Workplace Violence: Prevention and Response

According to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), more than two million American workers experience workplace violence each year. Workplace violence is the fourth leading cause of workplace deaths each year. A 2019 United States study by the Society for Human Resource Managers found that 33% of employees and 20% of human resource professionals do not know what to do if they are involved in a workplace violence event. A 2020 study found that 30% of full-time employees stated they were unaware of their employer’s safety and security plans for the most basic emergencies.

The National Institute of Occupational Health and Safety identifies four primary types of workplace violence, (1) criminal intent, (2) customer or client, (3) employee-on-employee, and (4) domestic disputes. This presentation will also review causative factors for many workplace shooting events. A review of workplace active shooter events in the last decade find that in many of the cases, the employee had a long-standing and ongoing dispute with another employee, whom they ended up killing. In the majority of the cases, upper management was unaware of the long-standing disputes.

This presentation will also examine OSHA’s expectation of both employers and supervisors. Many supervisors fail to realize that they are frequently viewed as agents of the employer. As such, the supervisors can create legal liability both for the company and for themselves personally. Supervisors who fail to train and prevent workplace violence events can find themselves financially and criminally liable. This presentation will review OSHA expectations of both the employer and the supervisor.

This presentation will also specifically discuss two types of workplace violence that are not physical assaults; harassment and stalking. Bullying and harassment in the workplace has reached epidemic proportions, with approximately one out of every three United States employees experiencing victimization from workplace bullying each year. This presentation will discuss three types of common workplace bullies, the overt bully, the covert clever bully, and the covert highly skilled bully. Participants on this course will all be able to immediately recognize people they work with as fitting into one or more of these categories. Participants will then learn how to deal with these bullies, and management will also receive training on recognition and management.

This presentation will look at ways to reduce workplace violence in controlled settings (those owned or operated by the business) and uncontrolled settings (outdoors, working homes, and so forth). Both settings require different strategies to employ to prevent and respond to workplace violence events.

Last this presentation will provide a comprehensive look at preventing and responding to workplace violence events. Prevention includes the concepts of verbal de-escalation, calming agitated people, recognizing imminent warning signs of violence using the STAMP method, and pre-attack indicators. Participants will also learn steps to take if they are suddenly in a workplace violence event.

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To download a PDF copy of this course, please click below. If you would like more information on booking this course, please email info@ThreatSuppression.com, or call 1-800-231-9106.