Labour Legislation Compliance

The intricate and complex employment regulations and labour legislation can be frustrating. We provide our clients with the necessary information and compliance tools in a way that is easy to understand and apply. Non-compliance can become an unnecessary expense. We ensure compliance without stifling business growth.

This includes:

1. Labour legislation audits with recommendations
2. Company specific contracts of employment
3. Assistance with compliance orders
4. Assistance with all employment related procedures
5. Drafting agreements and policies
6. Labour legislation training

Training and Development

We offer a variety of interactive training and development workshops, as well as information sessions to empower individuals to proactively identify and resolve employment situations before they become complex problems. If you can’t find what you are looking for on the list below, contact us.

Training and Development Topics include:

General Labour Legislation Overview: In this session we cover the most important parts of the Labour Law, including the Basic Conditions of Employment Act, Labour Relations Act, CCMA rules, and Employment Equity Act. Suitable for: Anyone, but specifically designed to assist Business Owners, Human Resource Managers/Practitioners and Managers responsible for implementation of the legislation.

Focused Labour Legislation Session: These sessions have varying topics based on the client’s requirements. Each session is designed to cover specific parts of the labour legislation to ensure that the candidates leave with a thorough understanding of the topic covered. Examples of this: Dismissals and Disciplinary action, CCMA Procedures, Unfair Discrimination, Strikes, etc. Suitable for: Individuals who require knowledge about specific parts of the labour legislation.

Managing Daily Discipline & Performance: These sessions are interactive workshops designed to equip managers, supervisors and other leaders in the organisations with the knowledge, skills and tools to proactively manage discipline and performance on a daily basis. During these sessions we cover all the information required to ensure compliance with the Labour Relations Act, but more than that we train managers to approach discipline and performance in a way to build stronger relationships with their subordinates, and to drive behaviour and performance towards to achievement of the department and company goals. Suitable: Supervisors, Managers and Owners.

Employee & Trade Union Representative Training: These sessions are designed to train employees how to be outstanding employee representatives. The role of an employee representative requires specific communication and negotiation skills, as well as a general understanding of the applicable labour legislation. Suitable: Employee Representatives, including Shop Stewards, Workplace Committee Representatives and Human Resource Officers/Managers.

Human Resource Practitioners & Managers: HR practitioners and managers are responsible for various functions including recruitment and selection, issuing contracts of employments, drafting policies, remuneration and making strategic employee decisions. Each one of these functions requires an understanding of the applicable legislation, as well as a broader understanding of the impact of employee decisions on the individual and collective employment relationships. This training includes a series of sessions to develop HR Practitioners & Managers’ employment relations knowledge and skills. Suitable for: HR consultants, recruitment consultations, HR officers, remuneration specialists and HR managers.

Interpersonal Problems and Conflict Management: We offer a variety of different conflict management workshops to assist with managing conflict in the organisation. Our workshops are designed to tackle problems such as office politics, low levels of trust between leaders and subordinates, merges and restructures, tension from diversity in the workplace and more. Our conflict management sessions are designed to equip the candidates with the tools to constructively communicate and deal with workplace conflict. The focus is on tackling the core problem and making a genuine difference to improve workplace satisfaction, productivity and to reduce destructive conflict. Suitable for: All individuals in any organisation with interpersonal problems.

Communication Training: Communication is a vital part of all workplace relationships, and miscommunication is the source of most conflict, yet communication techniques are not taught like other skills. We offer communication training to enhance communication between employees in the workplace, because with improved communication we see improved workplace satisfaction, productivity, effective leadership, lower labour turnover and numerous other benefits. Suitable for: All individuals.

Discipline & Misconduct

Misconduct and misbehaviour are harmful to the organisation. As such we provide the following services to assist clients when dealing with disciplinary issues and misconduct:

Advice: We are available to provide advice and expertise on how to deal with specific misconduct incidents or reoccurring misbehaviours. Moreover, we assist clients to understand and apply progressive disciplinary action in a fair and effective manner.

Chairing Disciplinary Hearings/Inquiries: We provide a chairperson to ensure that each hearing is conducted to ensure procedural fairness. While we will always ensure procedural fairness, the real value gained from having us chair a disciplinary hearing is that we make recommendations (substantive fairness) based on the particular situation, the relevant case law and years of experience.

Documentation: We provide tailor made templates to assist clients with dealing with misconduct. In addition, we draft company specific disciplinary codes and guidelines to ensure that disciplinary action is implemented consistently throughout the organisation (consistency is a requirement for procedural fairness).

Organisation Development: Repetitive misconduct and reoccurring misbehaviours require a more strategic approach. We provide OD services to determine the real cause of counterproductive work behaviours, such as excessive absenteeism, small to large scale theft and more. Once we have identified the causes, we design and implement OD interventions to tackle the cause of the problem, rather than treating the symptoms. Our interventions are designed to significantly reduce misconduct expenses and wasted resources.

Performance Management & Incapacity

Managing performance from an employment relations perspective includes managing poor work performance, as well as medical and other incapacity issues. We assist our clients by facilitating the procedures required to ensure both procedural and substantive fairness. The value gained from making use of our services is that we are experienced in the field of Industrial Psychology and, we apply this knowledge and experience to facilitating the process.

This includes:

1. Facilitation of counselling and evaluation sessions with employees
2. Chairing incapacity investigations and making recommendations
3. Assistance with all forms of incapacity, including medical conditions, injuries, psychological disorders, invalid workers permits and physical incapacity (due to being incarcerated)
4. Correspondence with registered practitioners to obtain necessary evaluations

Negotiation

The purpose of negotiation is to resolve differences or conflict and to reach an agreement. Typical negotiations include wage negotiations and negotiations about the terms and conditions of employment. However, with changing employment trends and increased economic pressure, we are seeing more joint-problem solving (or integrative negotiation). We provide expert and skilled negotiators to ensure that the process, and outcomes are as effective and efficient as possible.

Negotiation services include:

1. Representation in individual and collective negotiations
2. Drafting agreements
3. Facilitation of joint-problem solving discussions

Restructuring & Retrenchment

Retrenchment Assistance:

A specific consultation procedure, as detailed in the Labour Relations Act, must be followed when an employer contemplates dismissing one or more employees for reasons related to operational requirements (commonly referred to as retrenchment). We ensure that the consultation procedure is conducted, from start to finish, in accordance with the Labour Relations Act. Moreover, we provide experts who are skilled in negotiations and experienced in Industrial Psychology, to deal with the particular difficulties and complexities of retrenchment consultations.

Restructuring Assistance:

Restructuring usually requires that changes be made to the terms and conditions of employment. This, however, cannot be done unilaterally and consequently restructuring of positions, departments and/or entire organisations require consultations with the affected parties. Not only do we conduct the consultations to ensure compliance with the relevant legislation, but we also consider the impact of the changes on the organisation and the affected individuals. As such, we provide additional change management assistance when necessary to ensure a fair, legal and smooth transition.

Conflict Management

Conflict is a natural part of the employment relationship. If left unmanaged, conflict can reach destructive proportions, which will negatively affect all parties involved. Although conflict can have negative effects and it is often seen as a negative aspect of any relationship, it can also be constructive and if managed correctly, can stimulate growth, innovation and change. We provide expert conflict management assistance on both an individual level and a collective level to ensure that conflict does not break down the employment relationship, but rather that it stimulates growth and change.

Individual conflict management services include:

1. Handling grievances
2. Development of company specific grievance policies and procedures
3. Conflict mediation
4. Conflict management and communications workshops
5. Assistance with mitigating the negative effects of changes in an organisation, such as mergers, restructuring and moving of offices

Collective conflict management services include:

1. Facilitation of negotiations
2. Representation during union negotiations (distributive and integrative bargaining)
3. Assistance with strikes, picketing and lock outs
4. Dispute resolution