How to Encourage Respectful Behaviour Among Employees

As companies strive to increase diversity, respect in the workplace is becoming more necessary. The average office no longer consists of only white males. Diversity in the 21^st century isn’t just limited to gender or race. A diverse workplace includes people from a wide range of backgrounds, ages, personalities, and skills.

What is Respect in the Workplace?

The general concept of respect is that we treat others the way we would like others to treat us. However, in the workplace, respectful behaviour requires more than just being polite. Respect comes under five categories:

• Organisational support
• A fair salary and benefits
• Fair promotional potential
• Respectful communication
• Contingent rewards

Many studies point to the fact that lack of respect impacts the workplace. Workers who felt lower levels of respect in those five areas were significantly more likely to leave their current job.

The Benefits of Respectful Behaviour Among Staff

When employees are respectful to each other, this first thing that happens is that there is less negativity. Mutual respect between employees and managers reduces the amount of stress and can even increase collaboration. For example, an employee who used to feel belittled but who now feels respected will have the confidence to share their ideas.

Respectful behaviour among all staff can also benefit the organization. A 2016 study found that businesses that actively encourage respectfulness, experience less employee turnover. Employees feel embedded in the organization and are less likely to look for a new job.

How to Encourage Respectful Behaviour at Work

Few of us need reminding about the importance of acting with respect. But with busy office cultures, deadlines, and training, it is easy to forget about showing respect. Also, it isn’t apparent to everyone that encouraging respectful behaviour should be part of training programs.

Here are six ways to encourage respect at work.

1. Encourage kindness and politeness

True leaders lead by example, so management needs to treat everyone with respect. Welcome new ideas and listen carefully to what is being said. Employees will only feel genuinely respected if these ideas are put into place. Never interrupt and don’t tolerate it from others. Nit-picking and disrespectful behaviour are counterproductive.

As a general rule, always aim to praise employees more than you criticize—praise in public, criticize in private. Even then, your feedback should always be constructive and not only focus on the negative.

2. Avoid making assumptions

A quick way to destroy a positive working atmosphere is by making judgements and assumptions. When working in a diverse office, it is easy to believe stereotypes—whether that is about people from other countries or even a university they attended. Basing facts on stereotypes only restricts communication and the sharing of knowledge and ideas. Encourage respectful behaviour by helping all employees to take their time to get to know other employees and learn to accept others.

3. The right body language

Body language and your behaviour can demonstrate a lack of respect. The challenge is that our actions often happen subconsciously. However, others can easily pick up on these subtle signals.

One of the most disrespectful actions that we have all been guilty of is checking our phone when somebody is talking. Also, be aware of your eye contact—both too much and too little can be seen as disrespectful.

Related reading: The ten body language secrets successful people use.

4. Learn to control impulsive actions

Being able to control anger helps avoid getting into the negative habit of acting impulsively and doing or saying something we may. There is no place for anger in a professional work environment.  And, whether it’s you or your employees, every need to learn anger management techniques.

Teach employees to let go of irritating circumstances that they cannot control. How can you avoid falling into the trap of acting impulsively? Take a moment to think of how your words or actions are going to affect the situation.

5. Treat everyone in the same way

Age, gender, and race should never impact how you treat a colleague. Nor should position or role. When it comes to respecting others, the mail person is just as entitled to respect as the boss. This type of behaviour is vital in all workplace activities—meetings, working lunches, and social events. The 60-year old might be coming up to retirement, but that doesn’t you shouldn’t invite them for after-work drinks.

6. Manage conflicts peacefully

Considering the amount of time colleagues spend together, it’s natural that tempers will rise, and there will be conflicts in the workplace. Sometimes, conflicts may occur more frequently in a diverse workplace because there are so many varying opinions. But that doesn’t mean ongoing conflicts should be accepted.

As a leader, you need to discover ways to handle conflicts and learn how you can reduce them together. One way is to take responsibility for your actions and say sorry when necessary. An apology is an excellent way of showing your respect for others.