Workplace Violence

Workplace violence is one of the most widespread phenomena in the workplace that every employee faces during his/her life, directly or indirectly. This issue is very delicate, and it harms the quality of work performance of the entire organization. Workplace violence includes different aspects; for instance, it may be physical violence, verbal abuses, harassment, intimidation and even homicide (“Shooter in the Workplace: Workplace Violence Planning”, 2013). Thus, if my employer asked me to introduce the specific policies, I would recommend the following strategy. First of all, it is necessary to identify what kind of workplace harassment the victim experiences. After that, one should choose among the following policies the one that better illustrates the particular case.

According to this fact, the first step is to develop the procedure for reporting incidents. An organization should have the detailed procedure that will include the step-by step plan of actions in case of violence in the workplace. The procedure includes all types of violence in the workplace, both physical and verbal cases. The procedure should be in a written form, easily understood and interpreted by employees. Moreover, it should predetermine that some issues are too personal, and a victim would like to save confidentiality when he/she informs about such cases. Each case should be informed and analyzed by management representatives.

The next step is determining the importance of the issue (“Workplace violence”, 2014). One should take into consideration that there are also cases when the too familiar behavior of one employee towards another may be viewed as the harassment by the last one. Thus, it is necessary to estimate which actions are considered to be violence. Probably, a person who commits violence towards another one does not realize that such behavior is not appropriate in the working place. Thus, it is recommended that a victim should first take the preventive measures in order to demonstrate that such behavior is not appropriate. If the harasser does not change his/her attitude, then it is necessary to take stricter measures in order to stop violence.

Each organization should have the code of ethics, which predetermines the behavior of employees in the workplace. According to this code, each employee should treat others in a polite manner (Kemper, 2013). An employer cannot use abuses or physical force in order to demonstrate his/her superiority or when the employee makes a mistake. Thus, it is necessary to establish the same code of ethics in this organization. In this case, every employee and employer should be aware of the main principles of this code and they all should obey it. Moreover, violence in the workplace does not refer only to employees and an employer; sometimes clients may become the victims or even the abusers. According to this fact, clients should also have the access to this code of ethics in order to protect them from violence and warn them about the consequences of inappropriate behavior.

Moreover, the codex, besides the rules of behavior in an organization, should also include the legislations that illustrate the norms and the punishments (Bruce & Nowlin, 2011). In this way, an abuser will know that the code of ethic is not only the norms of behavior in this particular organization, but it is also the legal laws that predetermine the punishment. Thus, it will probably reduce the willing of some individuals to behave intolerant towards others.

One more specific policy is the developing of the prevention measures. Prevention is always better than dealing with a problem. Thus, an organization requires the providing of regular meetings that will be dedicated to the issue of cooperation and mutual understanding between employees and employers. For this goal, one requires to hire a manager who will be responsible for the relationships in an organization. A person who will occupy this position will be also the one who helps employees to find a solution for conflicts. For example, if two employees cannot find a common language, and their quarrels in the workplace ruin the positive atmosphere, then it is an issue that relates to the organization’s problems. Moreover, the regular trainings that will be dedicated to the conflict-solving strategies will be very useful in this case. In fact, the main problem of conflicts and, as a result ,violence in the workplace, is the fact that people understand each other in a wrong way or make wrong conclusions. In other words, misunderstanding is the basic reason for the majority of conflicts and aggression in the workplace.

According to this fact, the illustrated policies can help to reduce the number of violent issues and teach employees to cope with similar problems in future. These policies do not only present the solutions for the existed problems, but they also provide the educational trainings in order to avoid the repetition of such situations in future. The code of ethics is a good example of establishing the norms within an organization because it consists of the legislations that predetermine the behavior of employees within an organization. Every employee can use this code as an example of the appropriate behavior if somebody demonstrates the aggression or abuses him/her.

To sum up, it can be said that despite the fact that violence in the workplace is a widespread phenomenon, due to these policies, one may establish the friendly relations within an organization and to teach his/her employees to be more tolerant to each other.