The title for one of my presentations is: “Ethical and legal issues associated with a negative workplace culture”. This presentation is based on my recently published book titled “How to stand up to workplace bullying and take on an unjust employer”. This presentation is especially suitable for an audience of company owners, managers, supervisors, and their employees because the true account story describes a negative office culture in a workplace and the resulting legal ramifications.

This presentation includes discussions on many different issues that could be useful and appropriate for this audience:

• Inappropriate handling of workplace bullying and harassment issues
• Inadequate response to reports of workplace bullying and harassment
• Undeserved consequences for doing the right things at work
• Inappropriate handling of various forms of discrimination in the workplace
• Involvement of the Department of Human Rights
• Unjust termination for whistleblowing
• Involvement of labor union, if applicable
• Fighting back through the legal system

This presentation will be useful for employees and employers in all organizations where the goal is to maintain a harmonious workplace environment.

I wrote my book titled “Father Figure – my mission to prevent child sexual abuse” because of the following reasons:

• To describe a true account story that focuses on prevention of child sexual abuse (CSA)
• The story is about “intervention” and “prevention” and the numerous challenges faced in the process
• To bring about an awareness of the associated issues that require immediate attention
• To emphasize the fact that the challenges can be overcome if we are truly conscientious about prevention and are willing to work through a multidisciplinary approach
• To discuss what could have been done differently in this specific case to promote a more preventive mindset
• To demonstrate:
  • How a situation can pose risks for children
  • Reactions of authorities (such as law enforcement and child protection) to a preventive situation
  • Reluctance of family members to take preventive actions
  • Helplessness of at-risk children
• To share the experience to emphasize the point that at-risk children can use all the help they can get

Whenever I speak at schools or in front of a group of parents, I always try to make the point that teenagers don’t always come out and tell adults about what is bothering them. It is very important for school officials and parents to work together to make sure that the children can trust that the adults in their lives will listen to their issues and would do something about them.

Here are some comments made by various teenagers about things happening in their lives:

“But what some people don’t understand, is that you can’t throw someone into therapy, and expect them to be better with a snap of a finger. It can take up to months, or years, for someone to recover. It wasn’t working, so my dad took me out of therapy, and forgot about my depression. Now, I struggle with depression, and my dad doesn’t want to believe that I have it. I confide in my friends, and in my closest relatives for help.”

“I don’t really have any one to talk to in my life except my best friend but she lives in Canada”

“I try to tell my parents but sometimes I tell them like come downstairs with me and they call me a little kid and there is nothing to worry about, it’s your own house and I feel like I have no one to talk to about it.”

If the parents and the school staff work together, it is very likely that the children will receive the help they need to move forward in their lives.

Supervisors/managers in a company are highly responsible for developing and maintaining an environment that does not tolerate workplace bullying. There are many supervisors/managers who do a good job in this aspect. However, there are also many who simply are not capable of creating and maintaining a positive environment. The following are some of the characteristics of a supervisor who in fact helps in creating a negative environment in the workplace:

• The supervisor is generally hostile in nature in almost any situations
• The supervisor is loud and extremely harsh with many employees
• Promotes an environment of super autocratic control and believes that it is the only way to manage things
• The supervisor is constantly demonstrating signs of anger and frustration
• The supervisor is acting like a prison guard at all times
• There is a constant show of temper and hostility
• The supervisor promotes an environment that allows peer-to-peer bullying
• The supervisor shouts and yells at employees for no apparent reasons
• The supervisor is focused more on scaring tactics while dealing with employees

One of the key aspects of OCD is that the victims often suffer for years by themselves because of the bizarre nature of the disease. They don’t feel comfortable sharing this with others because they are concerned about what others would think. In my case, I suffered for 5 years by myself before sharing this with my parents. I later came to know that there are many patients who had gone on for many more years before opening up about the disease. That is why I wanted to make sure that my book makes it clear to OCD sufferers that it is okay to share this with others so appropriate treatment can begin. That is why I like the following comments made by some of the psychologists who reviewed my book:

“An uncensored description of what it is actually like to live with shocking, unwanted obsessions”.

 “The author is genuine in his description of his OCD symptoms and his successes and challenges along the way. While the descriptions of the OCD thoughts are graphic, they are not uncommon and many people will be able to relate to this book”.

“Descending into the hell of OCD — nightmarish intrusive thoughts and agonizing, exhausting behaviors he felt he had to perform to prevent harm to people he loved”.

“It shows the isolation that so many people with OCD have experienced, hiding their secret thoughts and rituals for years from their involved and caring parents, suffering needlessly, thinking they must surely be crazy and bad beyond redemption, until finally finding the right diagnosis and the right treatment”.

My presentations on workplace bullying provide key information, salient advice, and guidance on what workplace bullying is, how it can impact both the employees and employers, how it happens, what to do about it, and how to prevent it.

This presentation is appropriate for all attendees who are currently in the workforce as well as for those who are preparing to enter the workforce. College students entering the workforce must understand that it is everyone’s responsibility to make sure that the workplace is a truly positive and rewarding environment.

When I present on this topic, I typically focus on the following learning objectives:

• What kinds of things fall under the category of bullying and harassment?
• What to do if one is having to deal with bullying in the workplace?
• What to do if one has watched someone being bullied at the workplace?
• What are some of the typical responsibilities of a union, if the employee belongs to a union?
• What is whistle-blowing and what are the issues associated with it?
• What kinds of vehicles are available for defending against bullying in the workplace?
• What are some of the things to look for in case there is an unjust termination?
• What can managers/supervisors/employers do to maintain a bullying-free environment?

Here is an excerpt from my book “Father Figure – My Mission to Prevent Child Sexual Abuse”, regarding my experience with law enforcement in this specific true account story:

“Perhaps the greatest mystery remaining from Father Figure, and the leading cause of our setbacks in this story, is the confusing reactions that we received from the local police. Though this appeared to finally change after I wrote to the judge, I can never forget how helpless I felt when we were apparently let down by the cops.

To this day, I remain utterly confused over what actually happened behind the scenes with law enforcement. From the outside looking in, it seemed as though they were plagued with discrepancies over how they should deal with Charlie (the convicted sex offender in the story). Given the reaction from CPS (Child Protective Services), and the eventual consensus by the local police, it seems as though Charlie should not have been allowed anywhere near minor girls.

To law enforcement officers reading this, I request that you please use this most unique story as a case study for similar situations in the future and encourage your units to support more training in handling cases of CSA (Child Sexual Abuse). In a similar predicament concerning a sex offender, I certainly hope that law enforcement will err on the side of caution and choose to protect the kids. I also hope that a citizen will not feel threatened by law enforcement when he/she is reporting a good faith concern.Regardless of what rules or regulations were in place at the time, there was no justification that we could see for the local police to threaten an ordinary citizen like they did. We believe that we had approached law enforcement with a very good faith concern, and nothing that we did had warranted such an aggressive response. In general we felt there was a lack of swift and appropriate response to the reported threat.

To all officers reading this story, please continue to restore my faith. Please use this story to do your best to look out for those children at risk”.

As I go around the country talking about the long term impact of bullying, I clearly notice that there are many who still do not understand that bullying can have significant long term impact on the victims. Although many schools have now placed a lot of emphasis on the “stop bullying” movement, the necessary focus on ‘prevention’ is still lacking.

I believe it is really important to focus on understanding why bullying happens – why do bullies do what they do. In my own encounter in adult years with my worst bully from the past I came to understand that bullies are often misguided children who are struggling with issues of their own and do not know how to manage them. Instead they act out against other innocent children.

School staff and parents really need to understand this point. If a child’s emotional needs are satisfied, he or she does not have any reasons to be aggressive towards other children. Children deserve to be liked and admired for who they are – and if that does not happen, then they often end up trying something that they believe would make them popular (i.e., liked and admired by others). That is often what happens to turn some children into bullies.

It is possible that we may never be able to eliminate bullying altogether, but I believe that we would certainly go a long way, if we can focus on understanding why some children act out as bullies.

Some people seem to believe that there is no such thing as bullying in the workplace. They believe that if you want to work for someone else, you will simply have to put up with whatever the work environment may turn out to be. If you don’t like it, then simply be a “grown up” and leave and go get another job.

Well, some people are able to do that and it might even work out for them. But for many employees it is not that easy to simply quit and find another job. Most people try to find a job that is somewhat interesting to them. Why shouldn’t they have the right to do their work in a respectful environment? That is not a lot to ask.

It is often the case that only a very few people in an organization are the ones who cause the negativity in the work environment that might impact a lot of dedicated employees. So why not focus on the ones causing the problem rather than letting the good employees go?

In the workplace I describe in my book, there was only one supervisor who was responsible for creating the negativity. It impacted many employees. I decided to fight back, but there were many others who were experiencing the bullying but decided to put up with it because they enjoyed the work. It would have been a much better workplace if the organization had decided to train the supervisor properly and provide her the guidance she needed to become a better supervisor.

On several occasions I have had opportunities to speak at School Counselors Association conferences around the country. One of the topics of my presentation is “Prevention of child sexual abuse – the ethical challenges”. This of course is based on my second book titled “Father Figure – my mission to prevent child sexual abuse”.

These presentations allow me to discuss this topic with groups of school counselors. Some people believe that school counselors do not need to know about this topic since their primary job is to assist students with academic direction and to prepare them for college and career options.

However, the fact is that the school counselors often have a lot of contact with children and most children end up developing a trusting relationship with their counselors. And because of that, children can share things with their counselors that they may not discuss with anyone else. In my book I have described a true account story where a young child shared something with her school counselor that eventually led to the arrest of the abuser.

In my presentation I talk about the challenges in “prevention” of child sexual abuse and I discuss the roles and responsibilities of the various groups and systems in our communities. I think it is very important for school counselors to understand these issues because one never knows when there might be an opportunity to prevent a potentially risky situation for a child. And as we all know, even one incident of sexual abuse can scar a child for the rest of his or her life.