Assess your facility’s risk of personal harassment
By G. Michael Barton, SPHR
Vice President of Human Resources
Regional Medical Center
Madisonville, KY
Once you understand the different types of personal harassment that can occur in a health care setting, the next step is to determine how much of that might be happening in your organization. Astute organizations conduct an assessment to determine what they should do to address the personal harassment issue.
Getting employee input as much as possible is the key to determining if personal harassment is a problem for the organization. There are a number of excellent sources for obtaining input:
• employee opinion surveys;
• focus groups;
• departmental meetings;
• departmental surveys;
• exit interviews;
• post-employment surveys (mailed to the employee’s home 90 days after the employee leaves the organization);
• individual interviews;
• employee study groups.
Employee study groups are similar to focus groups except they are in existence long enough to gather data and submit it to the human resources department or corporate compliance officer for further review. Study groups can be useful in gathering data in a short time frame.
Below are some sample questions to determine if personal harassment might exist in a work area:
• Are there significant morale problems in your work area?
• Do you think the organization would take aggressive action to address personal harassment concerns?
• Is everyone in your work area held to the same standards of performance?
• Are workloads distributed fairly and equally?
• Does your supervisor treat employees consistently?
• Regardless of race, gender, or age, are employees with comparable qualifications provided the same opportunities for promotions, training, and work assignments?
• Are employees who perform poorly subject to corrective action that is fair and appropriate?
• Is your supervisor consistent and fair when granting time off to employees?
• Are there are a number of personality clashes currently in your work group?
• Do new employees receive appropriate training and information about how to perform their jobs effectively?
• Does your supervisor show favoritism when making work assignments?
Areas to look at in determining risk
After data have been gathered from employees, it is time to assess how vulnerable the organization is to personal harassment. The human resources executive and the corporate compli ance officer should take the lead roles in determining the organization’s risk. Their task will be to assess the current climate and practices regarding personal harassment. Following are some areas to consider:
• current problem areas;
• the readiness level of the organization regarding personal harassment;
• what has been done in the past;
• training required for the organization to get ready;
• how the organization has communicated to employees regarding its stand on personal harassment;
• what can be done in the future.
You have reached your article limit for the month. Subscribe now to access this article plus other member-only content.
- Award-winning Medical Content
- Latest Advances & Development in Medicine
- Unbiased Content