Tolerating mistakes

Here is another answer to Abby’s question about organizations that allow for mistakes. I have been reading Charles O’Reilly and Jeffrey Pfeffer’s Hidden Value and they have an almost amazing example. The book is an impressive account of eight companies that believe that, rather than emphasizing acquisition and retention of “the best and the brightest,” the best course for employers is to work with “ordinary people” and inspire loyalty and performance.

One case study is of Men’s Wearhouse, which, the authors note, stands out as being highly successful in an industry that has seen many long-standing firms go out of business. It is also listed by Fortune as on of the “100 Best Companies To Work For” in this country.

Men’s Wearhouse believes in giving employees who make mistakes another chance, and they apply that policy so far as to include employees caught stealing money. The authors explain that, however overly forgiving one might consider that, the company is aware that retail workers generally have history of being poorly paid and poorly treated and thus are more susceptible to make such “mistakes”.

Written personnel policies invariably identify theft as ground for immediate termination. Can anyone top this as an example of tolerating employee mistakes?