Violence and Aggression in the Workplace is on the Rise

In the early 1980s aggression and violence in the workplace have been a source of a lot of public discussion. (Piquero pg.383) The issues have risen again recently and have mostly been present in management and business fields. Workplace aggression often includes “behavior by an individual or individuals within or outside organizations that is intended to physically or psychologically harms a worker or workers and occurs in a work related”. (Schat& Kelloway Pg. 191) A national survey Conducted by the National Centers for Victims of Crime shows several statistics regarding workplace homicide by type show that is the year of (see fig. 1), violent crimes against victims working or an duty( see fig. 2) and nonfatal workplace violence committed by strangers(see fig. 3 Hortwitz, McCall and Horwitz (2006) examined workplace injuries using Rhode Island’s workers’ compensation claim from 1984 to 2002.When the cases were analyzed it showed that females were more likely to file claims it also showed that males suffered more from injuries that lasted longer and had higher costs. The costs associated with these claims were more than $7 million dollars there was average claim of $100 a claim. Furthermore, there were 6 deaths that were reports within the 5 year span. There was a rise in 2011 of 21 percent of female fatal injuries at work. In the percentage of these workplace homicides, the perpetrators were relatives – most of them being a spouse or a domestic partner. The 9 percent of male incidents that were homicides only 2 percent were relatives of the victim. There are also the cases of the female employee being killed during a commission of a robbery. Many times the robbers were the assailants in the deaths of male workers. Among the...

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...ork environment

Supervisors play a vital role in prevention perhaps the most logical improvement for violence in the workplace would be to sit down with the employee in a one on one meeting. In this meeting the supervisor should:

1. The supervisor should not start the meeting telling the employee the consequences the behavior

2. Let the employee know what they are meeting about

3. Listen to the employee( supervisor should not take notes during this time)

4. The supervisor give his /her point of view

5. Explain what will have if the behavior is not changed

6. Ask the employee how the issue can be resolved so it does escalate to termination of employment.

7. Set written guidelines and have the employee sign them.

Having put these specific guidelines in place the supervisor should work with their boss or corporate office to ensure that the guidelines are