As the story goes, Steven Slater was at the end of a flight. The normal announcement about staying seated while the plane is still taxiing had been made and, as usual, a number of passengers were taking absolutely no notice at all. It appears Steven asked a passenger to remain seated while the plane was moving and was verbally abused. It may even be that as he moved forward to talk to the passenger, a piece of luggage fell out of the luggage compartment they had opened and hit him in the face.

This led to, what can only be described as one of the most spectacular ways to resign from a job ever. Steven’s actions were to activate the inflatable emergency chute and grab two beers from the galley. Just before he launched himself down the ramp towards freedom he grabbed the PA and is reported to have said “to the passenger who just called me a motherf*****, F*** you. I’ve been in this business [20] years and I’ve had it.”

Now we can spend endless amounts of time psychoanalysing this gentlemen or we can get to the facts. These are the facts. Airline staff are, in general, paid relatively low wages. The job is nowhere near as glamorous as it was in the 1960s and 1970s, in fact it is, in reality a waitressing job in the air. It is a waitressing job which comes with rather more health and safety responsibility but the fact is these people simply get treated as waiters and waitresses. Additionally there are sections of society these days that feel that rules do not apply to them. For them, should a company breach the mental or moral contract, they feel they have, they are entitled to be rude, insensitive,e and aggressive.

We should not ignore the plight of the passenger either. They are increasingly packed, cattle like, onto planes. They are made to jump through ever increasing amounts of security before getting to the plane, whilst worrying that they may miss their flight. For a huge number of them this happens as they are about to embark on their only holiday that year, and they are feeling tired and stressed from a year at work.

All the ingredients for anger are there and in Beating Anger Derby we see them all the time.

The thing is, we (that is all of us) see this happening everywhere. Today it is an airline steward. Tomorrow it may be a traffic warden writing out their resignation letter in sticky tickets on the windscreen of someone who has abused them for the last time. Equally it could be one of many housing association workers abused by their tenants, an employee of a bank or one of the hundreds of thousands of call centre workers employed in this country. What we cannot get away from is that, for simply doing their job, and being in the wrong place at the wrong time, these people get it in the neck from customers. It is becoming a health and safety issue for employers as they are required to take care and account of their employees’ well being.

Here in Beating Anger Derby we have set our stall out to put a stop to this malaise. We are currently working with three housing associations. We design and deliver training that enables their staff to understand the sources of the anger directed at them. They also learn to identify aggression as it builds and learn techniques for prevention. Where we really add value is that the staff feel able to leave the anger they have had directed at them, behind when they go home. They will not perpetuate the cycle of anger that leads to the events described above.

My view is that I cannot reach the whole of the public at large and educate them to behave in a decent way when people are trying to do their jobs. What I can do is help those in really challenging jobs deal with the anger and rage that comes their way. If I had been working with Steven Slater or JetBlue Airways, I am convinced, this would not have happened.

Photo credits

federico stevanin FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Abi Skipp