I get where you're coming from much better now. Looking at your original comment/OP's post, I think a lot of the replies you got substituted in information from

I get where you're coming from much better now. Looking at your original comment/OP's post, I think a lot of the replies you got substituted in information from the OP in places where you did not specify. You've cleared it up though and don't sound so draconian anymore though! 1) The fire in the kitchen isn't the developer's responsibility as he is an employee and does not own the property or the problem. The company is hiring the developer to do work for them - that work includes fixing problems regardless of who created them. If the developer were on a contract for 1 month and something he created exploded on 1month+1day then the developer is under no responsibility to fix that problem. That extends just the same to an employee and shows how the employee is not responsible for the fire. Of course, most employees are going to happily stay and fix what they broke as it's part of professional integrity - but the business owner should really be saying "thank you" in that situation as the employee has gone beyond his employment contract to help. So I disagree with you - the developer being the only one able to solve a problem does not make him responsible in any way. If the developer received the rewards of ownership then he would be responsible. I'll admit that it doesn't work like this in most cases as employees are scared of getting fired and act more like indentured servants than anything - but as a manager you should try to be above that, I think. 2) Definitely not standard - and the OP who you wrote your comment to is clearly not being offered overtime. He is being told to work more with no mention of more pay. The company wouldn't want him working overtime if it was costing them more than hiring another employee. 3) So the developer deliberately sabotaged established company procedure. I'm not sure what it has to do with the OP so it's probably why the replies to your comment seem confused. At any rate, it's a completely separate issue and even if the dev stayed all weekend to fix the problem, he should still be getting a very stern official warning to follow safety procedures. Seems like an orthogonal issue.