Employer used sliding scale of suspensions tied to number and offensiveness of dirty emails circulated in the office
This instalment of You Make the Call features several employees who were fired for circulating pornographic emails in the office.
Bruce Power, a nuclear power supplier operating the Bruce Nuclear Generating Station near Kincardine, Ont., employed 500 construction workers at the station. Ninety of the construction workers had accounts on Bruce Power’s email network because they were supervisory employees or union stewards.
Bruce Power’s Code of Conduct specified its computer drives were for business use only and any inappropriate use was unacceptable. The code also said company email should not be used to “display, generate or pass on to others material (whether in text, pictures or any other form) which may be regarded as offensive on the basis of race, sex disability or any other grounds.”
Contravention of the code would leave employees subject to discipline or termination of their contract. The code also included a guide to unprofessional conduct that stipulated “offensive, suggestive or lewd comments, gossip, slander, emails and letters” were unacceptable. The code was circulated annually and employees took online quizzes and attended presentations.
In December 2007, an employee complaint led Bruce Power to launch an investigation into its email system. It found 67 employees had sent inappropriate emails of the type prohibited by the code of conduct. The HR and IT departments reviewed the emails in question and put each into one of two categories, according to explicitness. Each employee involved was ranked according to the number and seriousness of emails circulated, though if he had any in the most serious category, all his emails were considered in that category. Discipline was on a sliding scale, with 20 or more explicit emails leading to a 12-day suspension down to less than five less explicit emails leading to job counselling.
Seven employees, who received suspensions of varying length, grieved the process. Most claimed the emails were sent only to people they felt would enjoy the humour and not those who would be offended. They also claimed they didn’t realize the seriousness of the emails and apologized for their conduct. They agreed the distribution of the emails was inappropriate but argued they should have received a warning before resorting to suspensions. They also noted the practice was widespread, with two-thirds of the 90 construction workers on the email system involved, leading to a permissive culture with regards to the emails.
You Make the Call
Were the suspensions too harsh for circulating inappropriate emails to each other at work?
OR
Were the suspensions appropriate for violating company policy?
If you said the suspensions were appropriate discipline, you’re right. The board found the employees were all aware of company policy and the emails were inappropriate for the office. They had all received training on the code of conduct and that should have sufficed as amplevwarning.
In addition, the board found the categorization of emails into two types was a fair evaluation of the seriousness of the conduct. Those who circulated only less offensive emails received less discipline, while those who circulated the most serious and offensive ones received the harshest penalties. In addition, Bruce Power based the length of suspensions on the number of emails circulated. This was not an arbitrary system and was a reasonable approach to take, said the board.
The board also found the email audit included all 5,000 email accounts, not just the 90 construction workers. No other departments had a problem, so the 67 offenders were out of 5,000 accounts, not 90. This showed it was not a widespread practice at the power plant.
