Category: HR Risk Management

  • Suicide Prevention and Awareness: Four Ways HR Can Lead the Conversation – CUPA-HR

    Suicide Prevention and Awareness: Four Ways HR Can Lead the Conversation – CUPA-HR

    by CUPA-HR | August 31, 2022

    This blog post was contributed by Maureen De Armond, Executive Director, Human Resources at Drake University.

    In higher education, we must plan for many worst-case scenarios, including tornados, fires, active-shooter situations, and, as we now know, pandemics. Among this wide range of difficult scenarios that could present themselves on our campuses at any time, suicide is one that deserves more attention and discussion.

    Like other scenarios, suicide prevention and planning should contain at least these components: awareness and prevention at the front end; crisis-response protocols to deploy in the moment; and post-incident support and debriefing.

    Here are four ways HR can take the lead on awareness and prevention efforts:

    Normalize Mental Health Conversations

    HR can set the example in normalizing conversations about mental health. From new employee orientation to leadership trainings to trainings offered during open enrollment, make mental health as normal a topic to discuss as being sick with the flu or needing rehab due to an injured back. We know that mental health carries a stigma; openly discussing mental health helps chip away at that stigma.

    Coordinate Messaging

    Tailor communications to your institution’s practices and use more than one channel for communication. If your institution sends newsletters, plan articles for each week of September. Consider emails as well. Be sure to provide your leadership teams with prepared messages and information they can share with their teams. Point them to helplines, training opportunities, reminders about EAPs, and tips for what to do and where to go if they or someone they know is having mental health crisis.

    Collaborative messaging sent from campus and community partners can also create a widespread impact. Consider reaching out to student services, the provost’s office, Title IX/Equal Opportunity, campus safety, student senate, faculty senate, student counseling, faculty subject matter experts, and your institution’s employee assistance program (EAP) providers and health plan partners to team up on mental health messaging throughout the month.

    Train, Train, Train

    Offer learning and development opportunities that focus on mental health awareness as well as suicide prevention. This fall semester, Drake University is offering Question, Persuade and Refer suicide prevention training in addition to Mental Health First Aid for Higher Education for faculty and staff. Faculty partners are facilitating these sessions. We’ve found that having faculty-led sessions can help attract faculty attendees, leverage internal expertise and offer faculty additional forms of service to the institution.

    Inventory Resources, Benefits and Policies

    Take a fresh look at your well-being/wellness programming. Does it appropriately address mental health? Explore what resources and trainings may be available through your existing EAP contracts. Does your health plan offer virtual doctor’s visits for mental health care? If so, shine a spotlight on those resources. Making mental health care as accessible as possible may mean more people will consider using it. Review sick, personal and other paid-time-off leave policies to ensure mental health is clearly addressed. This includes handbook and web language, too.

    While suicide awareness and prevention shouldn’t be a once-a-year conversation, September is a great month for HR to demonstrate leadership in normalizing conversations about mental health and suicide prevention and planning.

    Related resources:

    Reassessing Your Institution’s EAP: Steps for HR Pros to Increase Awareness and Accessibility (The Higher Ed Workplace Blog)

    HEERF Funds Can Be Used to Support Mental Health Resources (The Higher Ed Workplace Blog)

    Mental Health Month Focus: Higher Ed Campus Culture (The Higher Ed Workplace Blog)



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  • Tools to Build a Harassment-Free Higher Ed Workplace – CUPA-HR

    Tools to Build a Harassment-Free Higher Ed Workplace – CUPA-HR

    by CUPA-HR | March 30, 2022

    Sexual violence is a multi-faceted and difficult topic. Higher ed institutions either enter the conversation before an event of sexual violence has occurred or after it has occurred, leaving the institution scrambling for answers to the campus community as to why it happened in the first place.

    As part of upcoming Sexual Assault Awareness Month (April), we’re highlighting some CUPA-HR resources that share first-hand experiences from some higher ed institutions and the strategies and trainings they’ve used to respond to and approach the topic of sexual violence on campus.

    Strategies to Create a Harassment-Free Workplace

    In an article in the spring 2020 issue of Higher Ed HR Magazine, UMass Lowell detailed how they addressed concerns about a sexual harassment complaint the university received several years prior that spurred anger among students, faculty and staff. Questions were raised as to how decisions were made following the violation, whether the sanctions were sufficiently severe and what steps were taken to mitigate risk of recurrence.

    In response, the chancellor convened a task force to review the university’s Title IX policies and procedures, educational efforts, culture and climate, and communications on these issues, and to make a set of recommendations to the executive cabinet for future improvements. Read the full article to learn about how the task force practiced transparency, built trust among the community and key themes that emerged in the recommendations from the task force: A Matter of Trust: Strategies for Creating a Harassment-Free Workplace

    Impactful, Engaging In-Person Sexual Harassment Training

    While training alone isn’t the answer to creating a harassment-free environment, it certainly should be part of an institution’s broader strategy. However, in order to make an impact, the training must be engaging, insightful, interactive and relatable — and sitting at a desk clicking through an online training module or watching a video about workplace harassment is anything but engaging. With an in-person training approach, participants can ask questions, engage one another in dialogue, and connect to the content, making the messaging more likely to stick.

    Explore the benefits of and barriers to in-person sexual harassment training, as well as examples of interactive in-person training activities in the article A Thoughtful Approach: How to Conduct Impactful, Engaging In-Person Sexual Harassment Training.

    Additional Sexual Harassment Resources

    CUPA-HR’s Title IX and Sexual Harassment Toolkit is a great place to check out what other institutions are doing to mitigate sexual harassment and misconduct. The toolkit highlights sexual harassment and reporting policies, trainings and other tools for HR pros.

    By tapping into these resources, higher ed institutions can positions themselves as those that prioritize prevention over reaction when it comes to sexual violence on campus.

    Related resources:

    How Institutions Are Leveraging Partnerships and Education to Address Sexual Harassment and As

    4 Ways to Mitigate Risk Related to Sexual Misconduct and Harassment on Campus

    Sexual Harassment Resources



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