JOnathan Goldberg

Many employees seem to labour under the impression that discipline relates only to the most common offences such as theft, dishonesty, assault and absenteeism.

There seems to be a lack of knowledge that if employees perform their jobs poorly, they can also be dismissed for misconduct.

A charge in this instance would range from negligence through to gross negligence for dereliction of duty.

Dereliction of duty almost always warrants dismissal but the employer must be able to show not only what the employee’s duties were, but also that the employee failed to perform them completely.

Similarly, an employer cannot charge an employee with dereliction of duty if the employee failed to do something that was not their duty in the first place.

The problem with these types of cases is that there is a very fine line between poor performance, being a form of incapacity, and negligent misconduct.

The test of negligence is whether a reasonable person in the position of the employee would have foreseen the harm or possibility of harm resulting from their act or omission and would have taken steps to prevent it.

An employer needs to ascertain whether the employee failed to exercise reasonable care in the performance of their duties.

Negligence warrants dismissal only if it is gross negligence, but where the consequences of a single act of negligence may have disastrous consequences, dismissal may well be justifiable on the first occasion.

These consequences did not need to happen; just the possibility of them occurring is sufficient.

l Jonathan Goldberg is chief executive of Global Business Solutions.

Contact him at execoffice@globalbusiness.co.za.

Visit www.globalbusiness.co.za