1. Handout 9: Organisational policies and procedures
PowerPoint presentation
Understand employer organisations
Handout 9: Organisational policies and procedures

2. Policies
They are formally documented.
Policies specify what must be done in certain situations.
They are usually written to meet various regulations and pieces of legislation.
These will specify what the organisation will do to ensure the legislative or regulatory requirements are met, eg for
health and safety
training and development
equal opportunities.
Policies often give rise to step-by-step procedures for action being written.

3. Procedures
Procedures are the steps that must be followed to carry out certain tasks.
Organisations write procedures for staff to follow to ensure that a specific job or task is completed in a set way to ensure the same outcome.
This means that any new member of staff can follow the procedure and carry out a job from beginning to end.
Procedures can help with organisation, legislation, safe working, clarity of roles, clarity of requirements and quality assurance.

4. Reasons for procedures
It is good practice to formalise and document company procedures because they:
provide greater clarity of roles and requirements for staff
quality assurance and improved organisation
ensure consistency across the organisation
legislative requirements are met
can be used in staff training.

5. There will usually be procedures to cover the following activities:
safe working procedures
fire, accident and emergency
stock control and maintenance
sending and receiving information
fax, , post
reproducing information
job sheets, work instructions
house style and presentation
storing and retrieving information: paper based and electronic
use of telephone.
The procedure on the use of the telephone may describe how it should be answered, how it should be used safely, how faults should be reported and how it should be cleaned and maintained. Procedures may also be written to ensure that quality requirements are consistently met.
Procedures are also written to ensure that health and safety rules are applied and followed so that accidents do not happen and that you can work with other people in a safe and healthy environment.

6. Organisation rules and regulations
Rules and regulations may exist in an organisation regarding:
holidays
the sickness reporting and scheme
maternity and paternity rights
employee information and consultation, on health and safety for example
relationships in the workplace
the monitoring of internet use
confidentiality and data protection
use of telephone for personal calls
use of company vehicles
health and safety and general safe working practices
what constitutes misconduct.
Your immediate responsibilities at work will be contained within your contract of employment. However, you will also be subject to the organisation’s rules, regulations and codes of behaviour to ensure you meet the standards that the organisation expects.

7. Codes of behaviour
Codes of behaviour may exist on:
dress code, eg no jeans
accepting and giving gifts
conflicts of interest
office, eg clean desk policy, use of passwords
customer service.