Policy and procedures - employer responsibilities

Establishing workplace policies that suit your business is an important step to:

• ensure your workplace meets legal requirements and 
• reduces risks and protects your business. 

Workplace policies: written statements that help to establish a clear understanding of the behaviour and performance standards expected of employers and employees. Workplace procedures: step-by-step instructions for routine tasks. Procedures are often linked to a workplace policy and are designed to help employees implement policies. 

Policy and procedure documents should be lawful and provide reasonable directions from you to your employees. As part of an employer’s responsibilities, policies need to take into consideration everyone who will use it. This means making the policies clear, concise, specific and simple enough for all involved to understand. Along with these conditions, employers have responsibilities when implementing new policies. Employers must:

• make sure they are in writing and easily accessible to all employees
• communicate the details to all employees 
• make sure employees agree to observe the policies and procedures
• provide training to ensure your employees know:
  • what the policy and procedures are
  • how they work in the practice
  • how it will affect them

Best practice in ensuring your employees agree to follow the policies is getting them to confirm this in writing. Their response should indicate they:

• have read and understood the workplaces policies and procedures and 
• will comply with the policies and procedures. 

Regularly promoting and educating your employees of the workplace policies will help them understand what is expected of them. There are a few techniques that can be adapted to better communicate the policies and procedures to your staff. These might include:

• lunch and learn sessions
• induction packages 
• one-on-one training 
• online training 
• an employee handbook
• noticeboards 

The benefit to having well-documented and defined policies and procedures can help improve the overall function and culture of your practice. They can also help:

• manage legal risks and legal disputes
• clarify employee rights and expectations 
• make consistent decisions and give clear and consistent responses when dealing with workplace situations
• outline how complaints and misunderstandings will be dealt with
• deal with disciplinary or performance management issues 
• ensure employees understand what is acceptable and unacceptable in terms of behaviour and conduct 
• create informed and effective workplaces.

If practices do not already have policies and procedures in place, we would recommend looking into implementing these. With the new legislative changes that will be coming into effect this year, it is also recommended the policies you already have in place are reviewed to ensure you remain compliant. 

You can contact us via phone (07) 3872 2222 and email support workplacerelations@amaq.com.au. 

	Workplace Relations Support Workplace Relations Support provides members with information on the new changes and what effects it might have on your current policies and procedures. You can contact us via phone (07) 3872 2222 and email support workplacerelations@amaq.com.au.
	Workplace Relations Toolkit Workplace Relations Toolkit subscribers receive policy and procedure documents as part of their subscription. As the WR team regularly reviews these documents, subscribers will be sent the updated versions.
	Workplace Relations Consultancy Workplace Relations Consultancy can review policies you already have in place and make suggestions and changes on what should be updated to meet legislative requirements.