We don't necessarily want them to leave but if they are actively looking for another job then their head is not in this job and more mistakes may happen. Also their job involves seeing information that we would not want an employee leaving seeing. If they had handed their notice in then they would go on gardening leave.

Lots of people look for jobs. If you believe the surveys around 1/4 - 1/3 of people plan on moving jobs in next year and are "looking". many people on these communities will have as part of their set up on linkedIn that they are open to discussions. This does not make them bad employees or a particular risk.

If they have under two years continuous service (and it will be interesting what the status of the "break" was a couple of years ago) then theoretically you could dismiss. But I am not sure I would. Their "complaints" seem fairly typical and reasonable and perhaps management could do a better job at explaining what mitigating actions its taking and why it appreciated people putting the extra effort in.

If he has more than two years service then...(a) I would see if hes salvageable by having some positive career orientated discussions with him about his future with the organisation and what you and he can do to facilitate that (b) have a discussion with him about how you expect him to behave while hes job searching, the standards and effort you expect and how you can all get on well together or (c) pay him to leave via a settlement agreement.

I would go for (a) or (b)

The point someone is thinking of leaving is not the time to worry about introducing new restrictive covenants (if they were planning on taking client lists they already will have them). Your employers contracts seem inadequate on this point and I would use this wake up call to review all contracts and if necessary put in a sensible set of covenants.

In reply to Keith:

Thank you. I have my work cut out for me. It will def be a wake up call.

I would also think that this could be a case of toys being thrown out of one's pram - whether justified or not, the reaction isn't one you would expect.

They might settle down after a few days and it will be business as usual, but at least it gives you a head start on planning what to do if they leave - rather than most cases where you are given a resignation notice and only then start the preparation.

In reply to Kerry:

Quite a few assumptions there about someone who is looking for another job. Do you have any proof that someone may make more mistakes etc., ?

On the point of the employee taking the sensitive information with them, I would strongly recommend that you make it clear to all of your staff that that information belongs to the organisation, and that they are not permitted to take it with them. Make sure you have policies (and training) in place so that staff understand their responsibilities when it comes to business information (including stuff they've worked on that they make think is 'theirs', personal data (including client lists) and what the sanctions will be if these policies aren't followed. Staff and ex-staff can be prosecuted for stealing company assets including information.

In reply to David Perry:

Past experience that past employees have purposely done.

Welcome, Kerry, to both the forums and to our complex, fascinating and frustrating profession.

1. As others have said, chances are at least a third of your workforce at any given time is looking for another job with varying levels of commitment. So him announcing the fact should (a) not be a surprise and (b) not affect how you deal with him otherwise.

2. It would not be a "conflict of interest" if the employee took a role with a competitor unless he was also still working for you.

3. If any of your employees have access to time-critical confidential information, you should look at introducing a Confidentiality Agreement for all your employees and, for relevant employees, adding a Restrictive Covenant to your contractual relationships, and potentially contractual garden leave clause as well.

4. Your employee needs to have a new signed statement of Terms & Conditions unless you are counting their service as continuous. Otherwise, what record is there to say that they ever left and came back?

5. I would encourage you and the manager involved to resist being pulled into conversations justifying yourselves to employees. By all means, communicate to the team as a whole to acknowledge that you've been asking too much of them and telling them what you're doing to address the issue, but when you start responding to individuals who are already fed up, you just come over as defensive.

In reply to Kerry:

That is an assumption - much like women can't do certain mens work.
You need to simply make sure that people don't drop standards.
It seems very unfair and unreasonable to me that someone who kindly informed you they'd be looking for another job and then gets penalised for doing so.

In reply to David Perry:

They didn't kindly inform us, it was part of their over reaction on being pulled up on a minor mistake which would of only warranted a comment such as to look out for something in the future. Yes it is an assumption but it is a scenario that we have to prepare ourselves for after past experience. Just wanted to know what our options were as i was new to this. However as the day has gone on more mistakes have been brought to our attention.

In reply to Kerry:

Kerry

Be careful not to have a "witch hunt" against this employee because he may be looking to leave. I am amazed at the number of times "evidence" emerges against someone who for whatever reason is out of favour. This only emerges when they are out of favour and never before.

So by all means monitor and manage their performance and if it really is dipping compared to other employees and agreed standards then take action (but its a performance management challenge and not necessarily quick) but make sure you step back first to ensure it really is warranted.

Best regards

In reply to Keith:

Completely understand you can start seeing things differently when you know there is a problem and can look too much into something. The problems that have occurred after have been reported by another employee who does not know what has happened. Could be just a case the employee mind is not in the game at the mo especially today. All staff know the measures that we are taking to try and manage workload however January is always busy. We have had a lot of input from employees including the mentioned one and actions were started a while ago. Without explaining exactly what that employee does its hard to explain the enormity of their job role (not just them that does this role so not all on them) and its importance.

A nice easy dilemma to deal with when i have just started this.
Thanks for all your input a lot to look into and take on board.

Hello Kerry
I just wanted to add to my previous post to say that there is a very useful (& brief) piece in People Management this week with practical suggestions for mitigating risk

www.peoplemanagement.co.uk/.../mitigating-the-risk-when-employee-leaves
Deborah

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