Violence is on the increase. Workplace violence is also increasing: domestic violence spills over on to the work site, disturbed employees commit violent acts. Sometimes the location of the workplace leaves it open to violent incidents such as robbery. What can managers do to prevent workplace violence? Begin by considering the following advice...

1. Be Aware: You Can be Legally Liable
Society expects organisations to provide safe working environments —and that includes safety from violent acts. Whatever the origins, violent episodes have the potential to result in legal action against your organisation, or individual employees or management. However, if it is apparent that you have installed appropriate preventative measures or actions aimed at defusing lethal situations, then the likelihood of liability diminishes.


2. Devise Strategies for Minimising Staff Violence
To minimise the possibility of workplace violence resulting from staff attacks on co-workers; whether they be threats, harassment, assaults or more serious acts; develop a set of procedures aimed at defusing the potential for such incidents. Consider the following actions:

• Screen all job applicants. Should you risk employing someone with a record of domestic violence, erratic behaviour, harassment, aggression, or an obsession with weapons?
• Compile a written policy. This should indicate clearly that threats, menacing behaviour, and actual violence will not be tolerated; incorporate processes for consistent and thorough investigation and handling of such incidents; and state the consequences of policy violations by staff.
• Circulate the policy. Ensure this policy is communicated to and understood by all employees.
• Implement procedures for raising concerns. Develop a process that enables staff to alert management to aggressive behaviour by co-workers. Be on the lookout for potentially violent employees – those exhibiting a recent decline in work performance or unusual behavioural changes; those with work stress, in conflict situations with co-workers, with domestic, financial, or medical problems, with short tempers and personality disorders; and those with prior records of threatening behaviour, violence or substance abuse.
• Create procedures for handling problem staff members. The key here is to establish a means which allows disgruntled employees to have their complaints and grievances addressed openly and promptly.

3. Devise Strategies for Improving Security
There is clear evidence of increasing violence in work locations, particularly retail establishments, which involve the exchange of money, routine contact with the public, staff working early or late hours, solitary work assignments, or businesses in high crime locations.

Attend to the safety of your staff and customers by considering the installation of lights and mirrors, personal and silent alarm systems, drop safes, limited cash on hand signs, and by increasing the number of staff during high risk time slots. Provide professional training for staff on how to react to violent situations such as robbery – basically, stay calm and controlled, act on the offender’s instructions, remember details for later, and don’t disturb the evidence.


4. Install a Formal Program to Defuse Violence
Adopt a formal approach to ensure the safety of staff and cusotmers. By focusing a formal program on four component areas, then the chance of violent incidents will be considerably lessened:

i) Violence Prevention Program. This delineates the organisation's systems and procedures to ensure staff and customer safety—security systems, dysfunctional behaviour identification, conflict resolution and mediation programs, pre-employment screening, supervisory training, discipline procedures.

ii) Personal Safety Program. This provides staff with skills to perform their jobs effectively and free from hostility—including interpersonal communication skills, personal safety training, and conflict management skills.

iii) Crisis Response Planning. This provides a plan for staff to recognise, evaluate, and intervene before workplace violence occurs; and includes pre-planned responses and the organisation's responsibilities to deal with any incidents—notification and evacuation plans, crime scene response plans, media relations, press release plans, post event debriefings, counselling services.

iv) Crisis Survival Plan. This provides staff with specific action to take if violence erupts in the workplace—threat recognition, emergency notifications, personal protection, 'fight or flight' actions. Only through dynamic leadership, effective communication, planning, and training can organisations create employee awareness, reduce anxiety, and implement action plans to improve productivity, effectiveness, and safety.


Quotable Quote
Key research findings demonstrate a strong relationship between job stress and workplace harassment and violence. Substance abuse, layoffs, societal issues, and financial insecurity all contribute to the problem. Violence prevention programs and crisis response planning help reduce not only the possibility of workplace violence, but also reduce employee anxiety and improve productivity.


Don’t Forget Why Violence Occurs
Very few people engage in violence for the sake of violence. In most cases, aggression and abuse in the workplace result from escalating frustration over a short time span. There are many instances where staff and customers can start to get angry, frustrated, even violent:

• Being kept waiting
• Unhelpful staff attitudes
• Mindless bureaucracy and red tape
• Invasion of privacy
• Feeling aggrieved (bypassed for promotion, treated unfairly, in receipt of shoddy product or service, etc.)
• Alcohol

Don’t Forget Employers May Be Liable
According to the Australian Institute of Criminology, bosses should formally record all cases of workplace abuse, threats and bullying, and conduct regular staff surveys to identify potential security risks. The Institute says that violence should be taken as seriously as any other occupational health and safety issue. It warns employers could be legally liable for acts of bullying, abuse and violence committed by one employee towards another if they did not move to assess the risk of workplace violence, and prevent it.


It’s a Fact
The initial 'trigger' to an act of workplace violence may be a single event such as a lay-off, disciplinary charge, or a series of minor incidents. The perpetrators are often loners who lack the necessary support system to cope with such events. They feel they have no control over their problems and survival becomes the goal because they perceive the world is closing in. There is 'no way out', and they can find no reasonable alternatives or solutions to the predicament. They embrace a violent act. In seeking to gain control of the situation, they see violence as a way of achieving this control.

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