Harassment?

Once again, there are ugly harassment claims happening in the news. Not just small companies, but some large ones like United Airlines and Piggly-Wiggly! How is this happening? Companies with large HR staffs and training in place should not have these issues, but they do.

Let's look at what has to happen before you can be sued:

1.   One of your employee has a manager or someone else they work with do something that makes them uncomfortable.

2.   That employee has to come forward with a complaint to their management or HR.

3.   If to their manager, that manager must then take steps, including going to HR, to stop the behavior.

4.   If the manager is at fault, then HR has to take steps to remove the manager from that position.

5.   The employee feels nothing is being done, so they go to the EEOC to file a suit (it can all be done online now).

6.   You get a letter from the EEOC. Game over.

While it could just be an employee mad at their manager, HR still needs to investigate to make sure. If what the employee says is correct, they have to take action to make sure it stops.

In all cases where the EEOC does either take the case or issue a Right to Sue to the individual, someone has dropped the ball. If your employee says either of these two things:

1.   I was afraid to report it because I’ve seen others fired, or;

2.   I didn’t know how or where to report it

You can just ask the EEOC how big a check you need to write when you get the letter. Why? Because the EEOC is very specific on what companies are supposed to do. One is to provide a safe place, free of retaliation, for employees to report anything; and two, your policy manual and training should be specific in telling employees how to report something that makes them uncomfortable. They should also be told what harassment is.

In a couple of recent cases, when asked why they didn’t report it, employees told me they were afraid to say anything. This is more common in small companies, but apparently, some of the larger companies have this issue, too!

In another case, I interviewed an employee during an investigation that another employee had brought up. During this interview, I found that this employee had also been subjected to harassment. When asked why she didn’t report it, she said she didn’t know that was harassment. (Harassment isn’t just sexual).

Small companies in particular have these problems. They usually have small HR departments who are up to their eyeballs in handling the day to day responsibilities of their job (payroll, benefits, etc.). Their employees view them as a direct line to the executives, so they don’t trust them. That’s why companies like mine exist. To give smaller companies a third party an employee or manager can call and not be afraid of retaliation. How small is small? I’ve worked with companies that have several hundred employees, yet have a one or two person HR department.

Small companies… get your house in order or you can lose everything. Big companies… get your HR in order or you’ll lose millions in class action lawsuits.