Question

You work as an HR Manager at Chenoa Automotive. Chenoa Automotive is an automobile parts manufacturer and it employs roughly 1,100 employees of whom 825 work in production facilities and are unionized. The rest of the employees are office workers employed in a variety of clerical, professional, and managerial jobs. Lately, the company is dealing with increased tardiness, absenteeism, and accidents. A preliminary investigation suggests that there might be a “drug problem.” Your CEO wants you to develop and implement a drug testing program. Describe in detail what the program will look like, how you will communicate the program, how you will implement the program, and how you will evaluate the success of the program?

Answer 1

Drug abuse is an issue faced by many businesses and such issues should be tackled efficiently for the sustenance of business.

The suggested program is as follows;

1. Make a report of the number of accidents occurred during the past one month, a report of the percentage of absent of all employees and effective working hours they are working.
2. Establish a clear drug usage and testing policy. The policy should state that how often employees will be subjected to testing in a year or in a quarter. It should also state the need to be drug free during working hours and the potential penalties for drug abuse.
3. A meeting needs to be conducted with the union leaders. The situation shall be relayed to them and they should be made understood the down trend in business and how it can affect them. A brief of the management decision shall be given to the leaders along with a copy of the testing policy.
4. Copy of the policy shall be displayed in notice board and it shall be made available to the entire team via email.
5. A reliable drug testing agency needs to be identified. Rates shall be negotiated, and a contract shall be made with the testing agency.
6. A schedule for testing shall be prepared and the same shall be agreed with the testing agency.
7. Tests shall be conducted as per the established schedule.
8. Reports shall be collected, and it shall be checked for any issues.
9. Drug abusers shall be intimated and a meeting with the union leaders shall be called. They shall be made aware of the issue and directions shall be given to resolve the issue. Serious violators shall be punished as per the conditions made in the policy. Other shall be intimated about the requirement to curb substance abuse.
10. Records of the test shall be prepared and kept.
11. Periodical tests shall be made, and violators shall be punished.
12. Records of all periodical tests shall also be kept properly.

The program, once prepared, shall be submitted for the management's approval. They will evaluate it and feedback will be given. It shall be amended as per their suggestions, if any given. Finalized program shall be delivered to all concerned department heads like HR, Operations etc. Union leaders also shall be made aware of the program and management decision.

The program shall be implemented step by step. A testing team shall be formed, and duties of each member shall be documented and relayed to the team member. There shall be people to coordinate with the testing agency. Vehicles and drivers to take the employees to the agency and back. There should be someone to monitor the process and to give feedback etc. Once this is finalized, a meeting shall be conducted to make sure that everyone is on the same page and everybody understand the program correctly. Once this is done, the program is to be implemented.

After testing and taking necessary measures, the employee attendance, tardiness and accident making rate shall be analyzed against the previous rates. Study shall be conducted to check changes. A target range for these issues shall be established and monthly evaluation shall be conducted. Evaluation study shall be made against the established standard rates and the report be given to management for their verification.