Every workday an estimated 16,000 threats are issued, 723 workers are assaulted and 43,000 are harassed. Given these statistics you or someone you know has probably or will someday become a victim of workplace violence. Still don’t think workplace violence is an issue?

Then consider the following statistics:

- In an average week one employee is killed and 25 are seriously injured in violent assaults by current or former co-workers
- In nearly eight out of ten cases, killers left behind clear warning signs
- Less than 20% of the targeted companies beefed up security or took internal prevention steps (according to a USA TODAY poll and CDC statistics).

Those of you in management positions are well aware of the dilemma, terminate an employee and risk being sued or keep the potentially violent employee around and risk much more. The solution is deceptively simple… don’t hire the violent employee in the first place. Simple because if the employee isn’t hired to begin with then he ceases to be a problem. Deceptive because many companies wont or don’t believe they can afford to implement screening procedures designed to identify potential problem employees. The following tips and procedures will help you spot potentially violent employees before they become a problem.