New Harassment Training!

You’ve trained your employees on harassment, and they may be familiar with the mandate of Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which forbids discrimination based on a person’s race, color, religion, sex and national origin.

But are they aware that harassment can occur and wreak havoc even when these “protected categories” are not involved?

Bring the new face of harassment into sharper focus with the Harassment: A New Look training program.

Bullying, cyber bullying, sexting and discrimination of younger workers – these are not necessarily covered by Title VII, but they are the recent and pervasive manifestations of harassment and hostile environments. Alarming stories of workplace bullying, either face-to-face or online, are on the rise, and statistics from the Workplace Bullying Institute (WBI) indicate a frightening scenario:

• 3 percent of victims take it to court. ¹
• 37 percent of workers have been victims
• 72 percent of bullies are bosses
• 60 percent of bullies are men, 40 percent are women
• 57 percent of victims are women
• 71 percent of women bully other women
• 40 percent of victims never report bullying to employers

Unlike the conventional types of harassment, these recent forms can be much more devastating because they have a greater prevalence within organizations. Workplace bullying in itself is already “four times more common than harassment (based on illegal discrimination),” according to the WBI.

And the worst part? The WBI says that 62 percent of employers neglect the problem. Another study shows that in 71 percent of cases, employers even retaliated against the victims who reported the bullying, with 24 percent losing their jobs for doing so! 2

Harassment: A New Look will help you and your employees recognize and avoid these new forms of harassment. In this program, a diverse group of employees and their clients engage in an illuminating discussion, using their personal experiences to show concrete examples and the destructive impact to:

• Workplace bullying
• Intimidation at work
• Cyber-bullying
• Sexting
• Discrimination against younger employees by their older colleagues

Harassment A New Look features re-enactments of everyday scenarios to acquaint viewers with the issues and to help them avoid the challenges that can impede awareness and prevention. The program also reviews basic concepts—quid pro quo, the reasonable person standard, and the hostile work environment—and relates them to the more recent types of harassment.

We have come a long way since Title VII, but harassment continues to evolve and adapt to today’s technology. Managing its new manifestations is a pressing issue, and it’s critical that your harassment training addresses this head on. With Harassment: A New Look, your organization can help raise awareness by pro-actively educating employees about the devastation the new types of harassment can cause.

¹ Workplace Bullying Institute. 2007 United States Workplace Bullying Survey. (2010). Available from WorkplaceBullying.org 2007 Workplace Bullying Survey. All stats come from this document unless otherwise stated.

² Workplace Bullying Institute. Labor Day 2008 Surveys: How Employers & Co-Workers Respond To Workplace Bullying. (2008). Available from Available from WorkplaceBullying.org Labor Day 2008 Surveys . All stats come from this document unless otherwise stated.

This program is part of the A New Look Harassment Training Series