Employee Refusing General Circular

Recently our company (hospital) circulated a circular addressed to all employees (regarding general behaviour expected). All were expected to read and sign the circular as 'read'. Some employees refused to accept the same. What action can be taken ?

dear dr bijoy, Was the circular issued to individual employees separately, if so they can be charged for refusal of official communication as per standing orders. But prior to that you need to call them and explain the significance of this communication and consequences of non acceptance.

Employees are violating general discipline by refusal to read sign in acknowledgement.
The concerned employees should be called over to HR office and given a copy of the circular directly in hand and then asked to acknowledge.
If they fail to accept then company can think in terms of disciplinary action against them.

Dear Dr. Bijoy,
What I can understand that some of your employees refused to acknowledge the circular as 'read'. As it is a hospital, hopefully the employees are in general discipline and because of nature of nature job they are bit sensitive and matured. In today's world it is difficult to impose discipline forcefully specially to any sensitive working place. Your basic objective is to complete the communication to all staff ( hope there will be some doctors/nurses also ).My suggestion is to communicate all of them verbally about the merit of the circular and followed by one copy of circular to them along with pay slip for their record.
S K Bandyopadhyay
USD HR Solutions
M-
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thanks. That's what we are doing at present. But some of these staff are just refusing as if in a challenging manner. That's disconcerting.

Why some staff are refusing?
Examine reasons carefully.
Is it because of genuine indiscipline or union motivated move or they genuinely have some problem which is not being attended or even properly heard by management.
Before treating it purely as a discipline case,talk to some of them and find out root cause of refusal.
Relationship with staff will improve once genuine steps are taken to understand reasons for refusal.

Hello Dr Bijoy,
Like Nathrao mentioned, did anyone from management make a preliminary/basic attempt to find the reasons for their refusal to sign?
Another aspect that CAN be important--vis-a-vis the options open to you--is how many employees.....out of the total strength......are refusing?
Unless you explain/give the FULL picture of the situation, you can be sure of getting EITHER misguiding/misleading OR absolutely non-actionable suggestions from anyone, including well-meaning CiteHR members--'non-actionable' meaning suggestions, that when implemented, COULD lead to other complications, possibly far severe. And then there's no point blaming ones who gave well-meant suggestions.
Rgds,
TS

Dear Dr. Bijoy,
Convey, convince, confuse, compromise and finally coerce - "C5" -Planning Strategy for "Commissioning .........".
Issue show cause notice for initiating disciplinary action against those who refused to acknowledge the general circular as per your standing orders / code of conduct. It's prime-facie misconduct, which is liable for taking action under the head "refusing to receive any Official order or official communication issued in person or in rem. Allowing such in different attitude personnel will spoil the office culture and atmosphere besides discipline.
If any union / unions are behind this scene you can also complain under " such action amounts to unfair labour practice on part of Unions" defined under the code/law.
"Maintaining cordial relations is two way traffic and shall live symbiotically".
Yagniah. K
Asst. Gen. Manger -HR
09703219177

Dear Dr. Bijoy,

I endorse the views and suggestions of Mr. Nath Rao.

I presume that you must have faced some real problems on the behavioural front of your employees that prompted you to issue this circular, more so because in a hospitality industry like yours it could be a major cause of concern.

However, it is not essential for you to get your each and every employee sign and acknowledge the circular personally. Instead, you should paste the circular on the Notice Boards that you might be having at conspicuous places in various sections of your Hospital. Keep it posted continuously for at least 7 days. That would be sufficient for the circular to be legally deemed as circulated for due compliance by every employee. In case any employee act against the spirit of the circular, you may take appropriate action against him as per the rules of your establishment without bothering for whether he had personally acknowledged the circular or not.

Regarding the indiscipline shown by your some employee in this context, I suggest that you should find out whether the employees who refused to acknowledge the circular are the same set of employees who have been the problem creators. You may initiate disciplinary action against them, individually or jointly, as per the provisions under your certified standing orders or the standing instructions for wilfully and deliberately refusing the valid orders of the management.

Vijayanta Kumar Sinha

If it is a general circular applicable to all the employees, then it would suffice if you paste it on the Notice Boards kept in prominent places/vantage points so that every one could see/read them. If the subject matter is affecting the service condition(s) then it is better issued individually. If any one refusing to receive under acknowledgement, it would be sufficient if you try to do, to issue to the concerned, in the presence of a witness and endorse the fact on the material and paste it on the Notice Board. Moreover the refusal to receive and sign as acknowledgement itself would be construed as 'indiscipline'. If your Standing Order does not contain such a clause, better amend it to include to this effect.