Treating Employees Like Adults: Discipline versus Empowerment

By learning and using the techniques discussed in this webinar you will be able to empower employees in the best interests of their own as well as for the organization’s future. Additionally, should you have no other choice but to proceed with discipline these methods can help you to make a good case even better.
Is traditional discipline always the best choice? Does it always provide the best result? How productive is it for parties to expend resources in a grievance/appeals process or before a federal/state/local board or commission to make its case? And even if the facts are clearly on your side the discipline might still be mitigated or even reversed! Alternatively, are there better options and if so, what are they and how do they work? The answer is “yes” there are options and when used properly they can promote and enhance the empowerment of all parties. Can such options serve to de-escalate grievance/appeals procedures? Again, the answer is “yes” and this webinar will introduce several alternative approaches designed to evolve your disciplinary process from punishment into empowerment and accountability.

• Realizing empowerment is a more useful/productive tool instead of traditional discipline (which all too often makes a situation worse, resulting in a damaged relationship).
• Understanding the concept and relationship between employee empowerment and performance.
• How to raise an employee’s performance awareness and accountability.
• The use of techniques/strategies for communicating non-disciplinary clear expectations/outcomes.
• How emphasizing employee empowerment can reduce friction/conflict between managers and employees (and their representatives).
• How employers can build a culture of mentoring employee success by treating employees as adults.

• Rights of the parties.
• Avoiding setting a precedent or establishing a past practice
• Empowerment Process.
• Exemption from the grievance/appeals process.
• Final and binding nature of the understanding.
• Following up = Following through.

• Limbo (or “Cryogenic Stasis”) Agreements
• Mirroring for discipline or bidding
• 90-60-45-30 Performance Improvement Program
• Conditional Discharge

• LCAs (Last Chance Agreements
• Pre-bid award conference for mandated seniority-based position.
• The Left-handed compliment

• Managers
• Supervisors
• Human Resources
• Employee Relations
• Labor Relations
• Attorney’s
• Union Officers
• Representatives
• Stewards
• Law Enforcement or Security staff
• Public and Private Sector Organizations
• Professional Organizations such as SHRM, IPMA-HR, NPELRA
• All Professional HR and Management Associations
• Any and All Unions

Bob Oberstein's career in Human Resources and Labor Relations spans over 48 years. Bob is uniquely qualified in this area having started out as a third-generation Union member who has represented both sides of the labor management table in both the public and private sectors in both the non-union and union workplace.

As an Interest Based facilitator he trained and coached parties on how to constructively process their negotiations to a successful conclusion thereby promoting and enhancing their relationship. Bob has also served the labor management community as a neutral fact finder, mediator and arbitrator for multiple organizations and agencies such as the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, American Arbitration Association, Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, Tucson Unified School District, Phoenix Employment Relations Board, Arizona Department of Education, United States Postal Service, and being a Special Master mediating and arbitrating disputes between, Fry's Food Stores & UFCW, Local 99. Several of his arbitration awards have been published by the Bureau of National Affairs as well as Commerce Clearing House and are referenced in How Arbitration Works by Elkouri & Elkouri, often considered the consummate reference in the field of arbitration. Bob was recognized in 1991 by the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service's "Director's Lifetime Achievement Award" for promoting positive labor management relations.

Also significant in his background are the positions of Labor Relations Administrator for EBASCO Services (nuclear power plant construction for both Florida and Louisiana Power & Light); Senior Labor Relations Administrator for the Salt River Project, the local water and power utility in Phoenix, Arizona; Executive Human Resources Director for the Washington Elementary School District (largest elementary school district in Arizona); Labor Relations Administrator and chief spokesperson for the City of Phoenix, Arizona; and most recently Labor Relations Manager in the northwest United States. Bob is also a member of the Society for Human Resource Management, International Public Management Association and the National Public Employers Labor Relations Association and has been recognized by these organizations as achieving certified professional and senior certified professional status.