Employment Relations

Whether you’re a business owner, manager, or fellow practitioner, this page brings together everything you need to prepare, chair, and conclude disciplinary hearings effectively and fairly.

Below, you’ll find the videos, templates, and in-depth guides I’ve created to support you through the entire process. Every resource is built from real experience and designed to be legally sound, practical, and easy to use.

Relevant credential: I have chaired close to 3000 hearings over 500 different companies, and I am here to share the skills, knowledge, and practical experience with you.

Please note: This page is updated regularly

I’m constantly adding new videos, blog posts, and downloadable templates to support you in handling disciplinary hearings with clarity and confidence. Be sure to check back often—or subscribe below to get notified when new resources are added.

Start here: Understand the Full process

🎥 Comprehensive Overview of the Disciplinary Hearing Process

This video walks you through the disciplinary process from start to finish—perfect if you’re unsure where to begin or want a solid foundation before diving into specific steps. This is also helpful to gain a good overview of the whole procedure to see where the specific parts and elements fit in. You can then refer to the resources I have that detail specific parts of the hearing for more information on those parts.

Before the Discplinary Hearing

Before scheduling a hearing, it’s crucial to determine whether it’s necessary—and ensure your documentation is correct.

🎥 Should you Have a Disciplinary Hearing?

Not all misconduct needs a formal hearing. This video helps you decide when it’s appropriate to proceed.

To help with that decision I created is a Disciplinary Guide

Disciplinary guide with a tables of offence and recommended disciplinary action

In addition to 1.5 pages of general tips and important information for taking disciplinary action, this document includes 5 pages of tables of offences. The offences are grouped into related offences.

The following groupings are in the document:
1. Absenteeism related offences
2. Time keeping offences
3. Job related offences
4. Customer service / professionalism related offences
5. Health & Safety related offences
6. Interpersonal offences
7. Dishonest conduct
8. Other*

The document includes 65 different offences and recommended disciplinary action.

*Other includes very short, table format, guides on how to handle other situations such as poor work performance, medical incapacity, incapacity due to not having a valid work permit, and retrenchment.

Client Feedback: “What an easy tool to use. After tailoring it to fit our company’s needs, it has streamlined the process of corrective behaviour in our business. Now we are more efficient and it’s easier to remain compliant.” – Davina

Get this guide now by clicking the link below.

Explaining the Notice to Attend a hearing

Video explaining everything about the notice to attend a disciplinary hearing

This video is all about issuing and receiving a notice to attend a disciplinary hearing or a notice to attend a disciplinary inquiry/enquiry (those terms are used interchangeably). Employers, managers, employee representatives and employees can find value in this video as it is made with employers and employees in mind. I start by discussing the purpose of a notice to attend a disciplinary hearing to put into context the important information that should be on there. The remainder of the video goes into more detail about the information that I recommend be on a disciplinary inquiry notification – this includes information about disciplinary charges/allegations, the place of the hearing, evidence presented in the hearing, how long in advance should the notice be given, and all of the employee’s rights and entitlements.

You can draft your own notice from the video or download my template

Notice to attend a disciplinary hearing template

This document is a template that is used to notify employees of a disciplinary hearing (also known as disciplinary inquiry / disciplinary enquiry).
It is a 2-page word document for easy editing.
The first page provides space for the details of the employee, the allegations/charges and details of the disciplinary hearing. The second page details the employee’s rights and provides space for the employee to sign, a witness to sign and the person issuing the notification to sign.

Please note: These documents have been drafted in accordance with the South African Employment Relations. The prices appear in dollars to facilitate the automated process where the documents are available immediately after payment is made through PayPal.

How to word allegations / charges on the notice of a hearing

This is a very important step and, in my experience, where many errors are made. To assist with this I have a video, but a more comprehensive and truly valuable tool (if I say so myself) is the guide to drafting offences.

Drafting Offences and Charges Guide (Professional Guide)

In this guide I take you through how to formulate offences, all the ‘dos” and best practices, and all the ‘don’ts’ and common mistakes. The guide includes a list of types of offences and their definitions to assist with categorising the offence on warnings and disciplinary notices. In addition to this, the guide has an entire section where I provide suggested wording and examples of wording for all the types of offences for you to use in drafting your warnings or disciplinary hearing notices.

With this guide you’ll be able draft offences & charges like a professional employment relations practitioner. 

It is 47 pages

It includes 32 different types of offences and their definitions

It includes several examples of wording for the different types of offences

Get this guide now

How to write offences on warning letters (video)

While this letter focuses on how to write offences on warning letters, the information can be applied to writing offences on disciplinary hearing notices.

If you need to suspend an employee before a hearing

Here is my precautionary suspension template. Use this document when you require an employee to not work or be on the premises pending their disciplinary hearing. Issue this completed document before the employee leaves the premises to ensure that the precautionary suspension is done fairly and to avoid unnecessary misunderstandings. All the important information when an employee is being suspended before a disciplinary inquiry is included in this template.

Precautionary Suspension Template

Important information:
A suspension pending a disciplinary inquiry/hearing, irrespective of the severity of the offence, is required to be paid and therefore the document indicates that the suspension period will be paid.

Get this template now or get more value and get the disciplinary bundle instead.

More information on suspensions coming to my Youtube channel soon.

Disciplinary Bundle

The disciplinary templates that all businesses and practitioners should have. This bundle includes the following templates:

1. Verbal Warning Template
2. Written Warning Template
3. 2nd Written Warning Template
4. Final Written Warning Template
5. Dismissal Letter
6. Precautionary Suspension Letter
7. Notice of Disciplinary Inquiry

Disciplinary Bundle: 7 Key Misconduct Templates

Warning Documents:
The warning documents are each 1 page. Each of the warning documents include clear spaces to be completed by the employer/manager when issuing the warning. The recommended validity periods appear on the warnings.

Dismissal Letter:
The dismissal letter is a 1 page document with clear spaces to be completed by the employer/manager. This dismissal letter is specifically for misconduct terminations (disciplinary matters) and should be edited accordingly if the document is to be used for retrenchment or incapacity dismissals.

Precautionary Suspension Letter:
This document is just over a page long. It includes all the important information when an employee is being suspended before a disciplinary inquiry. Please note that a suspension pending a disciplinary inquiry/outcome is required to be paid and therefore the document indicates that the suspension period will be paid.

Notification to attend a disciplinary inquiry:
This is a 2 page hearing notification. It includes clear spaces to enter the relevant information followed by the employee’s rights at the disciplinary inquiry.

Chairing the hearing

Once the hearing starts, your role as a chairperson is to maintain structure, procedural fairness and guide the process to make the appropriate decisions effectively and professionally.

Chairperson Introduction & Explaining the Procedure Video

This is one of my most popular videos on Youtube.

In this video I share the “Chairperson’s introduction and explanation of the process” speech. I take you through word-for-word how I start a disciplinary hearing. In addition to sharing my speech – I also explain why I say what I do and misperceptions that typically arise in a disciplinary hearing.

*A reminder that your engagement with my content & purchasing of my templates is how I can continue to bring you free employment relations information. Please consider commenting on & liking the video, and subscribing to my channel or purchasing my templates. Also – let me know what videos you would like to see*

A very valuable tool and also my second most purchased template is my chairperson notes template.

Chairperson disciplinary hearing notes

This is the form I use having chaired close to 3000 disciplinary hearings. I have refined the form over time to continuously improve it. I find using this form makes chairing a hearing easier and more effective.

Procedural Fairness when chairing a hearing

Just like I share the exact wording I use to start the hearing and explain the procedure, I have also shared the wording I use to establish procedural fairness at the onset of a hearing.

Establishing Procedural Fairness at the start of a hearing video

This video follows from my previous video where I share the exact speech and wording I use when chairing a disciplinary hearing to introduce myself and the procedure. In this video I cover the questions that I ask to establish procedural fairness from the onset. I cover my approach to procedural fairness in a hearing, as well as how I word the questions and why I word them the way I do, my experience of chairing hearings, some examples and tips.

My chairperson notes template covers the questions that I ask to establish procedural fairness and ensures that that information is recorded.

Like my video introducing the disciplinary hearing and establishing procedural fairness, I also have a video on how I proceed from when an employee has been found guilty to investigating the mitigating and aggravating factors. I share the exact wording I use and lots of other tips.

Video on Mitigating and aggravating factors

This page will be updated as new information is added.

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On my Channel I post lifestyle content in addition to employment relations content. I understand that having different content on a channel is unusual, however, the lifestyle content is less niche and allowed my channel to become monetized earlier. It is costly in terms of equipment, software and time to make detailed Youtube videos. Having my channel be monetized helps me to continue to make content that is free and accessible. I appreciate your support and understanding.

Employment Relations Playlist on Youtube

More resources on specific types of Misconduct

My first Youtube video ever was about Absconsion. Watch it here. You can also find several important absconsion templates available from my downloadable resources.

More information on specific types of misconduct will be created.