AIMS expects all its volunteers to support one another, work collaboratively, and treat one another with the same courtesy and respect that we want to see the maternity services give to all their users.
We recognise that in any organisation it is inevitable that differences in personality and preferred ways of working will on occasion lead to ill-feeling between individuals, to the detriment of effective working relationships. People can also have legitimate concerns about a fellow-volunteer’s or a Trustees’ actions which they must be able to raise.
The Trustees have therefore adopted the following resolution process.
(Note that cases of personal harassment are covered by our Personal Harassment Policy.)
We hope that in most cases any problems will be resolved informally through an open and respectful discussion. We encourage people to raise any concerns directly with the person or people involved and suggest that it is probably more productive to do this through conversation rather than by exchange of emails.
If individuals or groups are unable or unwilling to resolve their issues through an informal discussion they should raise the matter with their Team Lead or the management team. The Team Lead or a member of the management team will work informally with the parties to try to find a mutually-agreeable way forward. This will normally be through facilitating a discussion between the parties, though occasionally there may be circumstances where individual conversations would be more appropriate.
Should informal mediation fail to bring about a satisfactory resolution, volunteers will have the option of submitting a formal written statement of grievance to the trustees detailing the grounds, specific issues and what resolution or redress they are seeking.
The trustees will appoint two trustees to review the grievance. They will pass on the formal grievance statement to the other party/ies, explain to all parties the process to be followed and ask whether they are willing to participate in a joint discussion, which as before will be the preferred option.
They will then conduct a joint discussion or else individual discussions with both parties at a mutually agreed time or times. This will normally be done by Google Meet or phone.
All parties will be expected to maintain strict confidentiality during the formal grievance process, and to respond promptly to requests for information or to agree times for discussions. If either party appears to be delaying the process without good reason, the reviewer(s) will set a deadline for them to respond and may choose to terminate the process if that deadline is not met.
To ensure that the process is fair and open, the reviewer(s) will only address matters raised in the formal statement of grievance, so anyone submitting a statement will need to make sure that they have included everything that they wish the reviewer(s) to consider.
The reviewers may interview or obtain evidence from other parties in confidence, as needed to ensure a thorough investigation of the issue(s).
They will provide a written response to both parties and the AIMS Trustees.
If either party is not satisfied with the reviewers’ response they have the right to appeal it. The trustees will appoint an appeal panel of trustees who have had no previous involvement in the process to review the appeal. This will be conducted according to the same process as the internal formal review and will consider only the issues originally raised. The decision of the appeal panel will be final.