Your employment policies won’t protect you if your managers can’t have the conversation

Written by Lynsey Kitching from CAPE People Development

There is a lot for HR teams to think about as the employment landscape continues to change.

From 1 January 2027, employees will have the right to claim unfair dismissal after six months rather than two years, and the limit on compensation for unfair dismissal will be removed.

At the same time, Acas has been consulting on a significantly expanded Code of Practice for disciplinary and grievance procedures, with greater emphasis on addressing concerns early and, where appropriate, resolving them through constructive informal conversations.

We have been looking at these changes at CAPE People Development, alongside the wider direction of employment policy, and one thing in particular stands out. This isn't simply an HR compliance issue. It's a leadership capability issue.

Organisations will understandably spend time reviewing policies, processes and documentation. They need to. But there is another question that deserves just as much attention: are the managers who have to put those policies into practice actually equipped to have the conversations they depend on?

Because employment processes don't begin when HR receives an email asking for advice. They often begin months earlier, when someone isn't quite delivering what was expected, when behaviour starts affecting colleagues, when expectations aren't clear, or when a manager notices something but decides it isn't serious enough to address yet.

They begin in those everyday moments when everybody can sense there is a problem, but nobody quite knows how to talk about it.

This is why the increasing emphasis on informal resolution is so interesting. On paper, informal resolution can sound relatively straightforward. A manager raises a concern, listens to the employee's perspective, discusses what needs to change and agrees what happens next. In practice, doing that well requires considerable skill.

A manager needs to notice an issue, address it early, listen without immediately reaching a conclusion, establish what is really happening, create clarity about expectations and follow the conversation through.

That's not simply HR process. That's leadership

And it potentially exposes a gap in organisations that have invested heavily in people policies but considerably less in the everyday capability of the people expected to apply them.

Five things leaders can start doing now

1 Get much clearer about expectations

You cannot have a fair performance conversation about an expectation that was never clear in the first place.

Yet managers often believe they have communicated something because they have said it. Saying something and creating shared understanding aren't the same thing. Good leadership means taking the time to establish what good actually looks like, what is expected by when, where the individual has autonomy, what isn't negotiable and how both people will know that the expectation has been met.

This sounds basic, but we see the consequences of missing it repeatedly. A manager becomes frustrated that someone isn't delivering, while the individual believes they are doing exactly what was asked of them.

By the time the discrepancy is discussed, both sides have developed their own interpretation of what has happened. Clarity at the beginning can prevent a very different conversation later.

2 Stop saving feedback for when something becomes a problem

One of the most damaging habits in management is waiting. Managers wait because someone is busy, because they are busy, because the issue feels too small to mention, because they don't want to demotivate someone, or because they hope it will sort itself out. Then three months later, a relatively straightforward conversation has become a performance problem.

Early feedback doesn't need to feel like the beginning of a formal process. Often it can start with something as simple as, "I've noticed this. What's your perspective?" That creates an opportunity to understand what is happening while the issue is still manageable.

Small conversations held early are usually far easier to navigate than big conversations held late. The increasing emphasis on early and informal resolution should be a prompt for organisations to consider whether their managers genuinely feel able to do this.

3 Diagnose before you decide

Poor performance isn't a diagnosis. Someone may not understand what is expected of them. They may lack capability or confidence. They may need development. There may be competing priorities or organisational barriers getting in their way. Or they may understand perfectly well what is required and simply not be delivering it. Those situations require very different management responses.

Too often, managers enter a difficult conversation having already decided what the problem is. Once that happens, the conversation becomes about proving the manager's interpretation rather than understanding the situation.

A better starting point is curiosity. Ask what is happening, listen properly, test assumptions and then decide what needs to happen next. The quality of the questions a manager asks before reaching a conclusion can fundamentally change what happens afterwards.

4 Don't confuse kindness with avoiding the conversation

This is something we see repeatedly in our work with leaders. Managers avoid difficult conversations because they don't want to upset someone or damage the relationship. The intention is understandable, and often comes from a genuinely good place. But avoiding clarity rarely feels kind to the person on the receiving end when, months later, they discover their manager has had concerns for some time.

Support and challenge aren't opposites. A manager can listen and still hold someone accountable. They can acknowledge difficult circumstances while remaining clear about expectations.

They can care about the person and still talk openly about something that needs to change. In fact, having that conversation early and respectfully is often considerably fairer than allowing frustration to build in the background.

5 Follow up

A good conversation isn't finished when the meeting ends. What was agreed? What will each person do? When will they come back to it? Has anything changed? Without follow-up, even a very good conversation can become little more than a moment of good intention.

This is also where managers need to develop better discipline around appropriate record keeping. That doesn't mean turning every conversation into a formal HR document or creating a culture where people become frightened to talk openly.

It means knowing when it is appropriate to capture expectations, actions and follow-up. There is a considerable difference between a manager saying, "We've talked about this several times," and being able to explain what was discussed, what was agreed and what happened next.

Two things HR leaders should be doing

1 Audit capability as well as policy

Of course HR teams need to review disciplinary procedures, update guidance and make sure their organisations understand forthcoming changes. But it is worth reviewing the reality alongside the policy. Take a typical performance issue and follow it backwards through your organisation. Think about what would actually happen before the situation reached HR.

Would the manager address the issue early or wait? Would they know how to start the conversation? Could they distinguish between a capability issue, a conduct issue, a lack of clarity and a development need? Would they listen before reaching a conclusion? Would they know what to record and when? Would they recognise the point at which informal management was no longer appropriate and HR support was needed?

Most importantly, would they actually have the conversation?

That exercise may reveal far more about organisational risk than another review of the written procedure. A policy can tell a manager what they should do. It cannot give them the confidence, judgement or skill to do it.

2 Stop treating conversation skills as 'soft skills'

Perhaps this is the bigger shift. The ability to give feedback, create clarity, discuss performance, listen well, challenge assumptions and navigate disagreement is still too often described as a collection of 'soft skills'. Yet these are the capabilities on which many of our organisational processes depend.

You can design an excellent performance management framework, but someone still has to tell an employee that their performance isn't where it needs to be. You can create a clear flexible working policy, but someone still has to navigate the conversation when individual needs and operational requirements don't easily align.

You can encourage informal resolution, but someone still needs to sit down with two people when a relationship has become difficult and help them talk about what is happening.

These conversations affect performance, retention, engagement, trust and, increasingly, organisational risk. Calling them soft skills significantly understates their importance. Policies provide the framework. Leaders create the experience. So, as organisations prepare for the employment changes ahead, perhaps the question shouldn't simply be, "Are our policies ready?"

A more useful question might be: "Are our leaders ready?"

Because ultimately, the quality of your employment practices will depend not only on what is written in your policies, but on what happens in thousands of everyday conversations when nobody from HR is in the room.

CAPE People Development is an award winning leadership development consultancy founded by Naomi Regan and Lynsey Kitching. Working across the private, public and not-for-profit sectors, CAPE helps organisations strengthen leadership through better everyday conversations.

Pictured from left to right: Lynsey Kitching and Naomi Regan