5 Ways HR Help Stop Sexual Harassment In The Workplace


The MeToo movement has shone a light on the prevalence of Sexual harassment of women at workplace in modern life.
We are moving past stereo types and victim-blaming and becoming not just active about punishing sexual harassment after it happens, but proactively creating a safe working environment that empowers employees instead of isolates them. Here are some useful tips for fostering a healthy, safe workplace.

1. Go Beyond Training

Training has to be seen as being helpful, not a punishment. Recently, Starbucks closed every single location in the middle of the day to have a class on cultural sensitivity. While it is admirable that a company will take steps to correct a misdeed, it would have been even better had there been an ongoing conversation about this topic, rather than an emergency shut-down of all stores. The definition of Sexual harassment in the workplace is something that should have an ongoing discussion; the definition, according to the federal government, can include can include “sexual harassment” or unwelcome sexual advances, requests for sexual favours, and other verbal or physical harassment of a sexual nature.”

2. Have No Tolerance For “What aboutism”

What aboutism is a new word to describe an age-old phenomenon: when someone is accused of doing something wrong, he or she says “What about…” and lists something someone else has done wrong. This can, of course, be a person in the past or in the present, famous or personal, in politics, business, or entertainment. Push back against it by focusing on the matter and instance at hand.

3. Have No Tolerance For Harassment, And Even Less For Retaliation

Actress Anna Faris once related a story on her podcast, “Unqualified,” of how, on a movie set, a member of the crew slapped her behind so hard everyone on the set could hear it. She felt pressured to shrug it off, knowing that the hundreds of actors and crew on set would lose work should the production grind to a halt to run a formal investigation. Many in the workplace face some version of this question: Is it worth it?

4. Make It Easy To Report Harassment

Ensure that your company has multiple methods of reporting sexual harassment, including anonymous reporting. Be sure that whatever these avenues are, they should be well-known to the employees. For example, include these methods on your employee handbook, on your web site, and on your local intranet.

5. Be Proactive

HR departments are in a unique position when it comes to sexual harassment: it’s their job to ask how employees are doing. In any kind of performance review, it’s also the employee’s chance to give feedback on the company. Although ideally an employee would feel empowered to go to HR at any time, victims often feel pressure to downplay an incident, particularly if it’s less of an overt gesture, and more implied–an example being playing suggestive music that makes an employee uncomfortable. Part of HR’s responsibility is to ask about any of these smaller incidents to see if they, knowing a more complete picture than any one employee, notice troubling patterns so they can step in before it gets worse.

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