Case Study - Hostile Work Environment

"Encouraging civility in the workplace is becoming one of the fundamental corporate goals in our diverse, hurried, stressed, and litigation-prone society. A civil workplace is good for workers, since the workers' quality of life is improved in such an environment. But a civil workplace is also good for the customers, since the quality of the service they receive from happier and more relaxed service providers is improved". P.M. Forni, co-founder of the Johns Hopkins Civility Project and author of the book "Choosing Civility".

United Security Corporation (USC - fictional company) had a problem. The company culture had turned into one of rudeness. Some of it was aggressive, with co-workers

• making derisive comments to one another
• withholding important client information from co-workers
• claiming credit for another employee's work
• shifting blame to a co-worker
• using profanity
• and supervisors criticizing employees in public

Some was passive:

• arriving late to meetings
• routinely checking emails and texting during meetings
• ignoring or interrupting colleagues
• refusing to work hard on a team project
• not responding to calls or emails
• not saying please or thank you

USC management noticed higher turnover than expected, a decrease in productivity and less creativity among employees than in past years. Was this a culture shift in the organization? The stress of longer work hours? A reflection of the economy? Even the move to casual dress may have made the workplace too informal? As a department manager at USC, you have been asked to serve on a committee to explore the problem and asked to come up with any potential causes and some solutions to present to management.

The Worklife Culture Committee met to discuss this. Some facts they found regarding rude behavior in the American workplace:

• 96% of workers report experiencing uncivil behavior and 98% report witnessing it (study by Georgetown University and Thunderbird School of Global Management of nearly 3,000 participants) (Feintzeig, 2013)
• In 1998, 25% of workers surveyed reported being treated rudely at least once a week; by 2011, a separate study reported that number up to 50% of workers. (Feintzeig, 2013)
• A survey of 1,000 people found that 26% of respondents had quit a job because of an uncivil workplace (Feintzeig, 2013).

Each member of the committee has been asked to talk to employees and come up with some answers to the following questions. Company leaders will be VTC'd into the meeting to hear resulting ideas. Some of the comments you heard from employees:

• communications problems with workers from different cultures
• no respect given to support staff
• basic lack of respect (keeping common areas clean)
• inappropriate use of the Internet
• lack of flexibility for working mothers
• lack of privacy (cubicles)

1. Should USC take any action at all?

2. If USC decides to implement changes, what are some potential ideas they could use in an effort to promote more polite behavior in the workplace? (You can look up a few ideas online to encourage our discussion.)

References:

Feintzeig, Rachel. 2013. How to Disarm a Nasty Co-Worker: Use a Smile. Wall Street Journal. Online:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324906304579038922066369060.html?KEYWORDS=when+co-workers+don%27t+play+nice

Forni, P.M. et al. 2003. The Baltimore Workplace Civility Study.Available online:http://www.ubalt.edu/jfi/jfi/reports/civility.PDF

Green, Aaron. 2011. Incivility in the workplace. Available online: http://www.boston.com/jobs/employers/hr/hrcolumns/2011/03/incivility_in_the_workplace.html