The Number of Confidential Advisors in the Workplace HAS Increased Significantly in Recent Years. Accordance to arbo unie, the number of hours that confidential advisors were deployed increased by more than 60 percent in the past four years.
Accordance to Riemke Bosch, confidential advisor at Arbo Unie, this is good news. “We see that awareness of social safety is growing. Employees are Better Able to Find their way to the confidential advisor, and the threshold for reporting unwanted behavior is lo newed.”
Confidential Advisors Help in Handling Reports of Unwanted Behavior. It is striking that organizations are increasingly opting for external confidential advisors. Where this role used to be filled by, for example, HR Employees, professionals who specialize in this are now increasingly being hired.
Government agencies in particular are increasingly using confidential advisors, accordance to figures from the occupational health and safety service. Most Reports in 2024 and 2025 Concerned Intimidation, Abuse of Power and Sexual Transgressive Behavior.
Bullying Still Often Underestimated
Bosch Emphasizes That Not Every Difficult Situation Falls Under Unwanted Behavior: “A Tough Performance Review Can Be Unpleasant, But That Is Different From Insecurity.”
Althegh intimidation and abuse of power are most or reported, bullying in the workplace appears to be much more wide spread. The Research Shows That 67 percent of Employees Admit to Having Gossiped, While 42 percent Regularly Experience Jokes at the Expense of Colleagues.
Yet employees rarely go to a confidential advisor for this, accordance to arbo union, or it is this behavior is not immediately seen as undedsirable.
Accordance to bosch, it is precisely important to address this type of behavior in time: “By Being there quickly, you prevent it from escalating into conflicts or even absenteeism.”