Tag Archives: workplace

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

Word of the Day: “Overshare” in class and at work

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What is it called when a person discloses something too intimate for the setting or social company? Teaching clinical psychology to college students is to truly experience the term: overshare.  ”Overshare” describes the phenomenon that prompts the listener to think “TMI.”  I’ve started covering social norms about the proper level of personal disclosure for the classroom, in the first class of the semester.

Overshares in class

Here’s a true example: Andrew with raised hand at the beginning of class.

Me: “Yes Andrew.”

With Tom sitting next to him in class - Andrew: “Suzi, I wanted to let you know about Tom and me. We had a fight but we have decided that rather than being friends-with-benefits, we made up and we are going to be in a committed relationship.”

Tom is now looking a little green and the rest of the class is either uncomfortable or rolling their eyes.

Me: “Andrew, do you remember we talked about students’ relationship intimacy matters as being inappropriate for class disclosure?”

Andrew: “Yes . . . overshare?”

Me: “I think so. Let’s move on.”  Inside my head I am thinking, for the love of God!

Overshares at work

I find that some employees so needy for attention that they provide to coworkers excruciating detail about their physical illnesses, mental illness or intimate relationship issues. While some coworkers enjoy this kind of information  most would rather not have these pictures in their heads.

Workplace oversharing creates a dilemma for HR professionals.  Employers are prevented from disclosing any information about an employee’s illness or medical condition no matter what the employee has disclosed. HR professionals shouldn’t  discuss or comment. The idea is that with information about protected-class status  as general knowledge at work, it is difficult for an employer to prove that it’s actions did not consider this status. Once the information is readily available in the workplace milieu, it is really impossible to rein it back in.

Lack of general privacy

Facebook and other instant social media channels have encouraged oversharing and a disregard for privacy, generally.  I would like to see the pendulum swing back so that people in non-intimate settings might keep this kind of information a little more private.

Summary of DADT, Workplace Culture and the Impact of Repeal

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On September 20th, 60 days after the repeal order was signed for Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell (DADT), it goes into effect. Popular media have covered Military preparations for the changes. Though many see this as a necessary step in the right direction (some think it was way overdue), no one thinks this will put an end to problems. The military has had little success with consistent enforcement of DADT.  Nor has the military dealt all that well with blackmail and intimidation that the secrecy of DADT fomented.  DADT may end discharges using sexual orientation as the stated reason but it will likely be the beginning of a number of other issues: Can hate-crimes be prosecuted within the service branches? Will spousal benefits become a part of the employee benefits package? and many other related cultural issues.

Sometimes we forget the serving in the military is a job-the employer is the federal government-and it is an American workplace or more accurately a collection of related but different (branches) workplaces.  The Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell repeal represents a significant philosophical departure from past practice and such will have workplace culture-changing repercussions. Creating a sound Military work culture requires attention to a number of different goals. If you are anti-war or anti-military you will take issue with this entire article. If you accept that a functioning military is necessary, I can imagine three different fundamental principles or philosophies, necessary for a sustainable military. First they must try to prepare humans who are otherwise peaceful creatures to kill others and destroy property. As American children grow up in a civilian world where these acts are against the law, it is a challenge to say the least whether or not you think it is wrong altogether. Second, this workplace must also try to respond humanely when service members are wounded physically and emotionally.  Finally, I would like to see a workplace free of abuse and intimidation among coworkers (pie in the sky, I know). I’m not sure how average service personnel think of the last goal but American employees have a right to work free of abuse, harassment and intimidation based upon American civilian law. If we are keeping score, the military is doing well with waging war but not so well with humane treatment of their wounded and really not well at all with the free-of-abuse-and-intimidation goals. While we don’t have current federal legislation making discrimination a crime based upon sexual orientation, many states have taken this step, including my home state of Maine.

Recent suicide statistics have given military management pause especially in the months in which suicides have outnumbered warfare deaths. Incidentally, it is difficult to find exact numbers for suicides and hostility-related deaths by month. Time magazine has covered this story extensively.  Increased suicides are both a comment on how horrible warfare is and the unfortunate way in which the military has handled personnel mental health needs. It’s not like the clinical expertise and strategies required to treat and prevent post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) aren’t available. Ironically, most of the research that supported the formalization PTSD as a psychiatric diagnosis comes from research by the military on combat fatigue.

But the issue isn’t all black and white.  Military officers are not all narrow-minded conservatives.  There are military officers who are both strategic and progressive in their thinking and work approach.  I was struck by this when reading one of many quotes in a fascinating Gentlemen’s Quarterly article: “Tell: An Intimate History of Gay Men in the Military.” (Read more at: GQ, Sept 2011). The article notes stories from dozens of gay service men who served during war times from WW II to today.  These stories are mixed.  Yes, there are terrible stories of physical abuse, blackmail and intimidation (some are nauseating for sure) but there are hopeful stories in which those in charge refused to make being gay an issue even when disclosed. Some of this depended on the branch.  It seems that the most progressive branch, according to first-hand accounts is the Navy.  Generally, the Marine Corps was the worst from a hazing and harassment working-conditions standpoint.  But one gay Marine says that the Marine Corps was the best place to hide as long as you were tough and “straight-looking.” Some gay service men were very clever in how they maintained a neutral sexuality stance.  Some pretended to be straight.

Here is one of the stories I found optimistic:

A gay male Marine confided in a female friend/peer that he was gay.  When the two had a falling-out, the female attempted to get him in trouble by going to their superior officer with the disclosure.  The chief officer replied, “He’s a good Marine.  I’m not really interested in any of this nonsense ….Mind your own business.” That was the end of it. The gay Marine attributes his good fortune to his good job performance.  I think it also had to do with the ethical thinking on the part of the officer.

There is so much more to read-I highly recommend reading the entire article.  It is long and full of various different strategies for remaining “sane” while maintaining secrets.  It also describes the various different ways in which gay service members and their coworkers handled the excruciating contradiction of apparent neutrality (just don’t talk about it) with the psychological effects & risks of dangerous secret-keeping.

Researching this issue, I found a number of other resources for those who haven’t followed this issue up to now but who might be interested once the repeal takes effect on September 20th. I’m sure the issue will generate considerable media coverage next week.

Resources from a variety of angles, appear below:

Historical summary

Good old Wikipedia can always be counted on for a historical summary that includes important dates:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don’t_ask,_don’t_tell

The legislative process

The Human Rights Campaign website includes information about who worked on repeal wording and how it came about legislatively:

http://www.hrc.org/sites/repealdadt/index.asp?gclid=CL2qnr2spKsCFWsEQAodXEu80Q

Military communicating its position on the repeal

The Military’s official website includes a July 2011 video in which the Marine Commandant articulates how diversity and professionalism are consistent with lawfulness and the United States constitution.  Pretty clear statement though I realize that some service men and women to not behave consistently with the stated value or rules. Here is the video link:

http://www.military.com/video/forces/marine-corps/marine-commandant-on-dadt/1040941450001/

More specific legal matters affecting service members

The Service Member Legal Defense Network (SLDN) is a nonprofit organization whose mission is to provide legal guidance and support to gay service members.  To this point, support has centered around ensuring that legal rights are protected and providing a place for gay service members to turn when their orientation threatened their service.  This link is to a page that provides an excellent legal history of DADT and the site

http://www.sldn.org/pages/about-dadt

Transgendered service members

Often, discussion of GLBT issues are heavy on coverage of gays and lesbians and light on coverage of transgendered individuals.  According to the Service Member Legal Defense Network, transgendered individuals are barred from serving for reasons unrelated to DADT.  According the their website, the reasons are physical and mental while other sites describe the lack of care (drugs and counseling) within military service as the reason.  I am puzzled by a transgendered person who would want to serve in a military branch and subject themselves to this environment but they are protected from discrimination in several states who include gender identity in their anti-discrimination statutes. Here is an excellent legal discussion of the issue by the SLDN:

http://www.sldn.org/news/archives/ncte-and-sldn-advise-transgender-service-members-coming-out-may-lead-to-dis/

List of equality issues remaining after repeal of DADT

Here is a list of military equality issues that still remain for the GLBT community according to this private nonprofit website: equalitygiving.org.

http://www.equalitygiving.org/DADT?page-version=0&date=20110917132057

I hope you find this material informative.

Top Ten Things Employees Want from a Job

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A few years ago I researched what employees really want.  It was preparation for a workplace branding article.  If you don’t have the time or resources to survey your own employees you can use general list to guide company employee relations activities.  If  you are considering a culture improvement project you will want to survey employees for their specific values and thoughts. 

Top Ten Things Employees Want

While not every employee working today wants the following things, the list describes what fairly engaged employees are looking for at work.  What poor-performing employees want would be a different list.  Owners should pay attention to what top performers want as this is the group for which you want your workplace to be the most hospitable.

Employees are looking for the following, general characteristics in a workplace:

1. Interesting work content

Employees should know their own job responsibilities but you can also add annual goals that will change a bit each year.  Consider adding an “annual goals” accountability to all job descriptions.

2. Advancement opportunities

Advancement doesn’t have to be jumping up to the next level of management.  It can be a “lead” position responsible for helping to orient new staff or might have one or two new trainees reporting to them.  It could also mean learning a new area through cross-training. Finally, It’s important to pay attention to guiding current employees who have the skills and capacity for the next level of management so that they are ready when opportunities arise. 

3. Fair compensation

This means fair, not lavish and not a pittance. Employees in large companies are likely to understand how the company sets their employee compensation standard (market average, above average, etc.).  But for small and medium-size companies employees just want to know that they are paid a fair wage.  If employees are working without a salary increase for two years but senior management gets raises or are wasting company money, employees will quickly take notice.

4. Opportunities for enriched assignments

This can seem difficult in lean staffing times but cross-training and company-wide improvement projects can offer employees opportunities to learn new things, meet new co-workers and overall feel like they are growing.  Good employees want the company to succeed and will pitch in when needed.  Just make sure you are watching the duration of additional assignments and that individual workloads don’t stay too high for too long.

5. Strong leadership

If you are a leader who worries whether unpopular decisions make the company less appealing to strong performing employees, the answer is no.  Employees understand that if you try to please individual employees the quality of poor decisions is limited only by the stupid things their co-workers ask for.  Smart employees understand that their wants and wishes must be limited in favor of long-term company survival. Employees actually like it better when your articulate a set of quality and decision-making principles and then stick to them.  The best thing to counter an unpopular decision is to explain the process and factors that went into the decision and how it supports sustained company success.

6. Opportunities to be heard by management

Employees want occasional access to upper management and attention to their concerns.  This doesn’t mean the owner has to go to lunch with employees every day.  It means that when an employee offers a great suggestion the owner should stop by, make eye contact and say how much their contribution was both important and appreciated. There are 1000 different ideas of how to do this.  If you want ideas - Google “employee recognition and reward.”

7. High, consistent work standards

The better the employee (attitude and performance) the more they appreciate high performance standards.  Every employee should have a copy of his/her current job description that lists the jobs accountability and end results expected for that position. In addition, supervisors should discuss progress throughout the year not just at annual performance reviews.

8. An employer with integrity/character

When a negative story is made public or if a company’s practices are generally thought of poorly in the community, employees take notice.  In general, employees want to work for an employer who places emphasis on honesty and integrity.  But it’s not enough to have written values or standards, the company has to use these values in all activities; encouraging employees who personify the values and counseling those who do not.

9. An employer known for quality service/products

Here we are talking about quality again.  This time, the issue is product and service quality and customer/client satisfaction. Good employees take great pride in working for a company that pays attention to the quality of what they offer or produce. Engaged customers fit nicely with engaged employees. Have front-line employees participate in setting quality standards and make sure they understand exactly how quality is defined. Quality doesn’t have to be perfect but you should be measuring it and working to get the trend going in the right direction — up!

10. Freedom to make decisions affecting their work unit

Employees like to have a small piece of the company’s activities as their own, where they can make decisions and affect positive results.  This doesn’t mean you have to push company decision-making to the lowest point possible but it does mean to be mindful of this in job design.  If you articulate company goals and provide information about how company values should guide decision-making then let employees make decisions and take sensible risks.  When they foul up, don’t shame and blame but explain where their process went wrong and send them out to try again, encouraged by your great supervisory intervention!

What is 360 Degree Workplace Culture?

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The purpose of my work is to use human resource and business operations expertise to create positive and quality workplace cultures.  In these ideal cultures, not only are company business goals more likely to be achieved but employees are happier and treated respectfully in all interactions.

3600 Workplace culture excellence

A 3600 Workplace Culture is when:

  1. The culture and organizational values are purposeful, promoted throughout the organization and truly inform employee behavior across all programs and departments;
  2. The culture and organizational values support employees operating at their highest level of functioning toward the achievement of company business goals;
  3. Talent management structures and policies reflect the “on purpose” culture and values at all points along the employment life-cycle: at recruitment; at new employee orientation; through the performance management program; in promotion decisions and very importantly; when it’s time to go, an employee must be moved out of the organization if they cannot or will not follow the rules of respect and integrity. The desired culture and values apply as much to employee relations as to customer relations.
  4. Work values include and promote honesty, integrity and lawfulness in all company activities.

Example of unrealized workplace culture opportunity

Poor or disorganized workplace culture results when an organization has articulated values but does not follow them.  I’ve worked with many companies who have a wonderful list of values and might even ask employees to sign a code of conduct.  Meanwhile there is a long service toxic employee talking about people behind their back and targeting employees that don’t agree with them. Another example would be a company with no stated set of values.  In this case, employees’ personal values will be quite varied, will not help focus employee efforts on company goals and at worse, lead employees to work against the company’s and co-worker best interests.

Years ago, I worked for a wonderful nonprofit that serves mentally ill clients.  Client needs were at the center of service development. Company policies and program standards were very high.  The problem was that one employee in a key, one-of-a-kind position, used her power to move fellow employees around like chess pieces on a board.  I once caught her red-handed starting a false rumor about a new employee and yet couldn’t get the CEO to conduct performance counseling with any real consequence.  She’s probably still there. The same would apply in a company that says client/customer needs are important but where the company fails to redirect the behavior of employees who mistreat clients.

Sorry to bring up poor ENRON, but this was a company with two separate cultural groups.  In high level leaders, the culture was success and ambitious goal achievement regardless of their consistency with legal and accounting standards. In addition, this group feared the financial collapse but kept it secret from others. The second culture included rank and file employees and a few leaders who did not know or understand the conspiracy to keep the secret of impending financial disaster.  Clearly, honesty, integrity and lawfulness were not even articulated in this company.

News of the World appears to have suffered from a similar lack of intentionally positive work culture and values.  In the absence of a positive culture standard and with the context of very aggressive reporting goals, it appears that some employees did not balance their activities with that which is allowed by law or what most would consider basic morals.

 The ideal cultural quality and excellence

In the ideal company, leadership will have spent time crafting a statement of desired culture and values.  These values describe the organization’s concept of sustainability; how the company sees success and quality; how the company sees the importance and value of client/customer relationships; and finally, how the company sees employee relations. Everyone working in the company would know, understand and agree with this desired standard.

The closest ideal company I’ve personally experienced was my family’s clothing business, A. H. Benoit and Company. Though the company folded in the 1980s as a result of shifting retail centers (away from down towns), leadership changes and economic conditions, but in it’s day, the historical culture and standards were excellent. I didn’t realize it at the time (I was barely in high school), but my years there would represent one of my best workplace experiences. A couple of years ago, we uncovered a company employee handbook from the early 1900s that articulated the connection between happy employees and happy customers! They were known for very high quality men’s clothing, excellent customer service and being a place that employees loved to work.  Many employees worked their entire career in this business. Thirty years later people still ask me if I am related to this business and then tell me of some fond memory about either working or shopping there.

Zappos is a modern example of cultural excellence we know about because CEO, Tony Hsieh has spoken publicly about the intentional culture he built there. He has implemented his 360 degree culture in a way that has facilitated tremendous, sustained success despite tough economic times. One example as I understand it is that Zappos monitors employee performance in the first few months and moves employees out of the organization with a generous severance package if it becomes clear that their values are not consistent with stated corporate values. They are wished well and treated with respect but not everyone fits with a given culture/values.

360 degree culture means determining what you want the workplace atmosphere be, how it can help you achieve your business goals and then implementing it in a comprehensive way so it becomes a part of the institutional personality.