Build a workplace-violence program before behavior becomes an emergency

Source facts: prevention and response require many disciplines

The Interagency Security Committee’s 2019 Violence in the Federal Workplace: A Guide for Prevention and Response presents workplace violence as an organizational program rather than a security-only incident. It addresses planning, prevention, employee relations, labor relations, employee assistance, law enforcement and security, legal considerations, written policy, threat assessment, incident response, and recovery.

The guide describes benefits of a written policy, including telling employees what behavior is covered, how to report concerns, that reports will receive an appropriate response, and that management supports the program. Its scope extends beyond physical assault to threatening, intimidating, harassing, or disruptive behavior and can include contractors, visitors, interns, and other nonemployees as defined by policy.

The federal guide emphasizes collaboration among functions with different responsibilities and confidentiality limits. It is not a private-employer legal standard, diagnostic manual, or substitute for emergency services. Employment law, collective-bargaining obligations, disability and leave requirements, privacy, records, state workplace-violence rules, and law-enforcement authority require qualified local guidance.

DSE recommendation: create a trusted path from concern to managed case

Appoint an executive owner and a standing multidisciplinary team that includes, as appropriate, human resources, security, legal counsel, occupational safety, employee assistance or behavioral-health expertise, labor relations, communications, facilities, and operations. Define alternates and a 24-hour emergency path. The team should not wait for a crisis to exchange phone numbers.

1. Publish a behavior-based scope. Give examples of threats, intimidation, stalking, domestic violence affecting work, harassment, weapon concerns, sabotage, escalating conflict, and other disruptive behavior. Avoid labels based on identity, diagnosis, protected activity, personality, or rumor. State anti-retaliation expectations and the limits of confidentiality.
2. Offer several reporting routes. Provide manager, HR, security, hotline, and emergency options so a concern is not trapped with the subject’s supervisor. Tell people what information helps: exact words or actions, dates, context, people involved, immediate access or location concerns, witnesses, and preserved messages. Employees should report observations, not investigate.
3. Separate immediate danger from assessment. For imminent threats or violence, direct people to emergency services and the site’s emergency procedure. For non-imminent concerns, assign a case owner, acknowledge receipt where appropriate, preserve information, and convene the qualified team promptly.
4. Assess the situation, not a stereotype. Gather reliable information across authorized sources; consider behavior, context, stressors, capability, access, targets, protective factors, and changes over time; document uncertainty; and seek specialized assessment or law enforcement support when warranted. One unusual behavior should not become an unsupported prediction.
5. Choose proportional interventions. Options may include supervisory action, conflict management, employee assistance, schedule or worksite changes, trespass or visitor controls, access changes, safety planning, leave, discipline, protective orders, or law-enforcement coordination. Legal and HR owners should approve employment actions; security should not improvise them.
6. Manage and close the case. Record decisions, owners, review dates, contact restrictions, access changes, notifications, support offered, and triggers for reassessment. Confirm temporary badges, keys, property, schedules, and access permissions are handled through normal authorized processes.

Train managers and front-line employees on recognition, reporting, emergency actions, preservation of messages, and respectful response to a reporter. Give reception and security site-specific procedures for an agitated visitor, separated employee, protected person, restraining-order information, welfare concern, and law-enforcement arrival. Exercises should test coordination without sensationalizing real people or revealing confidential cases.

After an incident, address medical and psychological support, family communication, scene and evidence control, continuity, employee information, media, return to work, and lessons learned. Measure reporting awareness, response time, unresolved ownership, overdue reviews, access-change completion, and corrective actions—not the number of reports driven down. A credible program makes early reporting safe, decisions multidisciplinary, emergency action fast, and recovery humane.

Official references

• Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, Interagency Security Committee, Violence in the Federal Workplace: A Guide for Prevention and Response, 2019 edition.
• CISA, ISC Violence in the Federal Workplace Guide resource page.