Progressive discipline was defined in Question 61 in Chapter 6. There are several basic rules that apply to administering progressive discipline. In essence, your company’s progressive discipline system
must provide all the elements of workplace due process. Specifically,
you should follow these four rules when disciplining your
employees:

Rule 1: The employee needs to know what the problem is.
Rule 2: The employee needs to know specifically what he needs
to do in order to fix the problem.
Rule 3: The employee needs to have a reasonable period of time
in which to fix the problem.
Rule 4: The employee needs to understand the consequences of
inaction.

If your company has ever lost a wrongful termination charge, it may not have been because of the merits of your argument; it was probably lost because you failed to follow one of these rules.

Tell Me More
Let’s look at these issues individually.
Rule one states that an employee needs to know what the problem
is. That sounds fairly self-explanatory, but it’s actually a very
common miscommunication in the workplace. Employers assume that workers know what’s wrong, only to learn later that the employee
was confused by management’s directives and actions. ‘‘I didn’t realize that my job was in trouble; everyone does that around here, and no one else has been fired because of it’’ is a common response. Employers also hear rebuttals like, ‘‘You didn’t tell me that was a formal warning; I thought you were givingme a coaching session when you told me that I needed to increase my productivity on the shop floor.’’ Therefore, you shouldn’t assume that any performance-
related issue is self-evident; your concerns should be explained clearly both verbally and in writing.

The second rule states that workers need to know how to fix the problem at hand. The best way to accomplish this is by adding an ‘‘Expectations’’ section to your verbal and written warnings. For
example, you might write, ‘‘John, I expect that you will arrive at
your workstation by 8:00 a.m. and be ready to begin work at that
time on a go-forward basis.’’ That kind of directive is clear and incontestable in its intent. After all, a measurable standard must be
known in advance for it to be enforceable and capable of ithstanding
legal scrutiny.

Taken From : The Hiring and Firing Quention and Answer Book