Verbal Sexual Harassment

The workplace should be a harassment free zone where everyone can work in a safe and comfortable environment. The productivity of your employees will remain high and it’s just the right thing to do.

Nowadays, verbal sexual harassment cases are common in the workplace. Therefore, everyone is aware of the severity of sexual harassment, especially in the working environment. Despite strict rules and regulations, sexual harassment incidents can occur in the workplace. As a result, complaints are made and cases are filed against the harasser. Verbal sexual harassment effects the productively of the employees. As a result, they fail to work at their full capacity.

Verbal sexual harassment consists of many actions, for example, imitation of the voice of a male or female in a derogatory way, catcalling or whistling, crude remarks or jokes, speaking in a homosexual voice and so on. In a work environment, both men and women can commit such actions that can offend another employee. The other employee has a right to file a claim against the harassers.

Given below are a few effective ways to prevent such behaviors and reduce sexual harassment complaints. As a manager, you can implement these techniques in order to prevent the employees from committing verbal sexual harassment. The thing is that you should be serious about eliminating such behaviors from the minds of the harassers.

First of all, you should educate the employees and ask them to call their co-workers by their real name, title or a non-sexual term. Often, employees call their colleagues by their nick names. Sometimes, they call others by sexual terms which offends the other employees.

If you happen to hear a sexual story or joke about a male or female in the workplace, do not just smile. Instead, ask the employee to avoid telling such jokes or stories. In a workplace, let everyone know that such things are not acceptable.

You should speak in a normal tone all the time, so that others can also do the same. This will leave a positive impact on your employees. Gradually, they will start behaving normal with their co-workers. If you see someone imitating another male or female in a sexual way, take immediate actions and let them know that they should pay respect to others and should not act this way.

Leading by example is a good idea, so you should let your employees know that not any kind of sexual behavior or disrespect will be tolerated in the workplace. Everyone should follow the rules and regulations of the workplace at any cost. This will definitely help prevent verbal sexual harassment incidents.

A workplace should be a comfortable environment for employees. There should be no harassment or anything like that. By eliminating all types of verbal harassment, you can reduce the number of complaints and lawsuits against the harassing individuals. Employees working in a safe environment have higher productively that those working in an environment teaming with sexual harassers.