. a list of the matters of misconduct you wish to cover in the disciplinary meeting
3. any other letters or emails exchanged between you and the employee with regards to the matters of misconduct.

Once you engage our services we will:

1. supply you with the methodology of how to suspend the employee
2. incorporate your matters of misconduct into a disciplinary letter for you to cut and paste into a letter for the employee
3. conduct the disciplinary meeting taking notes (optional)
4. discuss with you the recommended outcome for the meeting (optional)
5. explore alternative options as a way of resolving the matter at hand (optional)
6. write the outcome letter for the disciplinary process.

Please don't hesitate to contact me on 0800 HELP ME (0800 435 763) or email with any further questions or queries regarding this.