June 7, 2004
The impact of abuse | A new study quantifies the economic impact domestic violence offenders have on their workplaces — and tries to get employers involved
By Sara Donnelly
Damarus Flood oversees about 100 employees as production manager at the Vic Firth Inc. factory in Newport. Flood has watched the company grow from a small operation with only a handful of workers to a multi-state entity renowned for making some of the best wooden drumsticks in the music industry. Despite the growth, she says the community in and around Vic Firth has remained intimate, which is why she has no second thoughts about addressing issues of domestic violence that affect her staff.
"We're not that big of a company," she says. "These are people on the floor ˆ they're not machinery ˆ and we do what we can" to help them.
During her eight years at Vic Firth, Flood can recall three separate instances in which she counseled employees who have struggled with an abusive spouse or have been the abuser themselves. For the victims, Flood offered confidential support, including information on finding help in the community, and worked to ensure their safety at the factory. In the single instance in which Flood identified an abuser at work, she says her efforts to encourage him to seek counseling were ineffective and he eventually left his job. In all three instances, Flood noticed a decrease in morale and productivity on the job as a result of the employees' abusive relationships at home.
Currently, lawyers and supervisors at Vic Firth are creating an official domestic violence policy to address both victims and offenders employed at the factory. Flood believes policies on spousal abuse are more than just an ethical obligation ˆ they're necessary for workplace safety. A domestic violence policy, she's come to believe, is as important as a fire evacuation plan.
But supervisors like Flood, who not only advocate for an established workplace domestic violence policy but also are skilled at identifying and helping employees struggling with abuse, are in the minority. According to the Corporate Alliance to End Partner Violence, a Chicago-based nonprofit that connects employers with agencies skilled at domestic violence prevention, just five percent of corporations in the country have domestic violence policies. Those policies tend to focus on help for the victim but do not address perpetrators employed at the workplace ˆ people who may be using company phone lines, company cars and company hours to harass their partners.
Here in Maine, efforts are underway to change that trend. An innovative study released in February by the Maine Department of Labor and the Portland-based nonprofit agency Family Crisis Services found that perpetrators of domestic violence can damage more than their personal lives. Decreased productivity, accidents as a result of lack of concentration, and absences due to court appearances and jail all were common side-effects of an abuser at work obsessed with controlling his partner (according to 2001 statistics from the U.S. Department of Justice, the most recent available, 85% of domestic abuse assaults are perpetrated by men against women). The study has been heralded nationwide by domestic violence experts as an important step in a new movement in the prevention industry, one that encourages employers to crack down on abusers under their roof.
Ellen Ridley-Hooper, an expert on domestic violence and the workplace in Maine and author of the MDOL and Family Crisis Services report, says many business people were surprised to learn of the level to which abusers use workplace resources. To spread the message, she hopes to convene a group of Cumberland County employers who are trained in domestic violence policies that deal both with victims and perpetrators. "[Domestic violence] affects the bottom line. There are all kinds of implications in terms of productivity and workplace safety issues," she says. "People's behavior is altered when they're held accountable for it."
When private matters become public
According to Ridley-Hooper, the workplace is the new American neighborhood. And this neighborhood is a dangerous one. The 2000 U.S. Census found that homicide is the second largest cause of workplace death for women. According to the Family Violence Prevention Fund, one of the oldest national domestic violence agencies, nearly three out of four battered women reported being harassed by their partner at work.
Besides the costs to human safety, abuse also is financially taxing. According to FVPF, lost productivity as a result of partner abuse costs an estimated $727.8 million a year, with more than 7.9 million paid workdays lost each year for court dates, hospital stays and other related absences. In Maine, the MDOL and Family Crisis Services study found that 70% of the abusers interviewed had lost a total of 15,221 hours of work time due to abuse arrests. These absences represent approximately $200,000 in lost hourly wages.
In recent years, employers have been saddled with more than lost wages as a result of employing abusers or victims ˆ they're now being sued for negligence in cases involving assault on company property. In one of the most notorious incidents of employer accountability for domestic violence, a woman who was shot by her husband at a Wal-Mart where she worked sued the store for selling him the bullets and failing to protect her. Here in Maine, a former employee of the retail outlet L.L. Bean won a suit in 2002 which held the company responsible for failing to protect her from another employee who was repeatedly harassing her. The harassed employee was awarded $215,000 in compensatory damages.
While it appears from court documents that the two weren't dating, Jessica Maurer of the Maine Attorney General's Office says the case may set an important precedent for domestic violence liability.
Still, many employers are reluctant to get involved in domestic abuse issues, worrying about the role they should play in an issue that has long been regarded as private. "What [employers] usually say in training is 'Where's the line?'" says Ridley-Hooper of Family Crisis Services. Though she spends most of her week traveling across the state giving trainings on domestic violence and the workplace, Ridley-Hooper says Maine businesses, like those nationwide, have been slow to implement domestic violence policies ˆ let alone policies that deal with abusers.
Bonnie Shaw, office manager for three McDonald's restaurants in South Portland, attended one of Ridley-Hooper's domestic violence training sessions a few years ago and instituted a policy afterwards. During her 18 years with McDonald's, Shaw has supplied two victims in her employ with resources for ending an abusive relationship. But to her knowledge, Shaw has never worked with a perpetrator. The three South Portland restaurants, she says, do not have a policy to respond to abusers. "We haven't come across that yet," Shaw explains. "I guess we really wouldn't know [an employee was an abuser] unless somebody came up and let us know. I guess there would have to be a situation. If it became a situation, then we would deal with it."
From intervention to encouragement
The results of the Maine study on perpetrators in the workplace suggest that managers like Shaw would do well to consider a policy related to abusers sooner rather than later. In the spring of 2003, volunteers for the MDOL and Family Crisis Services interviewed 152 male domestic abuse offenders taking classes through certified Batterer Intervention Projects.
The study is one of the first in the nation to analyze the effect perpetrators, not victims, have on their workplace and their target's place of business. Seventy-eight percent of those interviewed reported using workplace resources at least once to check up on, pressure, threaten or otherwise intimidate their partners. Nearly half reported that preoccupation with their relationship caused a loss of concentration at work, with 19% reporting an accident or a near-miss as a result. Seventy-three percent had easy access to their intimate partner's workplace, with 21% reporting they had contacted her at her workplace in violation of a no-contact order.
The Maine study also found that supervisory response to the offenders ranged from intervention (one man reported his supervisor forced him to get counseling) to encouragement (one man said his supervisor treated the abuse as a joke, while another said his supervisor offered to buy him two plane tickets to another country where the employee "could kill her if he wanted to"). Of the 73% of supervisors mentioned in the study who were aware of an employee's arrest for domestic violence, only 15% reminded the employee that the abuse is a crime.
But the study also found that most abusers said a workplace policy would have helped limit abuse-related damage to the workplace. In addition, nearly two-thirds thought a discussion of family violence and related policies at a new hire orientation would have created positive changes in their behvaior.
Sue Strasenburgh agrees. Over the last several years, she has supervised both abusers and victims at her Westbrook interior decorating company, Peerless Painting, and she knows first-hand how violence at home can follow an employee to work.
In 1998, one of Strasenburgh's employees came to a job site with weapons he later used at home. "He opened his trunk and showed [other employees] the guns," says Strasenburgh. "Later he went home and shot his family dog in front of his wife."
A couple years before this incident, Peerless Painting had instituted what Strasenburgh calls a "cookie-cutter" domestic violence policy after an employee was harassed by her boyfriend at a work sites. "That [first incident] was the first time as an owner of a business that I realized I might have to deal with this," she says.
But the experience with a perpetrator was a first for Strasenburgh. She fired the man the day after the incident, something experts warn against because it may cause retaliation against the victim. And then she updated her domestic violence policy to reflect what she learned from the experience. "Now, if I hear of [an abuser on staff] via employees or through the rumor mill, I would take steps to find the perpetrator help," she says. "At the same time, I would give him a reprimand that if his ability to function on the job site is not brought up to standards, then he would be dismissed."
Strasenburgh, who's preparing to become a statewide trainer in domestic violence in the workplace, says having a clear plan of action for family violence brought to the office before an incident occurs is crucial to maintaining control over what can become a volatile situation. "Don't wait until it happens to you," she says.
"We're not that big of a company," she says. "These are people on the floor ˆ they're not machinery ˆ and we do what we can" to help them.
During her eight years at Vic Firth, Flood can recall three separate instances in which she counseled employees who have struggled with an abusive spouse or have been the abuser themselves. For the victims, Flood offered confidential support, including information on finding help in the community, and worked to ensure their safety at the factory. In the single instance in which Flood identified an abuser at work, she says her efforts to encourage him to seek counseling were ineffective and he eventually left his job. In all three instances, Flood noticed a decrease in morale and productivity on the job as a result of the employees' abusive relationships at home.
Currently, lawyers and supervisors at Vic Firth are creating an official domestic violence policy to address both victims and offenders employed at the factory. Flood believes policies on spousal abuse are more than just an ethical obligation ˆ they're necessary for workplace safety. A domestic violence policy, she's come to believe, is as important as a fire evacuation plan.
But supervisors like Flood, who not only advocate for an established workplace domestic violence policy but also are skilled at identifying and helping employees struggling with abuse, are in the minority. According to the Corporate Alliance to End Partner Violence, a Chicago-based nonprofit that connects employers with agencies skilled at domestic violence prevention, just five percent of corporations in the country have domestic violence policies. Those policies tend to focus on help for the victim but do not address perpetrators employed at the workplace ˆ people who may be using company phone lines, company cars and company hours to harass their partners.
Here in Maine, efforts are underway to change that trend. An innovative study released in February by the Maine Department of Labor and the Portland-based nonprofit agency Family Crisis Services found that perpetrators of domestic violence can damage more than their personal lives. Decreased productivity, accidents as a result of lack of concentration, and absences due to court appearances and jail all were common side-effects of an abuser at work obsessed with controlling his partner (according to 2001 statistics from the U.S. Department of Justice, the most recent available, 85% of domestic abuse assaults are perpetrated by men against women). The study has been heralded nationwide by domestic violence experts as an important step in a new movement in the prevention industry, one that encourages employers to crack down on abusers under their roof.
Ellen Ridley-Hooper, an expert on domestic violence and the workplace in Maine and author of the MDOL and Family Crisis Services report, says many business people were surprised to learn of the level to which abusers use workplace resources. To spread the message, she hopes to convene a group of Cumberland County employers who are trained in domestic violence policies that deal both with victims and perpetrators. "[Domestic violence] affects the bottom line. There are all kinds of implications in terms of productivity and workplace safety issues," she says. "People's behavior is altered when they're held accountable for it."
When private matters become public
According to Ridley-Hooper, the workplace is the new American neighborhood. And this neighborhood is a dangerous one. The 2000 U.S. Census found that homicide is the second largest cause of workplace death for women. According to the Family Violence Prevention Fund, one of the oldest national domestic violence agencies, nearly three out of four battered women reported being harassed by their partner at work.
Besides the costs to human safety, abuse also is financially taxing. According to FVPF, lost productivity as a result of partner abuse costs an estimated $727.8 million a year, with more than 7.9 million paid workdays lost each year for court dates, hospital stays and other related absences. In Maine, the MDOL and Family Crisis Services study found that 70% of the abusers interviewed had lost a total of 15,221 hours of work time due to abuse arrests. These absences represent approximately $200,000 in lost hourly wages.
In recent years, employers have been saddled with more than lost wages as a result of employing abusers or victims ˆ they're now being sued for negligence in cases involving assault on company property. In one of the most notorious incidents of employer accountability for domestic violence, a woman who was shot by her husband at a Wal-Mart where she worked sued the store for selling him the bullets and failing to protect her. Here in Maine, a former employee of the retail outlet L.L. Bean won a suit in 2002 which held the company responsible for failing to protect her from another employee who was repeatedly harassing her. The harassed employee was awarded $215,000 in compensatory damages.
While it appears from court documents that the two weren't dating, Jessica Maurer of the Maine Attorney General's Office says the case may set an important precedent for domestic violence liability.
Still, many employers are reluctant to get involved in domestic abuse issues, worrying about the role they should play in an issue that has long been regarded as private. "What [employers] usually say in training is 'Where's the line?'" says Ridley-Hooper of Family Crisis Services. Though she spends most of her week traveling across the state giving trainings on domestic violence and the workplace, Ridley-Hooper says Maine businesses, like those nationwide, have been slow to implement domestic violence policies ˆ let alone policies that deal with abusers.
Bonnie Shaw, office manager for three McDonald's restaurants in South Portland, attended one of Ridley-Hooper's domestic violence training sessions a few years ago and instituted a policy afterwards. During her 18 years with McDonald's, Shaw has supplied two victims in her employ with resources for ending an abusive relationship. But to her knowledge, Shaw has never worked with a perpetrator. The three South Portland restaurants, she says, do not have a policy to respond to abusers. "We haven't come across that yet," Shaw explains. "I guess we really wouldn't know [an employee was an abuser] unless somebody came up and let us know. I guess there would have to be a situation. If it became a situation, then we would deal with it."
From intervention to encouragement
The results of the Maine study on perpetrators in the workplace suggest that managers like Shaw would do well to consider a policy related to abusers sooner rather than later. In the spring of 2003, volunteers for the MDOL and Family Crisis Services interviewed 152 male domestic abuse offenders taking classes through certified Batterer Intervention Projects.
The study is one of the first in the nation to analyze the effect perpetrators, not victims, have on their workplace and their target's place of business. Seventy-eight percent of those interviewed reported using workplace resources at least once to check up on, pressure, threaten or otherwise intimidate their partners. Nearly half reported that preoccupation with their relationship caused a loss of concentration at work, with 19% reporting an accident or a near-miss as a result. Seventy-three percent had easy access to their intimate partner's workplace, with 21% reporting they had contacted her at her workplace in violation of a no-contact order.
The Maine study also found that supervisory response to the offenders ranged from intervention (one man reported his supervisor forced him to get counseling) to encouragement (one man said his supervisor treated the abuse as a joke, while another said his supervisor offered to buy him two plane tickets to another country where the employee "could kill her if he wanted to"). Of the 73% of supervisors mentioned in the study who were aware of an employee's arrest for domestic violence, only 15% reminded the employee that the abuse is a crime.
But the study also found that most abusers said a workplace policy would have helped limit abuse-related damage to the workplace. In addition, nearly two-thirds thought a discussion of family violence and related policies at a new hire orientation would have created positive changes in their behvaior.
Sue Strasenburgh agrees. Over the last several years, she has supervised both abusers and victims at her Westbrook interior decorating company, Peerless Painting, and she knows first-hand how violence at home can follow an employee to work.
In 1998, one of Strasenburgh's employees came to a job site with weapons he later used at home. "He opened his trunk and showed [other employees] the guns," says Strasenburgh. "Later he went home and shot his family dog in front of his wife."
A couple years before this incident, Peerless Painting had instituted what Strasenburgh calls a "cookie-cutter" domestic violence policy after an employee was harassed by her boyfriend at a work sites. "That [first incident] was the first time as an owner of a business that I realized I might have to deal with this," she says.
But the experience with a perpetrator was a first for Strasenburgh. She fired the man the day after the incident, something experts warn against because it may cause retaliation against the victim. And then she updated her domestic violence policy to reflect what she learned from the experience. "Now, if I hear of [an abuser on staff] via employees or through the rumor mill, I would take steps to find the perpetrator help," she says. "At the same time, I would give him a reprimand that if his ability to function on the job site is not brought up to standards, then he would be dismissed."
Strasenburgh, who's preparing to become a statewide trainer in domestic violence in the workplace, says having a clear plan of action for family violence brought to the office before an incident occurs is crucial to maintaining control over what can become a volatile situation. "Don't wait until it happens to you," she says.
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