Introducing DOT Supervisors to the Reasonable Suspicion Training Program for Drug and Alcohol Abuse in the Workplace

Most DOT drug and alcohol awareness training programs begin with a quick dive into the drugs of abuse, their signs and symptoms, and information required by the DOT compliance mandate, but I suggest you create an introduction for your supervisors before diving in to the required content. There are a few good reasons why. Train DOT supervisors here.

Believe It! You won't easily find drug addicts!

Beyond introducing the time frame and other administrative or logistics information of your course, a key point must be to explain to supervisors that the goal of training is not to educate them about diagnosis of drug and alcohol abuse or addictive disease.

In fact, telling DOT supervisors directly that should not use the information they are about to hear for that purpose helps ensure that big problems down the road do not occur.

This message to supervisors no only reduces liability and a completely inappropriate role for any supervisor, but it also helps prevent employee manipulation and total frustration by the supervisor who will never---ever---win the diagnosis game. Most of us run our lives as “junior psychiatrists”

Employees with drug and alcohol use problems or drug addicts, which amount principally to the same thing, are experts at having discussions about their use, abuse, level of consumption, why they are not addicts, who is an addict, what is an addict, and none of these things include them.

No one wins arguments with addicts to the extent that they are convinced to enter treatment. A lot more is needed than intellectual persuasion. Unfortunately, this argument is usually won with leverage of fear associated with the certainty of being fired if the employee does not accept treatment.

Many people believe, and of course this includes supervisors, that no employee entering treatment will ever get well unless they really want to enter treatment and really want to quit. This is a myth. The truth is that no addict “accepts help” until after treatment begins because education is 95% of any addiction treatment program – designed to motivate the patient to self-diagnose where before treatment, just the opposite applies. The patient before treatment works overtime to compare out of the illness and convince him- or herself that the disease does not affect themselves.

Without the myths and misconceptions dispelled, family, friends, coworkers, and supervisors will take the leap to motivate them into saying “yes, I need help and want to quit.” This approach is for the most part, complete folly. True, employees do experience these completely self-generated desires to enter treatment, but it is usually only associated with crisis or a close call.

When training supervisors, provide them with information necessary to increase awareness about troubled employee behaviors. We are not talking about substance abuse signs and symptoms. We are talking here about behaviors that are purely associated with troubled employees like absenteeism, disappearing on the job, conflicts, late to work, complaints of feeling ill, leaving early from work, etc. Here’s why: Few drug addicted or alcoholic employees will ever be spotted directly by intoxication. This was well understood in the 1970’s when the Occupational Alcoholism movement took hold. More addicts were found via job performance than “drunk on the job.” In fact, many books were written about this phenomenon. And, in fact an entire association was formed around this reality – the Labor Management Journal on Alcoholism, the Association of Labor, Management, and Administrators on Alcoholism, and others. 

Since supervisors monitor performance, they can ideally be part of an early warning system for spotting performance problems that could be due alcohol or drug use.

Include the following information within your reasonable suspicion training program: Information about the disease concept of alcoholism and drug addiction; tolerance and cross tolerance; understanding loss of control, denial, avoiding armchair diagnosing, stopping enabling; principles of constructive confrontation.

DOT Training Essentials Beyond Drug Abuse What Other DOT Training Ideas to Consider

Most supervisors have misinformation about alcoholism and drug addiction.  This misinformation gets in the way of effectively responding to troubled employees, who can easily explain away and postpone confrontation as a result of their increasingly, well-practiced defensive mechanisms. Without training and a set of guiding principles for managing troubled employees with alcohol and drug problems that include non-substance use performance issues, supervisors are unwittingly outmatched.

Purchase PowerPoint, DVD, Video, or Web course for Reasonable Suspicion Training for the DOT.