SHRM's CHRO shares strategies for reviving civility in the workplace

Communities are grappling with an ever-widening gulf, driven by political and social divides that are causing stress, disagreements and often anger. The workplace is not immune to these pressures, but it can still be a space for employees to feel safe, supported and heard. 

"We were seeing increasing agitation in the workplace, and we started researching this and saw that what was actually being experienced by employees was a decreasing amount of civility," says Jim Link, chief human resource officer at the Society of Human Resource Management. "We found that employees reported 208.5 million acts of incivility per day in their everyday life." 

According to research from Pollack Peacebuilding, a workplace conflict resolution platform, 85% of employees experience workplace conflict at some point, and nearly a third say it occurs constantly. SHRM's research found that incivility ranged from how employees interpreted communications between people, through email exchange or in-person dialogue, all the way through to acts of harm against individuals.  

Read more: 56% of employees fear retaliation when reporting workplace violence 

While daunting to address, benefit leaders can set the tone for civil discourse in the workplace, and establish ground rules and boundaries to keep conversations and daily interactions professional. And while it's important to allow employees to express their views and share their full selves in the workplace, discussions and even disagreements must always come from a place of respect.  

"It becomes incumbent upon employers to set the standards for how dialog should occur," Link says. "And the best way to do that is to first establish that civility, regardless of the topic, is a requirement in the workplace."  

Link shared his thoughts on why the workplace has become so fractured, strategies for benefit leaders to establish healthier communications, and why technology can be a helpful tool. 

Interested in hearing more about this topic? Link will be a keynote speaker at Employee Benefit News' annual conference, Benefits at Work, happening September 3-4 in Las Vegas. Find out more information right here.

What are some of the factors that have led to a decrease in civility in the workplace? 
It's a byproduct of what we're seeing more largely in society right now. Certainly during the election time period, and now we see that political discourse come across in interactions between employees. 

With what we've seen in the media, what we've seen socially, what we've seen in our communities, there's been a bit of an enablement factor where employees or organizations believe that that same type of behavior is acceptable in workplaces. It's not, and employers need to establish what those rules of engagement are. We advise our members and member companies to utilize toolkits that are available out there that SHRM and other organizations have put together to help re-establish this idea that civility is a workplace requirement and part of the culture in which we all can be effective. 

[Some employers] have said, We're not going to talk about politics. We're not going to talk about current events. We're just going to put an all out ban on uncomfortable topics. Is that the way to navigate this? 

I understand why employers feel the need to [implement bans], but they're incredibly ineffective. Employers need to realize that their attempts to impact what actually gets discussed at work are most likely not going to be met with high degrees of success. Instead, there are phrases that tend to work in these situations. So we don't have debates at work. We have discussions. We encourage and want that open dialog within the boundaries of civility and respect. We want other people to acknowledge others' points of view. You don't have to agree with it. 

Read more: How to engage in political conversations at work — without a fight

What are some tools and strategies benefit managers can use to establish civility and encourage more constructive conversations at work? 
What we always find works in both effective listening and effective communication between people who are widely separated in what they believe about a particular topic is to show that you're listening by asking a simple question: Are you open to a different point of view? And the listener can either say yes or no. If the employee says, Yes, obviously, then, you're setting the stage to be open minded and openly listening. Whether you agree or disagree with someone's opinion, what an organization and the people who work in that organization need to create is a culture where that viewpoint is not disregarded, but accepted and valued, and even encouraged, even if you disagree with it. That is really hard to do. 

Read more: How to improve your benefits communication strategy

One of the things that SHRM has done is put together a political conversations playbook. We put together a five step guide to civil conversations, and we've partnered with outside organizations to create resources that they can deploy to help foster civil conversations and civility within their workplace cultures. Employers need to set the standard for what's acceptable, and when civil workplaces are in place, it will lead to a more engaged employee, a better employee experience and a better outcome for both the employee and the employer.

What role does technology play in these efforts, on both sides? 
I call it tech bravery, where people feel that technology gives them a higher degree of capability to express what they think, feel or believe in, oftentimes in complete disregard for the recipient. But we do feel good about what artificial intelligence might actually enable us to do. SHRM found that 52% of people tell us that AI and the use of effective AI in the workplace may actually enhance civility in the workplace. Perhaps technology will also enable us to have more tools at our disposal to be effective and civil. 

Read more: How to preserve human connection in a tech-driven workplace 

Utilizing generative AI on any of the available free apps, you can drop in an email that you're about to write and say, How can I say this better? How can I increase my effectiveness with this particular email? And I'm not talking about grammar, per se. I'm talking about tone and tenor. How can I ask this question in a way that shows I'm open to learning and not that I don't already have an opinion formed? It's learning how to prompt to get what you want out of any AI tool or capability. And employees are getting more and more savvy in the way that they're inquiring about these AI tools to help them be effective.