Author Archives: Suzi

About Suzi

I have worked in several different environments and have an unusual combination of credentials. I have clinical social work licenses in Maine and South Carolina; I have a Senior Professional Human Resources (SPHR) credential from HRCI; and many years of general business and nonprofit experience. My primary living comes from books and management consulting with nonprofits and small business. I use clinical skills to analyze small business issues, particularly employee relations. My consulting practice, Benoit Consulting, is dedicated promoting workplace excellence and employee relations that help companies achieve business goals.

What’s the Cost of Retaining Toxic Employees and Workplace Bullies?

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This topic is receiving increased attention today for a few reasons. First, 24 states in the US have reviewed or are reviewing legislation to make serious, targeted bullying a statutory crime. Second, increasing research demonstrates the cost of distractions these difficult employees cause within their teams. Third, studies are also showing that positive culture and employee engagement are correlated with increased financial success – these employees disrupt an employer’s efforts to fully engage their workforce. Finally, studies show that employees treat customers the way they are treated.

Let’s look at the cost

  • Distracted employees: employees who are concerned about the negative social tactics bullies use on them do not concentrate on work. They talk to other victims; they strategies how to stay out of the cross-hairs; they look for work elsewhere. They do this every day when the bully is at work.  There are various studies on this but assume that employees working in the same unit as the bully spend 20% of their day on these matters. Multiply their salaries and benefits by 20% and then by the number of work days in a year. 
  • Sabotage of work process: a fairly common tactic applied by toxic employees is withholding information from those who have fallen from favor. Perhaps a coworker has complained about them to the boss. Toxic employees who are responsible for distributing key information to others have the power to withhold that information as punishment. This slowed-down production costs you.
  • Lost sales and revenue opportunities: distracted employees don’t make sales and employees who are treated badly often apply that treatment to your customers. Let’s say this has only a small effect – five percent applied to annual sales.
  • Increased absenteeism: employees subjected to social isolation and other workplace abuse are more likely to be absent from work than peers in an otherwise healthy workplace. Take another ten percent of annual payroll for workers in the effected department. 
  • Long term health costs: workers subjected to bullying tactics are sick more often. They suffer physical symptoms of stomach and digestive distress, high blood-pressure, and body aches. Then there are emotional symptoms like lack of energy associated with depression. Eventually, medical claims will increase which, depending on the size of your company, may effect your claims experience rating. Increased premiums for you and your employees!
  • Reputation costs: Companies develop reputations both in their local communities and now in a wider, Internet-based community. A company’s negative reputation builds gradually. Over time, toxic employees target all the employees you want to retain. They go after employees they can’t manipulate like: high performers, workers with high ethics, and workers who don’t want to see friends victimized. People who are comfortable with a negative environment stay and those who are looking for a pro-social environment leave. The longer this goes on, the worse the overall atmosphere will get. It’s difficult to put a specific price on this dynamic but it sounds bad, doesn’t it?
  • Negative retention costs: Employers who ignore bullies and toxic employees are much more likely to be sued. Sooner or later the bully targets the wrong employee. Perhaps it’s an older person in a workplace filled with young people? What if their targets tend to be women? What if it’s the one gay employee whose “out” in your workplace. Emotionally injured and disgruntled employees sue. Even if they don’t prevail, lawsuits are a significant distraction to all involved. While not all employees whose rights are violated hire an attorney, the idea is to prevent this abusive and unnecessary behavior and engage the diversity of employees in a positive, healthy environment.

It’s worth the effort

There is so much to be gained by having a workplace of respect and collaboration. While it’s not easy to address a well-entrenched negative employee, it can be done. Employers need to articulate a positive standard of behavior; intervene when employees clearly violate this standard; and support the employees around the offender and help them set better boundaries. Finally, intervene swiftly and decisively when a bully retaliates against someone they think has spoken up against them. It will be difficult for you but it will clearly pay off in the end.

(c) Copyright BCSPublishing 2013 all rights reserved. 

6 Difficult Employee Types: Which are most toxic?

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For HR professionals, understanding the source of difficult employee behavior is key to finding the most effective intervention. This article describes tactics and relative toxicity of six difficult employee types:

  • Gossiper
  • Clearinghouse
  • Emotional Victim
  • Emotional Venter
  • Negative
  • Strategic/Toxic

Gossiper

Gossipers are highly social and are often friendly and well-meaning, but they become difficult by either ignoring work duties or distracting coworkers from theirs. Gossipers are likely to be highly connected to others through social media. They are verbally adept and seem to have a need to control social information in the workplace; if smart, they will outmatch their fellow employees. They can be immature relative to professional sense but skilled at social information management. Workplace social information may include

  • who is dating whom,
  • coworkers’ financial situations,
  • where people live,
  • coworkers’ clothes/appearance, and
  • who is aligned with whom power-wise in the department.

A Gossiper’s positive skills may include party planning or developing employee events since he/she probably knows who will like which kind of activities.

Tactics: The Gossiper collects (banks) social information and uses (lends) it to his/her advantage by spreading gossip or repeating rumors. These employees are likely to align with those who have power because they may be less politically savvy in today’s workplace. Gossipers use a variety of tactics against others. One of the clever but evil manipulation tactics invented by seventh graders is used in the workplace. It is called negative contracting and involves secret agreements to favor this person and marginalize that person. A similar juvenile tactic is what I call the third-party ambush. This is when employee 1 and 2 are aligned. Employee 2 goes to employee 3 (the target) and sets up a negative discussion about employee 1. Employee 2 then runs back to employee 1 and recounts all the unpleasant things employee 3 said. Employee 3 is victimized— caught by naively accepting the discussion with employee 2 at face value. I have seen this strategy both employed against my daughter when she was 12 and against adults in a professional setting. Being the target of this tactic is an event the most secure individual will remember and work to avoid in the future.

Toxic? The Gossiper can create power through social manipulation. When aligned with a truly Toxic employee, this can greatly enhance the power of the Toxic one, lending strategies of marginalization and so forth (see below).

 Clearinghouse

The Clearinghouse employee is primarily concerned with predictability and control. This employee is most comfortable when he/she has an information control system followed consistently by coworkers. The need to control information may come from perfectionism or may be masking fears about their worth to the company. If the former, the key factor is how far he/she will go to control the flow of technical or business information. Positions that might be a positive fit for a Clearinghouse – forms technician or some type of assignment tracker.

Tactics: The Clearinghouse employee uses essential business information to demonstrate his/her power over others. They may withhold information or criticize those who complain or try to change the information flow.

Toxic? This employee can be toxic if he/she acts up and retaliates against coworkers who grumble or seek to change the system. Another way the Clearinghouse employee can be toxic is when the information he/she controls is essential for other departments or colleagues to perform well. If financial success or quality customer relations is dependent upon timely information exchange, the employee who controls information can wreak havoc. Toxic strategies can include marginalizing unpopular coworkers and facilitating information flow to “allies of the moment.”

Emotional Victim

Emotional Victims are insecure individuals who are afraid their work isn’t up to par, have low self-esteem, or are fearful people don’t like them. I find that this kind of difficult employee is not emotionally equipped for the normal give and take of today’s workplace. They can become overly wounded by legitimate, mundane feedback or normal supervisory boundary setting.

Tactics: Some of the problematic behaviors Emotional Victims use in the workplace are crying, hysterics and promoting a view of those who critique their work as bullies. Because they don’t tolerate negative feedback well, they will use diversionary tactics to neutralize “critical” supervisors. They may leave out certain story details to support a narrative of themselves as “victim” and the supervisor as unfair.

Toxic? Whether or not Emotional Victims are toxic depends on how far they are willing to go to make themselves seem like victims. Depending on the level of fear or insecurity, these employees ally with more powerful Toxic employees to inoculate themselves from critical feedback. Initially, coworkers may rush to their defense but over time their peers may grow tired of the drama. At the extreme, their crying and hysterics over time can compel supervisors to avoid holding them accountable. Supervisors may contemplate serious intervention such as performance counseling or termination but often fail to follow through for fear of provoking an episode.

 Emotional Venter

Emotional Venters are emotionally unsophisticated— indiscriminately venting their feelings. This is a blunt instrument that does not necessarily include devious or negative intent. These employees can be insecure, fretful, and even panicky. The problem is that they don’t seem to be able to control the outward expression of these feelings in the work setting. I find that these folks are not self-aware and may not realize how extreme they get in the heat of the moment. Perhaps an Emotional Venter might be a good fit for an army sergeant, though even there one needs to have a good command of the effect of emotional venting on others!

Tactics: The Venter often yells, criticizes, blames and shames others when he/she is anxious. These situations can develop if the Emotional Venter gets caught making a mistake or if something goes wrong with workflow. He/she typically vents emotions and then gets over the issue and moves on.

Toxic? Whether or not the Emotional Venter is toxic or how toxic he/she might become depends on the degree of offense and trauma to others. The louder and more aggressive their language, the more toxic they become. The nature of their toxicity manifests in coworker fears that evolve into attempts to avoid becoming targets. Sensitive employees are more harmed by these outbursts and can become traumatized. Venters discharge their emotions and move on; meanwhile the roadside is littered with victims. Finally, this type of behavior expressed toward important clients may have a direct and negative effect on company financial success and/or customer service goals.

Negative  

The Negative employee has a pessimistic view of the world, the company and his/her prospect within the company. They tend to have a less trusting view of the company (and institutions in general) than the average person and therefore can be somewhat fretful. Because of their glass-half-empty take on life, Negative employees diminish the positive attitudes of others.

Tactics: Negative employees are naturally suspicious and have a knack for reframing positive company results or initiatives into a complaint with examples and cleverly crafted evidence. Coworkers often walk away confused about how a positive event can be twisted into a threat or disgruntlement. Negative employees are unhappy with the company and tend to work against its attempt to build morale and a positive culture.

Toxic? Negativism isn’t by itself toxic. However, when a Negative employee possesses strong verbal skills and high intelligence, his/her arguments for a pessimistic sense of the world can make it exhausting for others to support positivism. The negative talk, unhappiness with the company and general pessimism makes the Negative employee very difficult to motivate or shift. Fortunately, however, the Negative employee is sometimes eventually neutralized when coworkers grow weary of their complaining, unite and write them off as having little objective credibility.

Strategic/Toxic

Strategic/Toxic employees are smooth, smart and strategically controlling. They are often a ringleader for coworkers. The Strategic/Toxic employee is always several steps ahead of others. They are most comfortable when they are seen as favored and special in that the rules don’t apply to them. These folks may experience a high degree of performance success in technical areas. They may even be seen as having good people skills if others are too afraid to confront them. This is more likely to be the case if the company’s performance evaluation system focuses on technical results rather than collaboration and respectful treatment of others. Strategic/Toxic employee power depends upon the manipulation of others and on coworker silence about the techniques to which they are routinely subject.

Tactics: Strategic/Toxic employees are highly skilled manipulators. They use emotional manipulation (creatively making others feel responsible for their missteps), which generally has increasing success over time. Negative contracting, rumors, threats to ruin reputations and subtle intimidation serve to keep coworkers and even supervisors in line. These employees are motivated by personal gain and not company success or a positive work culture. Maintaining the status quo is very important to protect their power base. Another tactic is neutralizing those perceived as threats to retaining power. These “threatening” employees can be stopped by tactics of exploiting their mistakes or making provocative accusations against them to bring positive change to a halt.

Toxic? This group is by definition the most toxic of all the difficult types. The Strategic/Toxic employee has the capacity to create the greatest harm to the company and the most trauma to coworkers and supervisors; they control the company by creating fear. They can hijack the workplace keeping employees busy trying to stay out of the line of fire. Workplace productivity declines rapidly as staff members either choose sides with the Toxic person or lick their wounds with fellow victims. At first it requires a public thrashing for employees to see who has the power. Later, the mere threat of retaliation is sufficient to get coworkers to back off a confrontation and supervisors to refrain from holding them accountable. When the Strategic/Toxic employee is highly technically skilled or of long service, he/she is very difficult to dislodge. Their strategic mindset often leads to alliance with a powerful company leader or a key client. This, in turn results in their freedom to accost coworkers and prevent scrutiny. As a consultant, I am often retained to solve company problems with Strategic/Toxic employees. Successful intervention requires strong-willed leadership and a constituency of positive employees who can unite to shift the culture – definitely not for the faint of heart or inexperienced! Any attempts to diminish their power will be met with resistance and preemptive strikes to neutralize change.

For more information on Toxic employees see collective articles on this topic at: Benoit Blogs on Toxic Employees.

© Copyright BCSPublishing 2012 all rights reserved – sbenoit@benoitconsulting.com

All About Toxic Employees in the Workplace

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What motivates Toxic employees? How do Toxic employees control other employees?

Introduction

If you run a business, you’ve likely encountered a “toxic employee.” You hear complaints about or you experience a worker who is mean or abusive. But you hesitate to deal with the employee because he/she might be technically gifted/hard to replace. This article discusses the complicated social dynamics that arise when one or two employees engage in abusive and intimidating behavior. Also covered here is how toxic employees and their tactics harm the business and coworkers.  Toxic employee tactics consolidate and maintain informal power in the workplace and control coworkers for personal gain. This behavior goes against healthy workplace values and conflicts with company goals. Unproductive drama distracts surrounding work units, victimizes workers and prevents the achievement of company goals.

This material addresses a workplace where well-meaning leadership is disengaged or fearful. It does not address a workplace where the prime abuser is the chief executive. When the chief executive is abusive and fails to respond appropriately to employee feedback, employee behavior will become understandably negative in response. In this situation employee acting-out is a natural consequence of poor leadership and requires a special, tailored intervention not precisely covered by this material.

Who are toxic employees?

I have defined “toxic employees” by observing the techniques they use. Looking at what sets them apart from typical employees, toxic employees are motivated by getting and protecting personal gain (power, money, or special status) NOT by achieving company goals. What the company wants of his/her individual performance is of less interest to a toxic employee. He/she typically does not recognize a duty to an overriding principle of ethics or respectful treatment of others. Finally, relationships with coworkers are not defined by the formal organization structure but are defined by the toxic employee’s own power; coworkers they favor in the moment and coworkers they do not trust.

Toxic employees are not just difficult coworkers.  They plan ahead and use strategies to neutralize supervisors and detractors.  Sometimes they are just protecting their personal power.  Sometimes they are protecting secret misdeeds or malfeasance. Finally, they may be inoculating themselves from performance feedback.

In addition, toxic employees are not just bullies.  A bully punishes, teases and abuses others at work.  This alone is grounds for performance counseling.  Venting emotions inappropriately, yelling and other forms of abuse should not be tolerated in the workplace. When bullies repeatedly target a particular employee, the effects can be devastating. This can and should be stopped by a carefully crafted performance intervention.  I have covered this topic in several other blogs.

Toxic employees use bullying tactics but there’s more. A toxic employee is more deliberate and strategic and more difficult to stop than a straight forward bully. This is because of their clever means of discrediting those who speak up AND dis-empowering supervisors and others who possess the power on paper, to make changes in the workplace.

The problem

I am often engaged to address one employee’s negative workplace performance. Once on site I find the situation is more complex than simply establishing a performance improvement plan for the offending employee. The greater the informal power residing with this one individual, the more likely the employee group around him/her has chosen up sides. Because negative social dynamics become well entrenched, any real solution requires an intervention addressing both the main offender and the surrounding social system.

How this dynamic harms employees

Victimized employees can and do suffer emotional and physical harm such as stress-related illnesses. Employee victims of ongoing workplace abuse and intimidation (bullying) will eventually require support to re-establish healthy boundaries with others even after the offender’s termination. Employees with a good perspective and a desire to support business goals often draw fire from powerful negative employees. Employees who express disapproval of the negative dynamics or who try to resist those dynamics have likely learned who has the power in both subtle and in more overt, public ways. Negative messages from toxic employees to NOT speak up can be so powerful as to render even strong, competent peers unwilling to alert leadership. It is very much worth the effort to retain those who disagree with negative approaches by re-establishing positive supports and rewarding their instincts to speak up. Intervention timing is key.

How this dynamic harms your business

Toxic employees who operate from a negative, abusive perspective and who mistreat fellow workers rarely treat customers with respect. Employees distracted by a work atmosphere of squabbles, choosing up sides and consolidating informal power structures do not perform at their best. This atmosphere serves to preserve the negative dynamics and consistently drains productivity. In addition over time, highly motivated and positive employees who have tried and failed to improve things will move on to other companies and those more comfortable in a negative environment will stay. The longer these dynamics continue the worse the environment generally becomes. All of this combines to distract even high-performing staff from promoting business goals and quality client service delivery. The failure to exercise supervisory power creates a vacuum through which ill-motivated staff can emerge and divert attention from the organization’s goals. It can take years to reverse the behaviors and the effect of the abuse on others.

Informal power structures and dynamics

Today’s workplace is full of unwritten “agreements.” Status quo power structures and informal processes are established over time and become well-entrenched. For example, those with informal power steer their peers away from employees who they see as a threat to their power and can punish those who ignore these warnings with silent treatment and rumors. Eventually, everyone “gets the message” and learns to go along. Disturbing the status quo is met with resistance and dynamics that worsen just before they begin to shift. Those who stand to lose their informal power will up the ante to preserve it. Knowing what to expect along with a well-thought out plan is essential to moving away from abuse and intimidation toward comprehensive positive change.

Ringleader motives

It’s helpful to think about what motivates abusive employees in the workplace. Mistreatment of others comes from a self-centered perspective. It is sometimes constructed to cover personal insecurities or fears. It is generally maladaptive social behavior. This behavior might be learned or may the result of formative trauma. More specific answers are beyond the scope of this material.

  • Acquisition of informal power and control
  • Advancing ones value and position in the organization
  • Decreasing (or neutralizing) another’s value and position in the organization, particularly those seen as a threat – supervisors and other change agents
  • Retaliating against perceived slights by fellow employees

 Control techniques

Ringleaders as toxic employees generally collect information to either withhold or use against targets for maximum advantage.  In addition, they use strategies to prevent complaints about them from getting traction and to weaken the power of others. The foundation of most toxic techniques is a near universal need humans have to be liked by others in the workplace.

Negative contracting is an agreement to keep secrets, look the other way, do something harmful, or spread a rumor about someone else. Contracts are typically a secret agreement between the toxic employee and others with a goal of avoiding consequences or reducing someone’s power.

Emotional manipulation is when a coworker is manipulated into questioning his/her judgment or instincts and controlled to believe the story spun by the toxic employee. Often the appeal is to the target’s sense of responsibility for the feelings of others. Clever manipulators can make anyone feel responsible for what’s gone wrong.

Blaming the victim is using clever manipulation to exploit victim mistakes and attack their credibility. This is done in a manner that shifts focus away from whatever the victim was trying to raise for management attention onto the victim’s “misdeeds.” In some workplaces employees give up trying to get management’s attention because the futility has been demonstrated repeatedly.

Marginalization is the process of ostracizing targets, giving them the silent treatment or withholding information as a way to demonstrate power over others or as punishment for a perceived offense. Depending upon how much the targeted employees want to be liked at work, this can be a very powerful deterrent.

Negative dynamics thrive when . . .

There are certain environments in which negative dynamics are promoted and enhanced and very difficult to shift. This would include those situations where:

Ringleaders are often technically strong . . .

  • Ringleaders often have access to historical information, company lore and information needed by other employees to carry out their assignments
  • Ringleaders are in positions of specialized skill and perceived to be difficult to replace
  • Organization performance evaluations are based upon technical performance results without accountability or demonstrated command of:

 Negative dynamics are more difficult to maintain when . . .

Some workplaces actively promote positive values and respect for one another. In these environments positives are rewarded and negatives are addressed. Tactics that make it difficult for abusive employee strategies to take hold include those where:

  • The organization articulates its vision of a healthy, productive workplace through a code of ethics or set of employee relations values
  • The organization informs staff how it plans to shift and maintain the desired culture with examples of what is positive and what will be discouraged
  • Performance evaluations measure end results AND the demonstration of corporate values in the areas of teamwork, collaboration, corporate ethics and pro-social behavior
  • Supervisors are connected to what’s going on in their areas
  • Supervisors operate as a well-coordinated team with good communication and consistent management techniques
  • Supervisors are well-trained in identifying and responding to negative dynamics
  • Offending employees are cautioned and counseled with escalating consequences
  • Offending employees are eventually moved out of the organization

Strategic plan to shift negative workplace dynamics

Shifting the workplace toward a more healthy and productive environment requires a comprehensive plan and approach that lets employees know where you are going and why. It also requires simultaneous extinguishment of negative behaviors and encouragement/skill building for victims and others.

  1. Establish company or departmental values and a clear code of conduct
  2. Identify the various players and research current dynamics
  3. Plan the intervention carefully
  4. Intervene with the group and then primary offenders
  5. Follow up with the group and offenders, as needed
  6. Carry out legal, sound terminations where needed
  7. Develop recruitment strategies to foster desired work climate
  8. Implement ongoing team-building and employee engagement strategies

© Copyright BCSPublishing 2012 all rights reserved – sbenoit@benoitconsulting.com

Part 3: HR Intervening with a Potentially Violent Employee

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Previous articles in this series: Part 1:HR Principles Guiding Workplace Violence Prevention; Part 2: HR Steps to Preventing Workplace Violence

Making the plan

After reviewing an employee’s history, behavior and disclosures, a comprehensive plan for intervening must be developed. It is useful to consider past interventions with this employee as information on how this one will progress.  Review company policies that might apply to this situation and always maintain a respectful and firm posture toward the employee.  The employee who takes the central role in delivering the “bad news” should be a seasoned person with experience in these kind of difficult employee discussions.  It should be someone who is not afraid to set clear boundaries during the discussion and will know when to put a stop to discussions altogether.  A skilled individual can keep a discussion de-escalated and more successful overall.

The reader is cautioned to remember that every intervention must be custom-designed. Only those closest to the discussions know the best course of action.  These general steps may help in your planning:

  • Objectively assess the employee,s background, work history and safety risks
  • Consult an expert or attorney on legal process to ensure the company obligations and employee rights are protected;
  • Create plan for handling the performance conference – location, timing, personnel involved;
  • Ask the authorities and/or security to review the plan and provide feedback;
  • Create a detail schedule of events;
  • Prepare the financials for the employee’s last pay if termination is warranted;
  • Plan out each person’s role in the intervention including the talking points of what is to be conveyed;
  • Consider letting coworkers know that you will be meeting with the potentially dangerous employee or notify them directly after, if warranted;
  • Carefully consider where the employee will go directly after the intervention – escort to locker and off the premises, etc;
  • Provide instructions if the employee is not allowed to contact various employees and inform the employee of who he/she should contact if questions arise post termination;
  • Implement the plan;
  • Follow up with authorities if the employee makes either vague or specific threats to company personnel;
  • Follow up with peers and other workers who might be affected by this employee’s actions or the company intervention;
  • Provide co-workers and supervisors with instructions on what to do if threatened or contacted;
  • Review company security procedures and refresh employee understanding if appropriate.

As always, review and evaluate the intervention outcome, considering what worked well, what did not go well and potential changes to company policies.

Good luck!

(c) copyright BCSPublishing 2012 all rights reserved

Part 2: HR Planning to Prevent Workplace Violence

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Previous articles in this series: Part 1:HR Principles Guiding Workplace Violence Prevention

Roles in preventing workplace violence

There are four entities to be considered when developing policies and procedures on the management of potentially violent employees: The individual, the work unit, the company and the community. The company’s role varies regarding these groups. The company has a duty to protect all employees from workplace violence. The company must listen to unit supervisors and co-workers who  disclose information or fears about an employee. The company has a responsibility to have reasonable policies that guide company operations regarding employee violence (see part one of this article). Finally, if a disgruntled employee makes threats to employees, there could be a moral obligation to inform authorities because employees can be at risk both at work and in the community. The nature and clarity of these threats can provide guidance here.

The individual employee

It’s helpful to focus on the individual employee’s history and behavior to determine the risk for violence. Over the years, I have found that looking at employee behavior overall, not just one or two incidents, is key to accurately assessing the potential for violence. But first, what are the basic emotional skills that every employee must have for reasonable chance of success?

Mental and emotional basics for every employee

Does the employee have sufficient emotional health and maturity for the workplace? Recruitment interviews and reference checks should reveals whether there are red flags in any of these areas.

  • Reasonable self-awareness and self-assessment of his/her capabilities;
  • Reasonable perspective on his/her own performance strengths and weaknesses;
  • Reasonable accurate perception of how he/she is seen by management, peers;
  • Reasonable perspective on personal responsibility (blaming others or accountable for the consequences of their poor performance?);
  • Reasonable acceptance of performance criticism; and
  • Ability to see things from someone else’s perspective.

A particular employee’s potential for violence

When HR sees red flags going into a performance counseling with a particular employee, there are some simple questions to consider.  The focus needs to be on observable behavior, behavior changes and employee disclosures. Here are a series of questions that get at the employee’s observable behavior in the workplace as well as their potential state of mind:

  • Is the employee’s employment status about to change involuntarily and what is their potential awareness and acceptance of this change?
  • Has the employee made any overt or veiled threats against the company or employees?
  • Has employee asked for accommodations or disclosed mental illness or emotional difficulties?
  • Has the employee made complaints about others that proved to be false or unfounded?
  • Has employee disclosed significant life stressors: recent or pending divorce, financial difficulties or personal loss?
  • Do the employee’s performance history, counselings and results reveal troubling patterns?
  • Does the employee have a criminal background?
  • Has the employee talked about revenge, fights outside of work or violence, generally?
  • Have there been any observable, recent behavior changes? Odd behaviors or performance changes?

The key here is to trust your instincts.  Seasoned HR professionals generally know to trust their instincts or “gut feelings.”  When you have that uneasy feeling, consult an informed and neutral third-party – perhaps an HR colleague to see if he/she shares the concerns.

Part 3 in this series will cover the planning for an intervention, next.

(c) copyright BCSPublishing 2012 all rights reserved

Part 1: HR Principles Guiding Workplace Violence Prevention

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Workplace shootings covered in the news remind human resource professionals that monitoring potential violence and unsafe behavior in the workplace is crucial. Planning for any performance intervention or termination conference must include an evaluation of the risk for dangerous behavior. This article includes a comprehensive series of questions to support such an evaluation.

Introduction

Section 5(a)(1) of the Occupational Safety and Health Act, states that employers have a duty to protect employees from recognized hazards that are likely to cause death or serious harm to employees. Emotionally unsafe employees often react strongly to negative information or changes in the workplace. Physical harm to human resource staff, supervisors or company employees are an immediate consequence but there are long-term human effects such as: emotional toll – grieving employees, trauma for those who witness violence. Finally, the business will suffer as folks struggle to regain some form of normalcy.

24-hour factor

When employees are counseled about poor performance or turned down for a position, they may not act out at first. There may be an apparent honey-moon period in which the unsafe employee is unable to respond at first, followed by a strong reaction that builds as the reality of the situation becomes clear days later. I call this the “24 hour” factor.

Attorneys and security can help

Workplace violence prevention strategies can help to manage the risks associated with unsafe, unstable employees. The greatest point of risk is during or after an intervention aimed some negative situation: poor performance, being passed over, or probation and termination. Human Resource professionals often have feelings of apprehension during this preparation. They consult their attorney on the HR legalities and make plans that involve security personnel or the police. Attorney’s can comment on the legality of an employer’s action and the likelihood that an employee action might be successful in court. The police can contain certain situations once erupted, but neither may be able to assess the psychological potential for violence in advance. Sometimes visible security dampens the risk of violence.  In some cases, a visible police or security presence may actually incite a greater reaction. A good assessment of psychologically-based risk and sound intervention planning can make a significant difference in the outcome. Using information that management and HR already possess regarding the individual’s behavior in some or all of the following areas can yield a psychological profile that can inform successful planning.

 HIPAA vs Assessing the risk

When consulted on potentially violent employees, questions arise about private/medical matters that employers are charged with protecting – has the employee been diagnosed mental illness or medical condition that might alter mood? Does the employee take a medication that alters mood? Often this information is familiar to coworkers.  If the employer is unaware of these employee mental health issues, you move to observable behavior and other employee disclosures. Has the employee had violent outbursts, over-reacted to minor issues, broken tools, etc? Does the employee talk about violence in their home?

Workplace safety goals:

The following are the ultimate goals of violence prevention policies

  • Keeping company employees safe from aggression, threats of violence and assault;
  • Keeping company property safe from damage or theft and company operations safe from sabotage; and
  • Keeping an employee safe from self-harm at work or immediately after HR action
  • Keeping the community safe when you suspect imminent harm to people outside the company.

Guiding principles for violence prevention policies

It is important to know what ethical principles should guide decision-making in this kind of situation. Here are some examples:

  • Prevention of violent or unsafe incidents at work is a priority;
  • Company responses must be legal, ethical, professional and respectful;
  • Employees must be treated equally with respect to mental illness so attention must be focused on employee performance measures and observable behavior;
  • Responses must be consistent with company policies;
  • Company employees must be free from abuse, intimidation and physical harm at work;
  • Continuous, smooth and orderly business operations must be maintained;
  • Employee relations for the unit, peers and supervisor is important;
  • Planning and approach should consider professional risk assessment when there is a history of violence, threat of violence, discussion of firearms or presence of a chronic mental illness.

Companies can always add safety measures to written policies as long as they are focused on legitimate safety issues at hand and do not disproportionately affect a protected class. Some policies that might contain references to potentially violent conduct in the workplace:

  • Employee Termination
  • Medical Benefits
  • Conditions for Continued Employment
  • Progressive Discipline
  • Workplace Violence
  • Workplace Harassment
  • Performance Management and Feedback
  • Employee Requests for Disability Accommodations

Part 2: Checklist for planning interventions – coming next.

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HR: Sorting out Business Mistakes – Employees and Customers

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When you make a mistake at work, do you obsess and then over-react?  Maybe you blame others around you. I tend to think about it over a 24 hour period and then usually let it go. I rarely blame others and try to go easy on myself about whatever I contributed to the error or problem.  This is partly because of my age and experience and partly due to some great advice I got as a young executive in my first management job.

How you must respond to mess-ups in a business-sense depends upon the interaction of two important factors.

  1. Relative size of the mistake
  2. Relative visibility of the mistake to the outside world

Size of the mistake

Calculating the size of a mistake involves a common sense evaluation of right and wrong, ethics, and legality. A breach of confidentiality is generally a pretty serious mistake. It is wrong and potentially illegal.  If there is a breach involving employee social security numbers, checking account numbers or dates of birth,  it’s very serious.  This error can aid criminals in identity theft and fraud. When something is wrong, illegal, and/or unethical, it’s a serious mistake.

A much more minor error might be if a management list of business issues goes to one extra manager who was not supposed to be on a distribution list.  Damage control involves having a chat with that one manager. Another minor issue might be an easily corrected math error. Again, correct the error and move on.

Mistakes involving one or two work units are minor.  Errors involving the entire company, the company’s most well-know brands and significant numbers of customers will be greater and much more complicated to fix.

The “external judgment” factor

When it’s easy for a casual observer to see how a mistake might be made this is generally a lesser issue than when a company fails to install obvious procedural checks and balances. Most people expect companies to know obvious risks and to do something to prevent obvious errors – such as confidentiality breaches.

Error Frequency

Remember when Netflix failed to anticipate understandable customer push back regarding rates after their failed price increase in September 2011.  This was a fairly obvious error that might have been discovered/anticipated by market research.  Everyone assumes a large company has resources to conduct research and knows it’s important. Then, weeks later, the company made another mistake by separating it’s movie business into two brands. This decision was later reversed. They failed to anticipate a considerable backlash to a price increase and then made things worse by having no comprehensive and well-thought out response. Too much reactive decision-making.

The greater the error, the greater the need for a thoughtful plan to control the damage, create a new plan and amend procedures to prevent this type of error in the future.

Visibility of the mistake

Visibility refers to employees, customers and sometimes to regulators. Mistakes can have low visibility – a few employees got an internal memo they shouldn’t have; or high visibility – a damaging internal memo is leaked to several external clients. The greater the number of individuals outside  an organization who become aware of the mistake, the greater the need for external damage control. External damage control can often lead to media exposure. Once media exposure is involved, a very small mistake can take on global proportions.

Here’s a simple guide:

  • Small mistake, low visibility – speak to the people involved, change procedures and move on.
  • Small mistake, high visibility – notify those involved, change the procedures and prepare for media response
  • Large mistake, low visibility – speak to the people involved, change procedures and consider performance couselings for those who are most responsible for the problem.
  • Large mistake, high visibility – conduct an investigation, prepare two responses for the people involved and then the media. Step carefully because your response will be scrutinized. Be deliberate, respectful and fair.

Mistakes can lead to deeper relationships

Mistakes create opportunities to improve the company and help employees grow in their performance and skill. If the mistake involves customers, they remember what you did in the face of adversity.  Did you overreact and blame them or your employees? Did you fail to admit what happened? Most importantly, Did you disclose mistake’s source or cause and fix it? Customers will understand if you come clean and make it right. Think about the “Tylenol tampering” scandal of 1982 in which Johnson & Johnson took a well-reasoned and honest approach and suffered little long-term damage as a result.

Don’t berate employees

I have seen colossal over-reactions that caused more damage that the original error. Try to stay calm and remember that employees generally want to do their best. The most common source of errors is confusing or inadequate communication. Empathize with employees and hold people accountable only after a good investigation of what went wrong. Don’t be too heavy-handed – make the consequence fit the nature and degree of the problem. And, if your initial reaction was wrong, go back and make amends correcting things you said or did in a reactive mode. Employees will forgive this as well.

An ounce of prevention

Preventing mistakes is so much easier than “un-ringing a bell.” The moral of this story is to pay attention to operational issues. Set up procedures with reasonable checks and balances; train employees in the basics of their jobs; and guide them to have an eye out for the most likely problems that will lead to embarrassment or worst – illegal activities. Be clear in your communication with them on all matters. Then follow a deliberate process to handle mistakes as they arise.

(c) BCSPublishing 2012 all rights reserved

 

Ten Management Tips to Put Your HR Attorney Out of Business!

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Not listening to employee complaints or failing to act decisively will lead to disgruntled employees over time. Disgruntled employees are the ones who sue.  Though most employment-related legal issues are avoidable many companies never work on prevention.  They stay in reaction mode.  Unfortunately, once you are sued by an employee, other employees are more likely to consider this option.

.No company can achieve all of these preventive strategies perfectly.  My advice is to decide where your worst weaknesses are, and work on those. Then establish long-term goals to address the others over time. If you are struggling to develop an HR strategic plan, some of these strategies might make sense for you.

These Ten Management Tips will help you minimize successful employee lawsuits

  1. Establish a code of ethics & define positive culture –  include examples of wanted (collaboration) and unwanted (disrespectful) work approaches.
  2. Ensure that all employees know, understand and follow sensible policies,
  3. Define each position/job as more than just the tasks – include end results and work approach.
  4. Treat each hire as an opportunity to build on your positive culture – screen for technical skills, desired work approach and fit with company values and philosophies.
  5. Evaluate performance for all aspects of the position – tasks, end results and work approach.
  6. Listen carefully to every employee complaint – everyone wants to be heard.
  7. Know what your supervisors are doing – they are by extension, you.
  8. When one employee mistreats you or his/her peers, respond firmly and professionally – don’t overreact but also don’t ignore it.
  9. Treat all employees professionally, respectfully and equitably.
  10. Staff HR with a professional, knowledgeable individual or contract with an attorney and carefully weigh his/her advice.

(c) 2012 BCSPublishing all rights reserved.

Today’s Strategic HR – Supporting the achievement of financial goals

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Sound Human Resource management is as essential as financial management in today’s business environment. If employees are distracting each other, unmotivated, ill-trained or worse, ignorant of how their efforts either facilitate or detract from company goals, what’s the point of reporting financials and talking about fiscal responsibility?

Every company job must contribute to the bottom line. For HR this means certain competencies are essential:

  1. Extensive knowledge of the company’s main lines of business;
  2. Knowledge of finance, sales and marketing, efficiency strategies and operations;
  3. Knowledge of organizational strategic planning and setting strategic goals;
  4. Keen understanding of how division/department action plans support strategic goal achievement;
  5. Understanding the variety of talent activities that could support the achievement of company goals; and
  6. Development of HR strategic plans

HR’s mission has evolved 

Over the last 50 years HR’s mission has changed.  Gone are the days of “recruiting qualified candidates” or “training and staff development.”

  • 1960s to 80s – Recruitment, training and record keeping
  • 1980s to 2000 – Uninterrupted supply of qualified, well-trained employees
  • Today – Align comprehensive talent management with the company’s strategic plan to facilitate the achievement of company goals

For more HR mission statements www.missionstatements.com. 

All company strategic goals including purely technical goals such as finance or IT have numerous and related human resource implications. If a strategic goal is to increase company profitability, consider these human resource-related questions:

  1. Do you have the right competencies in the Finance office?
  2. Does the CFO have performance problems?
  3. What drives revenue? Can people make a difference? Which jobs have key influence in financial success?
  4. Are senior leaders held accountable (perf. eval.) for their share of revenue activities?
  5. Does the senior leadership team work collaboratively together toward financial ends?
  6. Do financial reports provide data that accurately reflect progress toward goals so that management can make sound decisions?
  7. Does every employee understand the importance of key financial indicators?
  8. Do senior leaders, supervisors, and front line job descriptions include financial end results?
  9. Does the compensation program reward good performance in finance?
  10. What employee-oriented barriers might interfere with revenue increases?
    • Are the barriers attitude-based (uncooperative, disgruntled or toxic employees)?
    • Are they competency-based? Performance-based?
    • Employee relations-based? Poor engagement, poor management?
    • Employee poor health or stress-related? Absenteeism, presenteeism?
    • Tools and materials-based?

And finally,

11. Does the corporate culture and values reinforce financial stewardship?

Think strategically and good luck!!

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How to Make 360 Performance Feedback Less Snarky, More Helpful

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Performance Evaluation Input

For supervisory staff especially, it is helpful to get constructive feedback from other supervisors (peers), the person’s supervisees, and maybe even external contacts with which this supervisor has regular contact. Many companies try this only to abandon the activity when the feedback is less than helpful. I’ve tried various techniques to maximize the positives of peer and supervisee feedback and minimize the mean and unproductive things folks say when providing feedback. Here’s a brief discussion.

Why use feedback to inform performance evaluations?

Looking at a front line supervisor position, feedback might be helpful in the following scenarios:

  1. If a company has strong peer-to-peer relationship values, this feedback is essential to know how employees are using this value.
  2. Supervisors with an authoritative style may be stifling supervisee ideas – how else would you know?
  3. Some supervisors cater to supervisees and are isolated from or less kind to their peers.
  4. Perhaps most of the supervisor’s contacts are outside the company and external relations are highly valued.
  5. Feedback from more than one dimension can provide the best, well-rounded context for the supervisor’s performance development.

Pitfalls

You create these questionnaires, you explain why you’re gathering feedback and you let participants know that recurring themes will be discussed with the employee for their evaluation. Sounds straightforward. Two ways for this to go wrong – one is participants are afraid to provide feedback if they question or distrust your assurances.  This is a difficult problem to overcome.  It takes a trusting, professional atmosphere.  You can begin with a pilot program and expand as employees see that the original documents are not seen by the employee.  Creating a healthy workplace culture is the topic of several individual posts on this blog.

The other is that participants go overboard detailing everything the employee ever did wrong. Employees may not be experienced in providing feedback. Sometimes they mistake this as an invitation to vent. Understanding professional boundaries is something employees often need support to achieve. Starting with the assumption that most employees have some useful feedback, the key is to ask only questions for which answers are helpful.

Try this

The key is to tie the question to the employee’s effect on those around them and avoid open-ended questions. You want to focus on what the employee does and not workers’ personal opinions about them.

  • “Please note areas in which you feel this individual performs well or where his or her actions contribute to your success or the success of the organization.”
  • “Please note areas in which you think this individual could make some changes in order to better contribute to your success or the organization’s success:

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