7/08/2020

Human Resources Professionals – Are you prepared for the unexpected?

As an HR professional, you are likely familiar with WorkSafeBC’s bullying and harassment training. But are you able to proactively identify a dangerous or potentially violent employee? What happens when you are faced with a situation of potential employee violence? HR personnel can often become the default, go-to problem-solver in these situations. Increasingly, Human Resources are the first line of defense for the prevention of workplace violence frequently the target of these threats of workplace violence. Often workplace violence policies, programs and training are not developed or utilized as they should be, which leaves many HR professionals unsure where to turn to.

Traditional law enforcement techniques historically have focused on the apprehension and prosecution of violent offenders after violent crimes are committed. Unfortunately, increasingly sparse resources and a high volume of service calls make it difficult for law enforcement agencies to expand their scope beyond enforcing criminal laws. Most are stretched thin as it is.
This is where Lions Gate Risk Management professionals can assist.

Using valid and reliable threat assessment tools and guides, Lions Gate’s board-certified threat specialists and security professionals work with you to conduct behavioural threat assessments to assess the likelihood of violence toward the targeted person or persons. This type of threat assessment requires collecting and evaluating information and assessing the credibility and level of threat posed.

Equally important elements in the process include:

• The development of risk mitigation, intervention, and mitigation strategies
• Communication with, and education of, corporate decision makers
• Monitoring of the situation to ensure the safety of the targeted employee(s).

The first and most fundamental potential barrier to engagement is lack of knowledge, knowledge about threat assessment and management itself, about risk factors and warning signs, about what goes into managing potential threats. This knowledge is a key to implementing viable strategies to reduce targeted violence. Without it, prevention efforts are far less effective because they may then be guided by assumption and fear of the unknown, rather than knowledge and experience

No one person is positioned to see every single risk factor, warning behavior, or mitigator, nor is one single individual positioned to manage a threat. Organizational environment, administrative actions, and interpersonal communications all have the potential to inspire or deter an at-risk individual’s decision to engage in planned violence. Threat management is about diverting direction of interest, diminishing dangerous and concerning behaviors, and altering a path toward targeted violence.
HR Professionals need to know that Lions Gate Professionals are here to assist you with these potentially difficult files.

Violence is the product of an inter-action among three factors:

• The individual who takes violent action.
• Stimulus or triggering conditions that lead the subject to see violence as an option, “way out,” or solution to problems or life situation.
• A setting that facilitates or permits the violence, or at least does not stop it from occurring.

For more information contact Lions Gate Risk Management Group at 604 383 0020