The Price of DV… and the cost
I sat in an insightful and disturbing presentation yesterday morning from a colleague of mine, Stephanie Angelo (www.hressential.com) on domestic violence. Stephanie helps clients by creating or enhancing their internal domestic violence programs and processes, and yesterday morning talked about the price of domestic violence to employers, and of course the cost to the employee, their family, and their co-workers.
The statistics were hard to take, especially in terms of the people costs. However, it was the price to business that surprised me.
In an organization with no formal Domestic Violence program, as many as 10% of employees are affected by DV. On average, victims of domestic violence miss 3 days of work per month. So, in a 1000 employee company, 100 employees are affected, 3,600 days are lost, or 28,000 hours per year. At $15/hour, that equates to $420,000 per year in lost salary.
The cost of domestic violence is horrendous. Now companies better understand the price. Do something because it is the right thing to do, or do something because it works. Either way… DO SOMETHING.
I’m glad you wrote about Stephanie and her mission to get people to be aware of what’s happening with domestic violence. She has been diligent and has tremendous insight on the subject. Stephanie is very active in the National Speaker’s Association in Arizona and has made us all more aware of the troubling aspect of our society. We appreciate her for her hard work and we appreciate you for bringing the subject to light in your blog.