Empowering Survivors: Support in the Workplace

Hola Fierce Friends, 

This is the first of many in-depth articles focusing on building female leaders through resilience, authenticity, and compassion. I know you will greatly enjoy all the new articles and content coming your way 🙂

While speaking at a church in New Mexico many years ago, I told the story of how I was impacted by sexual violence. 

For the first time, I saw the emotional impact and felt the heartache of the Congregation, empathizing with my personal, familial story. I witnessed the pain in their eyes as something within them stirred with a resounding, me too!

The truth is no one really wants to talk about sexual violence. Sometimes, not even me and it's my day job. The survivor story is so deeply personal and sacred and should be honored in its retelling. 

I often tell my clients that not everyone deserves to hear your story.

In the recent documentary Quiet On Set, Drake Bell from the Nickelodeon kids TV show Drake and Josh discloses that he was the John Doe in a child sex abuse case in the early 2000s. 

If you are sensitive to the subject of child maltreatment. I caution you in watching it.

The visible discomfort of Drake when he was asked about what happened to him was cringe worthy. In the documentary, he doesn’t provide any details; however, the court documents are flashed on the screen. Drake tells the producer the only person who knows the details of the abuse he encountered is his therapist. 

I thought that sounds about right!

As a trauma therapist, victims tell us their most horrific experiences—and then we are there to wrap them in love and compassion and help them pick up the pieces. That’s my job, but what about everyone else? How do you empower a survivor if you’re not a therapist or some other trained professional?

Considering the staggering statistics that 1 in 4 women and 1 in 6 men will be sexually assaulted in their lifetime, it is abundantly clear that empowering these survivors is vital to their healing journey, but that is not always left to the professionals. Learning to empower survivors of assault helps to empower one’s own skillset of resilience, authenticity, and compassion when challenged with difficult topics and conversations.

This is why the topic of sexual violence, although uncomfortable, is an important topic to cover when talking about women leadership. The impacts of trauma on our daily lives does not just stay in the privacy of our homes. Trauma follows us to work, hangs out with us when we’re working with our employees, and paints a veneer over our ability to see ourselves clearly.

In general, people believe that people are mostly good in the world. Unfortunately, trauma survivors have firsthand experience that is not true as they have faced the bad people of the world.

Even though Trust may seem like a no-brainer for people, it’s not always self-evident.

Survivors of trauma do not tend to trust easily. They may sit back and observe their environments, including the workplace, and may not engage until they have figured out whom they believe they can trust and whom they wish to keep a distance from. But is there a way to help them? Yes!

Building trust isn’t built overnight. Recognize that it may take some time to engage with a survivor in a work environment. Try not to judge their mistrust as not liking you or others but as simply being cautious of their environment and interactions with others.

When we are a survivor of sexual violence often abusers take away our personal power and control over our own bodies. Specifically in child sexual abuse, many abusers gaslight their victims, making them no longer believe in themselves or take away all their personal choices.

When told that they didn’t see what they saw or that it didn’t happen to them, but they know for a fact it did happen, and that they saw what they saw, the survivor begins to question their own inner truth and judgment, making it difficult to make decisions. Thus, the Survivor becomes indecisive. Now ask yourself, how can I help my co-worker or employer overcome this…

Make it a part of your work culture to know that making mistakes is ok. It can be extremely stressful if you feel like you can’t make a mistake. In the case of a survivor, support their decision and let them know what wasn’t the right choice and how they can always fix it. This takes the pressure off their decisions. So what’s the next step…

Your work environment is your home away from home. Not all survivor's home lives were happy, healthy, or safe. Try your best to foster an inclusive community. I am aware that a work environment needs to be professional; however, are there things that you, as a leader, can do to improve the environment or create a community?

Some community-building ideas can include potlucks, regular recognition, and face-to-face contact. It's hard to feel a part of a community if you never spend time with your people. A fun idea to consider is having your employees take their work recognition and love languages tests.

As a leader you can use those results to best show your people you care about them.

Lastly, not all survivors have the same experiences, nor do they express their emotions or triggers in the same ways. When in doubt, ask questions, be compassionate, and be confident in your abilities to empower a survivor on their journey of healing. And importantly, don’t assume.

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