Following National Safe Work Month Holland Thomas conducted a survey with specific focus on the variation in terminology used to describe aggressive behaviour as experienced by different sectors. Our key findings from the 200 respondents are listed below. Please get in touch if you would like to go through the results in more detail.
KEY FINDINGS
Incidence of Aggressive Behaviour
As is frequently seen among our client groups the incidence of aggressive behaviour experienced in the workplace is alarming:
43% of respondents were themselves, or had staff that were, verbally abused in the week prior to completing this survey.
26% of respondents were themselves, or had staff that were, threatened in the week prior to completing this survey.
19% of respondents were themselves, or had staff that were, physically assaulted in the week prior to completing this survey.
Chart 1: When was the last incident when you or a member of your team was verbally abused?
Choice of Terminology
Terminology used to describe aggressive behaviours is not standardised within each sector or across sectors. A range of different terms are commonly used to describe incidents of aggression. However, the broad range of terminology used is consistent across all sectors and there were no identifiable sector specific terms in use.
When asked to label a situation involving verbal aggression towards staff from a client, respondents stated that the most appropriate terminology was “aggressive behaviours” (71%).
When asked to label a situation involving verbal aggression and physical assault towards staff from a client, respondents stated that the most appropriate terminology was “violent behaviours” (74%) and “aggressive behaviours” (69%). The escalation to physical assault escalated the terminology used.
The term “violence” was largely thought to be inappropriate when no physical contact had occurred.
Table 1: Select the most appropriate term(s) to describe the behaviour (verbal abuse) of your client Bob.
Table 2: Select the most appropriate term(s) to describe the behaviour (verbal abuse and physical assault) of your client Mary.
Future Plans
Many respondents were keen to emphasise that there are extenuating circumstances in these types of incidents and that staff ability to take appropriate steps to manage the incident is the key to avoiding it happening at all.
Staff safety training was noted as the number one priority for respondents in the coming 12 months.
This was followed by improving incident reporting and culture.
Travis Holland
Managing Director
Holland Thomas
Should you wish to discuss strategies to improve your staff’s safety in their work environment, please feel welcome to contact Holland Thomas.
Our goal at Holland Thomas is to create safer workplaces that enhance wellbeing for all concerned whilst also delivering improved operational and financial performance.
This blog draws on our years of experience delivering our M.A.B.™ Staff Safety Training (Contextualised Prevention and Management of Aggressive Behaviours) across Australia and the development of My Safety Buddy, our smartphone app and web portal based lone worker safety solution.
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