Importance of communicating an organizational policy

A policy is the guideline to what is expected to happen in an organization. It links employees to organizational best practice, corporate culture, country’s laws with regard to what a policy covers, and procedure to implement a policy.

The emphasis is on implementation of the policy. The policy designed and approved in the boardrooms is not enough if it is not implemented properly. It is easy for an employee to breach the regulations of a policy if he/she is not aware of. In many disciplinary hearings of many organizations tendency is to remember a policy when an employee has gone astray with regard to policy. When an employee or employee representative refutes the present of a policy, a desperate organizational official takes out a policy from the ‘archive cabinet’. In these situations, even draft policies are used in order to discipline an employee.

The policy has one and only one purpose of informing the employees to support an organizational Purpose. It is not intended to punish employees. In this view, the policy should be properly implemented. An approved policy is not the implementation of a policy. The approval of the policy starts the implementation of policy.

A policy should have the following:

Policy Name	It must cover the Purpose It must be short and concise E.g: “Policy on Company Vehicle usage”
Purpose	State the reason of establishing a Policy. Why the Policy is necessary to provide guideline How the organization will benefit
Area it covers	State  what it intends to cover: e.g Junior Staff only or Senior only or All Staff “The Policy shall cover…..” Explain in details
Policy leaders	E.g. Finance Policy: The CFO is ultimate leader or delegated person who should approve or both CFO and CEO. Policy writer could Cost Accounting or Financial Accounting (Using Finance Policy as an example)
Date of Approval	The Policy should have a date of approval by Senior management: HR Policy is GM HR; Finance Policy is CFO, etc. These HOD’s have delegated authority from CEO for their respective departments.
Date of Implementation	When Policy has been approved, workshops and training are needed for All employees and the people who are expected to manage it. Implementation date is important for Labour issues. Approval date indicates that a Policy is legal; implementation date indicates that the Policy was communicated after it was approved.
Review periods	The Policy should have duration. It must be reviewed for its relevance to its intention Duration could One year to Five years. Three year duration is most accepted since it is not too short or too long.
Provision of a Policy	It must not be ambiguous (Interpretation should support the purpose)  The “shall” factor is important for emphasis E.G. 1. All employees shall have drivers license before they use company vehicle. 2. All employees shall first check the company vehicle before they use it. 3. Dents and New dents, etc shall be reported on Check List form and singed by supervisor or manager before the vehicle is used.
Space for signatures	At the end, provide lines for signatures.