October 23, 2017 | Category: Workplace violence

WPV

In our last webinar, we discussed workplace violence. Workplace violence is any physical assault, threatening behavior, or verbal abuse occurring in the work setting. A workplace can be defined as any location either permanent or temporary where an employee performs any work related duty.

So What Does This Mean?

Workplace violence includes, but is not limited to, the buildings and the surrounding perimeters, including the parking lots, field locations, customer/patient/client homes and traveling to and from work assignments. So essentially, anywhere that work is being performed, whether remote or in-person.

Among the alarming statistics above, homicide is the FOURTH leading cause of death in workplace. There are four different types of workplace violence: 

 

Type I: Criminal Intent

Type II: Customers/Clients

Type III: Worker on Worker

Type IV: Personal Relationships

Work Place Violence Includes:

• Beatings
• Stabbings
• Suicides
• Shootings
• Rapes
• Psychological traumas
• Threats or obscene phone calls
• Intimidation
• Harassment of any nature
• Being followed, sworn or shouted at

How Common is Workplace Violence?

• From 1992 and 2012, there were 14,770 workplace homicide victims
• From 2014 and 2015, 417 cases. 2009, there were 572,000 reports of WPV
• Approx. 2 MM Workers a year are affected by WPV

Zero Tolerance for Work Place Violence

Employers should implement a zero tolerance in the stating no threatening or violent behavior is acceptable
and no violent incident will be ignored. Company violence prevention policies should require action on all
reports of violence, without exception.

To achieve this, create a written policy. As well as an Incident Report card. This help your employees feel they can openly share their experiences (anonymous or not) and feel safe in doing so. Even creating a ‘skeleton’ plan for this is helpful and will keep your employees at ease.

• Meet with law enforcement & other responders
• Create & distribute incident response cards
• Show “Run, Hide, Fight” to employees
• Develop communications plan

Tips for Workplace Violence

Report it!
Record it!
File Charges
Get Help

Conclusively, each and everyone of your employees deserves and is owed safety in the workplace. Feeling safe is necessary for workplace happiness and KPIs. Plans, policies and procedures reduce workplace violence significantly, but participation at all levels is required.

DO NOT FORGET to gather, record, analyze, and act on information (before, during, and after!). Training is a vital part of this process.

If you would like us to help you, or would like to see a mock-up of an example written policy, don’t hesitate. Contact the Nevada Association of Employers and let us walk you through it.