Lack of training leads to crimes

So, I was working with a client whose employees were committing third degree felonies on an alarmingly regular basis. A third degree felony is punishable by up to five years in prison, five years probation, and a $5,000 fine. The “crime” committed, was the recording of business calls without notifying both all parties on outgoing calls.

In-bound call notification is somewhat easy, as you have a recording up front notifying everyone that they are on a recorded line. However, out –bound call notification is dependent upon the agent. In this case, the first person that answered the call was notified that it was recorded, however, the next person may not have been notified. The lack of notification is discovered by the auditing of telephone calls by supervisors.

As I reported to the client, the problem begins in the hiring process. Employees are given no training and only read a document that describes the notification requirement and agrees to notify those called by signing the document. Also, the employee development plan has no provisions for recorded call notification. There are no standards in place to say that an employee making the calls need to be 100% in compliance with the notification policy. The supervisors also are provided no guidance on how to remediate the issue.

My recommendation was to put in place performance criteria into the employee’s development plan. Create a remediation training program and explain to the employees the severity of the violation and its punishment.

If an organization does not educate its employees on why specific policies and procedures exist, then management has to live with the consequences. Putting in policies and procedures in place without such education places the entire organization and its reputation at risk.