Serious misconduct involves willful, deliberate behavior by an employee that's fundamentally incompatible with continuing their job, often causing severe risk or damage, and includes actions like theft, fraud, assault, sexual harassment, intoxication at work, or refusing lawful, reasonable instructions, potentially allowing for dismissal without notice. It's conduct that destroys the trust and confidence needed for the employment relationship, going beyond simple error or poor judgment.
Meaning of serious misconduct
(c) engaging in theft, fraud, assault or sexual harassment in the course of the employee's employment; (d) being intoxicated at work; (e) refusing to carry out a lawful and reasonable instruction that is consistent with the employee's contract of employment.
Examples include: causing serious and imminent risk to the health and safety of another person or to the reputation or profits of their employer's business, theft, fraud, assault, sexual harassment or refusing to carry out a lawful and reasonable instruction that is part of the job. Other known term: misconduct.
Gross misconduct can include things like theft, physical violence, gross negligence or serious insubordination. With gross misconduct, you can dismiss the employee immediately as long as you follow a fair procedure.
Misconduct generally means things such as a ``deliberate and wanton disregard for your employer or a fellow employee''. So this would be things like insubordination, repeated inexcusable tardiness or absences, violating the law, or being so negligent it causes bodily harm.
The five generally accepted fair reasons for dismissal are Conduct, Capability/Performance, Redundancy, Statutory Illegality (breach of statutory duty), and Some Other Substantial Reason (SOSR), all requiring a fair process including investigation, warnings (usually), and opportunity for the employee to respond. These cover an employee's behavior (misconduct), ability to do the job (performance/health), the job no longer existing (redundancy), legal restrictions (losing a license), or other significant business reasons like irreparable personality clashes.
A sackable offence refers to conduct in the workplace that is serious enough to justify dismissal. Acts of gross misconduct, such as theft, fraud or violence, are sackable offences where an employee can be summarily dismissed, ie; without notice or pay in lieu of notice.
4 Common Reasons for Dismissal
Examples of Workplace Misconduct or Poor Performance that May Warrant Immediate Termination
Courts and agencies look for detailed, corroborated evidence to establish a pattern of hostility. The most persuasive proof typically includes: Emails, text messages, or instant messages containing hostile, discriminatory, or inappropriate language.
Many words that scare human resources fall into clear categories: Legal and sensitive terms: “harassment,” “discrimination,” “lawsuit,” “retaliation.” These words trigger legal and compliance concerns because they suggest unresolved, serious workplace issues.
While misconduct is a general term for any inappropriate behavior, serious misconduct bridges the gap between regular misconduct and gross misconduct. Serious misconduct involves behavior that is highly inappropriate but may not yet justify immediate dismissal without further investigation or prior warnings.
Behaviour is unprofessional if it negatively affects clients or the work of other staff and teams. Unprofessional behaviour can relate to one incident or repeated incidents.
If workplace bullying, harassment, or excessive stress led to a diagnosed mental health condition such as an anxiety disorder or depression, you may have grounds for a legal claim against your employer for failing to provide a safe work environment.
If, after following a fair process, the employer concludes that the employee has engaged in serious misconduct, the employee may be dismissed without notice. Serious misconduct is behaviour that fundamentally compromises the employer's trust and confidence in the employee.
How long does a misconduct investigation take? The duration of an investigation depends on the complexity of the case, the number of witnesses, and the availability of evidence. Most investigations take a few days to several weeks, but complex cases may require longer periods to ensure due diligence.
Serious misconduct includes theft, fraud, assault, sexual harassment, intoxication at work and the refusal to carry out lawful and reasonable instructions consistent with the employment contract.
The biggest red flags at work often center around toxic leadership, poor communication, and a high-turnover culture, signaling deep issues like micromanagement, lack of transparency, burnout, and disrespect, where problems are normalized and employee well-being is ignored in favor of short-term gains. Key indicators include managers who don't support staff, excessive gossip, broken promises, constant negativity, and environments where speaking up feels unsafe or pointless, often leading to high employee churn.
Abusive conduct may include repeated infliction of verbal abuse, such as the use of derogatory remarks, insults, and epithets, verbal or physical conduct that a reasonable person would find threatening, intimidating, or humiliating, or the gratuitous sabotage or undermining of a person's work performance.
Automatically unfair reasons for dismissal
family, including parental leave, paternity leave (birth and adoption), adoption leave or time off for dependants. acting as an employee representative. acting as a trade union representative. acting as an occupational pension scheme trustee.
Your employer cannot fire you based on discriminatory reasons such as racism, ableism, ageism, or sexism. Employers also cannot fire you as a retaliatory act in response to denied sexual advances, whistleblowing, or calling attention to problems.
An employer can dismiss an employee without giving notice if it's because of gross misconduct. This is when an employee has done something that's very serious or has very serious effects. The employer must have followed a fair procedure.
Here are 7 examples classed as workplace misconduct
The choice depends on what matters more to you—your reputation or your finances. Quitting gives you control over the narrative but may forfeit unemployment benefits or severance. Being fired can hurt your confidence and reputation, but it often makes you eligible for unemployment or other protections.
Check what behaviour is unacceptable