WORKPLACE DE-ESCALATION TACTICS

WORKPLACE DE-ESCALATION TACTICS (WDT) was developed after we noticed a significant gap in the capabilities of human resources, supervisors, and management personnel. We had multiple employees at various companies ask us what they could do to resolve a situation that has escalated or even turned hostile. The standard response to an aggressive employee has always been to call security or law enforcement. However, waiting for the police to arrive is not a viable action when faced with a violent individual. Police response times start around 15 minutes and could take as long as an hour. When faced with an individual that wants to or is attempting to cause you harm, this can feel like an eternity.

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Insider threats are the number one cause of a violent incident at a workplace and terminations and reprimands are the main causes of an employee feeling upset enough that they could initiate an attack. Tensions and emotions are most high in the initial moments of receiving the termination or reprimand. It is crucial that employees have the capabilities to handle these situations as the appear.

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WDT is based in psychology and behavioral science and factors body language, physical positioning, emotion, logic, and behavioral patterns into the tools and techniques provided. Using these concepts, employees finding themselves in the middle of an escalating situation can leverage what they learned and potentially reduce the chance of violence or injury. These are the same tools, tactics, and techniques our staff used to de-escalate tense or hostile situations during their time as military law enforcement officers.

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To set your people up for success, our techniques are implemented before an interaction even occurs. We show your employees how to prepare for an interaction, how to ensure the area the interaction occurs is safe and secure and give them options on how to handle the interaction. Next, we provide techniques that can be used to slow things down when the situation starts to escalate. These include how to interrupt behavior or thought patterns, how to make the agitated individual feel heard and understood, how to bring reason into the discussion, and how to prevent the individual from escalating further. If a situation does escalate to violence or is approaching that point, we teach your people what to do, who to call, how to behave, and how to resolve the situation. Finally, we discuss post-event actions and what notifications are required. We also examine security procedures that should be in place after terminating or removing and individual that has become violent or hostile.

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WDT can either be a standalone training event lasting four hours or incorporated into other training events like ACTIVE SHOOTER INCIDENT RESPONSE or combined with PERSONAL SECURITY ORIENTATION training for a day-long event.