The ‘Everything Works in Theory’ Problem
This post is about conflict management | personal safety | dynamis training. We met a training participant some years ago who described how she expected to use her Lone Worker Safety Device:
“Well first, I would hopefully have it ready if I thought anything bad was going to happen. I mean, I am supposed to have it in my hand already and be ready to press the button. Actually, I think I need to pull a pin out of my device, to activate it. Anyway, hopefully I would have it ready, and then if I could activate it, well that’s when the loud noise of the siren would hopefully distract the bad-guy long enough for me to get away from the dangerous situation.”
The room went silent for a moment, and a lot of lightbulbs went off over people’s heads. Crikey, our attendees thought — there’s an awful lot of “hopefully” going on in that plan.
For years we have seen tremendous commercial innovation in building a better Lone Worker Safety Device. We have witnessed the evolution from pressurised gas-based personal alarms — the kind that sound like mini car-horns — all the way through to today’s more technologically complex electronic sirens. And now we have sophisticated communications technology and computerised tracking systems for lone workers.
💡 The core problem: As Lt. Col. Dave Grossman describes it, we all share a “universal human phobia” of intense interpersonal conflict. When faced with sudden, explosive confrontations, the vast majority of us experience phobic-level responses in our physiology and psychology — the very situations in which these devices are expected to work.
Three Critical Questions
The key questions every organisation should be asking about their lone worker safety devices are refreshingly simple:
- How easily can you access your device under high stress?
- When you have accessed it, how easily can you activate it?
- When you have activated it — what happens next?
Now, for the avoidance of doubt: our training team is positively inclined towards the Lone Worker Safety Device. But its relevance and appropriateness in different circumstances needs to be contextualised and made clear to the people who are going to use them.
The Physics of Danger — Proximity and Timing
Accessing any type of safety device — whether a personal alarm, a mobile phone, a radio, or a panic button — requires several elementary factors to be working in the operator’s favour.
Alertness is the first. It’s embodied by the staff member, informed by the levels of information sharing and recording in place within their team, their organisation, and their sector. Crucially, it’s also informed by their training in recognising danger signs. Your intuition will tell you when you need to activate the device — but your intuition only works if you are paying attention.
The next two factors — Proximity and Timing — are mainly influenced by the attacker. The ferocity and intensity of their actions will determine, to a large extent, the success of anything the device operator tries to do.
The Reactionary Gap — 7 Yards in 1.5 Seconds
In the most dangerous incidents, a highly aroused or motivated attacker can move with such quickness and ferocity — and at such close proximity — that the worker’s challenge in accessing a device becomes enormous. Lone Workers, especially those for whom the risks of physical violence are greater, typically work in close quarters with their service users. Consider the size of an average living room, bedroom, or hallway for a moment.
How quickly can an attacker cover the distance between themselves and the worker they are with — and deliver a blow? How much time might a worker need to recognise they are under attack? How quickly can they make the decision to activate their device, and then finally execute the motor programme for moving their hands towards it?
These questions point to the Reaction Time problem — well studied in sports science where performance under stress is so important — and arguably under-utilised in assessing how a Lone Worker Safety Device is used in real, live situations.
The “reactionary gap” theory, pioneered by police trainers in the USA, asked two simple questions:
- “How long does it take to react to a fast-moving threat?”
- “When is an assailant too close to allow a person to reach for a safety device or weapon in time?”
Following extensive experimentation — typically with live scenario replication using role-players — one key finding consistently appeared.
⚠️ The reactionary gap: A motivated attacker can cover a distance of 7 yards in 1.5 seconds.
A motivated attacker can cover a distance of 7 yards in 1.5 seconds.
Acknowledging this standard, it is reasonable to ask: what can a device-equipped Lone Worker realistically be expected to do in that space of time? Even considering the highly prepared worker — who has the device in their hand, not in their jacket or handbag, at the outset of the encounter — what can be achieved with a device in that tiny interval?
When Devices Fail — Lessons from the Front Line
One of our training and consulting projects involved working with client staff in the Financial Services sector, who told us many stories of their experiences with aggression and violence:
- One man routinely left his Lone Worker Safety Device in his car when visiting clients — before being locked in a house for an afternoon with an agitated client.
- One woman had her device swatted from her hand before she could place her distress call.
- One man was hit from behind with a baseball bat before he even knew his client was angry.
- One female lone worker — Mary Merry — was dead on her client’s floor before her distraught husband began calling her phone in vain.
The Mary Merry Case
Mary Merry lost her life one winter’s night in 1999 when she was attacked by one of her customers as she collected debts on a notorious housing estate in Cambridge. She had worked part-time as an “insurance collection agent” for Provident Personal Credit Ltd in Cambridge for three years.
Mrs Merry made weekly calls on clients in their homes to collect repayments. Robert Norton, 37, was one debtor over whom she had expressed grave concerns. He paid her £12 a week to cover a £400 loan, but she often felt uncomfortable in his company. On at least half a dozen occasions, she had felt vulnerable enough to take her brother along for support. When Norton saw her brother accompanying her, he would not let the pair into the house.
Mrs Merry had told her husband that Norton would sometimes lock her in his house or stand between her and the doorway.
On the fateful night, Norton — who had been sexually fantasising about Mrs Merry — attacked her with two knives and a pair of scissors. When she did not return from her rounds, her husband rang her mobile phone. Three times Norton answered it but said nothing. When it rang a fourth time, he destroyed it by stamping on it.
Norton admitted killing her but claimed manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility, saying he had heard voices telling him to attack her.
— BBC News, Saturday 16 June, 2001: “The dangers of working alone”
The Bottom Line
Our key question about accessing your personal safety device is this: when you are in danger and need to deal with an imminent risk — what is happening while you are deciding to use, looking for, or reaching for your device?
💡 Key takeaway: While you are concentrating on the device, your attacker is still concentrating on you.
While you are concentrating on the device, your attacker is still concentrating on you.
No device replaces situational awareness, appropriate training, and a clear understanding of the realities of violent confrontations. The best safety tool is the one you never have to reach for — because your preparation, positioning, and awareness kept you out of harm’s way in the first place.
Conflict Management | Personal Safety | Dynamis Training: About the Author
Gerard O’Dea is a professional violence-management trainer and consultant who has been active in personal safety training since 2006. He regularly delivers training to local authority, housing organisation and other community-based staff teams who work with sometimes difficult, distressed or dangerous members of the public.
His approach to lone-worker training is pragmatic, functional and based on a keen analysis of the issues in the real world of community working. Gerard published “Lone Worker Personal Safety: A Guidebook for Health and Social Care Staff” (on Amazon in Paperback and on Kindle) in 2014.
For more information please visit: www.dynamis.training/lone-worker-personal-safety/
This guide on conflict management | personal safety | dynamis training is part of our ongoing work with schools and academies.