Business Policies for better governance and culture

by Business ProcessXpert Business Process Xpert

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In every home, there’s an acceptable time to have meals. Many schools nowadays focus on maintaining a healthy teacher-student ratio. At certain workplaces, mock fire drills are conducted every once in a while. These are all examples of policies or parts thereof. Policies give us a sense of direction in thinking, conduct or functioning contributing to a broader meaning, purpose, and identity as a whole.

Every company needs policies to be used by all concerned for a broader sense of direction to reflect/achieve the ethos, values, priorities, and necessities of the company. These policies carry an overbearing effect on organization cultures as they will define how employees need to behave in general or in particular situations.

In this article, we shall discuss some of the basic company policies for better corporate governance and shaping a robust organizational culture.

Employment Policy

An employment policy provides the governing rules or guidelines to control the working relationship between a company and its employees. It can include recruitment policy, PMS policy, leave policy, IT-usage policy, anti-kickback policy, remuneration policy, office communication policy, etc.

For example, many companies have strict policies against harassment and discrimination in the workplace. It passes a strong message across the company that certain behavior or way of thinking will not be tolerated by the company no matter who it is coming from and shall be dealt with strictly.

Safety Policy

Safety is one of the most sensitive areas which every company needs to take seriously. Nothing should be left to chance there. It must be scientifically drafted, well-documented, implemented with the utmost strictness, and reviewed and updated from time to time. A poorly defined or poorly implemented safety policy may not only reflect negatively on a company’s image but also there are regulatory compliance on safety that must be adhered to.

The services of occupational health and safety specialists and experts can be hired for designing and implementing safety measures and protocols. A good way to imbibe the seriousness about safety in work culture is to conduct safety drills and exercises at regular intervals. This is in addition to the routine safety SOPs.

Assets/Device Usage Policy

Every company needs to provide certain assets/devices to their employees for work. These assets/devices can include vehicles, machinery, or gadgets like smartphones as well as laptops. Employees need to be made aware of certain dos and don’ts on the use of such assets concerning factors like systematic usage, human safety, when and whom to contact for repair, replacement or replenishment, etc. These dos and don’ts may be general as well as specific. An assets/device usage policy can address these and similar other concerns.

Privacy Policy

Every company must ensure that the data/information of the company or that of its customers, employees, suppliers, and other stakeholders is safeguarded from any potential threat of being compromised. Some of the elements of a good privacy policy can be:

- Use of advanced and secured digital platforms for access, storage and exchange of data/information

- Having protocols on the use of company-provided credentials

- Controlling and limiting access to data and information

- Restricting unofficial sharing of company news, information, decisions, etc.

- Keeping the concerned stakeholders informed about the measures taken for data protection

- Using official channels of communication

Replacement/Refund Policy

Products may turn out to be faulty or defective. That is okay. But giving deaf ears to customers, that is not good for business. And that is why it makes sense to have a replacement/refund policy in place extending to both the ends — suppliers as well as customers.

A replacement/refund policy needs to be laced with terms and conditions that are just and fair. For example, a certain period within which a product could be replaced, conditions under which a refund can take place, conditions under which a product would be considered for replacement or refund, etc.

Having an unambiguous replacement/refund policy will help your employees make the right decisions and also your customers would know that your company is fulfilling the promise.

Credit Policy

Credit is a business norm, especially between two trading entities. It is important to have a policy defining how business credit is going to work for a company because credits have a bearing on working capital. For instance, if your supplier is offering you a credit period of 10 days in a working cycle, you’ll have to ensure that the credit period you are offering to your trading partner is of 10 days or lesser. Similarly, the amount of credit in float should also be considered. A credit policy will vary from company to company. Having a definite credit policy will help you eliminate the chances of working capital crunches.

Social Media Policy

Social media could be quite a distraction, especially at work. Having a well-documented social media policy will ensure that your employees do not waste time browsing through their social media profiles while on work.

Numerous times we have experienced that small issues getting blown out of proportion due to employees sharing irresponsible photos and adding insensitive comments from their social media accounts while prominently displaying the name/logo of their organization. Also, people holding important positions in a company need to exercise a certain degree of restraint while posting on their social media handles. A social media policy in place could help keep a check on all these concerns.

Employees need to be made aware that any irresponsible behavior by them even on their personal social media handles can have a denting effect on the image of the company given the prowess of the internet, trolling, and memes.

Summing Up

Business or company policies are a very important tool for corporate governance. Without clear and unambiguous policies, corporate governance will be biased because even the top leaders would not have anything to refer to except their judgments — which could be right sometimes but which also could be biased at others.

Secondly, well-crafted business policies play an important role in building and shaping an organization culture. With policies in place and adherence to the same, employees’ behavior begins to sing the same tune across the organization.

There are more business policies than the ones listed in this article. And these will vary from company to company. But it is important to have business policies in place for better organizational functioning and a better organizational culture.

About Author: BPX is a premier business process consultant who provides Business Process Consulting and other business process services.

Article Source: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/business-policies-better-governance-culture-dr-rupal-agarwal/