Evaluation of Organizational Justice Intervention to Alleviate Type III Violence

Details

• Personal Author:
  Lipscomb, Jane A.
• Description:
  Overview: Workplace violence is an important problem worldwide; the economic burden in the U.S. is estimated to be billions of dollars. A widespread and costly segment of this problem includes those actions that are perpetrated by a current or former fellow employee, so-called Type III violence. The purpose of this study was to assess the prevalence of Type III workplace violence in a large public sector workforce and to develop, implement and evaluate interventions to reduce its occurrence. For the purpose of this project, we defined Type III workplace violence as coworker conflict using standardize measures of "negative acts" and bullying. Approach: The study was conducted in two phases; both were highly participatory. In phase I a Project Advisory Group assisted with the recruitment of State Government Agencies and the unions representing these workers, as well as the development, administration and completion of an email-based survey of approximately 12,000 state workers (72% response rated) employed in five State Government Agencies. The web-based survey included both subjective (self-labeling) and objective (a checklist of six negative acts) measures of bullying. Phase II involved interventions to address coworker conflict within a subset of agencies. The interventions included a three-hour conflict resolution training and the inclusion of three competencies on supervisors' annual Performance Evaluation pertaining to managing conflict. Key Finding: 1. 10.0% of the respondents indicated that they had been bullied at work during the prior six months; 7.6% and 2.4% reported being bullied occasionally and regularly, respectively. 2. 52.3% of those who reported regular NAQ and 71.9% of those who reported regular bullying identified the perpetrator as a supervisor, top management, or both. 3. Workers reporting coworker conflict reported that it negatively impacted their work, them personally, and their intention to remain in their current job, with a clear dose response relationship between severity of bullying and impact. 4. Findings from the post-intervention survey included no reduction in NAQ ("negative acts") and a slight increase in the frequency of bullying over the study period. However, improvements were documented in the perception of the work atmosphere in all units over the course of the project, with the intervention units demonstrating greater improvements on a number of measures of work atmosphere, as well as knowledge of policies and procedures post interventions. Conclusions: Although we did not demonstrate a reduction in coworker conflict over the study period we documented improvements in measures of the work atmosphere, with a greater improvement among the intervention units. The participatory process that guided this project was highly successful in engaging labor and management partners and sustaining the initiative beyond the funded research project. The overall intensity of the intervention was limited by a number of factors, including the nature and demands of state government work, multiple collective bargaining agreements, as well as a culture that makes changes from the rank and fil e, not to mention outside researchers, challenging at best. In addition, intervention's impact was diluted by ongoing Agency-wide efforts quality improvement efforts, including the implementation of changes to supervisors' Performance Evaluation. [Description provided by NIOSH]
• Subjects:
  Bullying Occupational Health Safety Surveys And Questionnaires Violence Workplace
• Keywords:
  Questionnaires Statistical Analysis Violence-prevention Workers Workplace Studies Workplace Violence
• Series:
  Grant Final Reports
• Publisher:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Document Type:
  Text
• Funding:
  Grant
• Genre:
  Final Grant Report
• Place as Subject:
  Georgia ; Maryland ; OSHA Region 3 ; OSHA Region 4
• CIO:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)
• Division:
  OEP - Office of Extramural Programs
• Topic:
  Workplace Safety & Health
• Location:
  North America
• Pages in Document:
  1-30
• NIOSHTIC Number:
  nn:20047917
• NTIS Accession Number:
  PB2016-103232
• Citation:
  Atlanta, GA: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Public Health Service, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, R01-OH-009072, 2013 Nov; :1-30
• Contact Point Address:
  Dr. Jane Lipscomb, University of Maryland, School of Nursing Suite 655C, 655 West Lombard Street, Baltimore, MD 21201, USA
• Email:
  Lipscomb@son.umaryland.edu
• Federal Fiscal Year:
  2014
• Performing Organization:
  University of Maryland, Baltimore
• Peer Reviewed:
  False
• Start Date:
  20060901
• Source Full Name:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• End Date:
  20120831
• Collection(s):
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:72f4a75cf7f6cc5f604f3b6753319e7f9a053ddc5fe62fda90d1771a854cdedfb6456958e013ab9e652df7d46d2323f028146645730bceab5fe8d66b5e31c20d
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/218633/cdc_218633_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 760.10 KB ]