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Foundations and Governance/Infractions/Policy Violation.md

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+A Policy Violation occurs when an employee ignores or disregards official methods or rules. A person can be cited for a policy violation even if skipping or disregarding the policy didn't cause an immediate problem.
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+The reason is that official processes and methods have been developed over time with care and thought. Each policy and step exists for a reason, usually to avoid some kind of accident, loss, or other problem. When an employee doesn't follow official policies and methods they could be unwittingly creating risks that aren't immediately obvious.
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+## Why policies and processes exist and need to be adhered to
+In general, a policy or process exists because otherwise there won't be any common sense. Policies are generally created around situations where 2-3 people presented with the same decision would likely reach slightly different conclusions or need to debate what to do. That's especially true if they have different levels of experience or perspective about the situation.
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+For example, when confronted with a ringing telephone three different people might reach three different conclusions about what they should do:
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+- Person A thinks they should get a supervisor.
+- Person B thinks they should ignore the phone and keep working.
+- Person C thinks they should answer "Hello, LDR, how can I help you?"
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+All three people are probably reaching conclusions that feel like common sense. The problem being, each of them would probably disagree with each other or be surprised by each other's decision.
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+Policies and processes exist to eliminate that kind of confusion and frustration, as well as protect us from non-obvious risks that might be unapparent to people in a given situation.
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+### A policy may exist to protect from harm
+In many cases policies may exist to protect other employees from some kind of unforseen or non-obvious danger.
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+For example, if an employee answers the phone, they are not supposed to answer any questions about who's at work or what their schedules are. That might seem arbitrary to people who don't understand the reasons, so they might be tempted to fudge that rule. The problem being that answering questions about who's at work or what their schedule is could aid a stalker in accosting an employee or let a burglar know the employee isn't home.
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+### Policies may exist to ensure consistent results
+In other cases policies may exist to ensure the results of our work are consistently what the customer wants.
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+For example, when a person is doing picking or STOW, the placement of barcodes on items matters a lot. However, it's not really important for people doing other jobs. That's why we have a policy to always put the barcode on the smallest side of a product because it makes the work easier for other people. That's important because our customers expect us to locate and ship items on a deadline, which we can't do if picking or STOW are bottlenecked.
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+### Policies may exist to reduce communications overhead and meetings
+For common decisions arising in the business, there may be policies that act as a decision-making framework for how employees are supposed to respond. The purpose of these policies is to improve the consistency of decision making and reduce the time it takes to respond to situations.
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+For example, it is unfortunately a situation that sometimes people no-call, no-show, meaning they don't show up to work or contact us. Our policy is if a person does that two days in a row we just assume they quit. That's to avoid needing to have a lengthy debate or discussion about it each time it occurs.
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+
+## How to avoid and prevent policy violations
+As an employee, the best way to avoid policy violations is checking with your supervisor to clarify any rules, policies, or processes so you fully understand what they are. Before deciding to skip or bend the rules, run it past your supervisor to make sure it won't cause some kind of unforseen problem. This is especially important if you hear something that seems to contradict what you've read or heard.
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+As a supervisor, focus on the most important processes and rules in your area. Regularly touch base with your subordinates about them. It may be helpful to distribute memos or post signage to remind employees about important policies.
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