Labeling Roles & Expectations

Each person in a workplace has a specific job to do, and each person holds a specific role in the hierarchy of authority and decision-making for that particular workplace. Workers are expected to know how to address a supervisor, what tone of voice and body language to use when responding to customer requests, what kinds of conversations are appropriate in the work environment and the break room, and a host of other unwritten social “rules.” A worker who doesn’t understand and follow those rules may be at risk for losing his job. For some students, it is helpful to translate these unwritten rules into explicit rules, with clear examples for the kind of behavior that is expected in each social encounter. A student can then practice responding to a customer’s question or a supervisor’s comments with concrete responses that will help minimize conflict and maintain the student’s good standing in the workplace.