An examination of whether work culture influences victimization and harassment of federal correctional officers

The purpose of this paper was to examine possible factors that may contribute to workplace harassment for correctional officers employed with the Correctional Service of Canada by examining the results from the 2019 Public Service Employee Survey (PSES). An analysis of the results indicates that 36% of correctional officers reported harassment on the job. The most common types of harassment that correctional officers reported were offensive remarks, unfair treatment, being excluded or ignored, aggressive behaviour, personal attacks, and humiliation. With respect to the source of harassment, the findings indicate that supervisors and managers were the leading source of those engaging in harassment behaviours within CSC. Fear of reprisal was the most common reason reported for why correctional officers did not file a complaint of harassment. The most common operational and organizational stressors reported were not enough employees to do the work, pay or other compensation-related issues, lack of control or input in decision-making, competing or constantly changing priorities, lack of recognition, and lack of clear expectations. An analysis of CSC’s response to harassment revealed that current initiatives are ineffective and may perpetuate workplace harassment. Several recommendations are made on how CSC should address harassment going forward, such as utilizing human resources and establishing a complaint process that is free of conflict of interest and employs an external independent review body to oversee the process.