Let’s take a look at how serious the issue is with the following sexual harassment in the workplace statistics.
At some point during their life, 81% of women and 43% of men experience sexual harassment or assault. This is an alarming statistic for anyone to hear.
It’s practically impossible to avoid all potential sexual harassment situations because so many occur in the workplace. Just going about your daily life by showing up to work, you could still become a target.
Sometimes, these incidents occur if people don’t understand what qualifies as sexual harassment. In fact, one survey found that around 16% of people didn’t know what constitutes this illegal behavior at work. Another 32% of employees didn’t know that jokes could qualify as misconduct.
So what is sexual harassment in the first place? It can include:
People are more likely to be a target depending on their gender, the industry they work in, and their job positions. They may also notice more instances when working online since the harassers can hide behind a screen.
While these instances are frequent in the workplace, not everyone reports them. And even the incidents that do get reported don’t always get addressed properly. This has negative consequences for both the victims and their company.
Let’s take a look at how serious the issue is with the following sexual harassment in the workplace statistics.
This inappropriate behavior is already so common outside of the workplace. But it’s also the most common type of workplace harassment. A majority of people see it happen in their careers, or they become targets themselves. The method of offense can vary, and the number of incidents may be increasing as more charges get filed. Perhaps this is because there are still many organizations that don’t provide anti-harassment training.
Unsurprisingly, women are more often targets than men. Both men and women are primarily targeted by people of the opposite sex.
But some do experience harassment by people of the same gender. Race, gender identity, and sexual orientation can also influence if someone becomes a target at work.
via Medium
Each industry’s employees face different rates of harassment. It could be due to the nature of their work or the demographics that make up a majority of the field.
Someone’s job position can have an impact as well. People in higher positions are more often harassers, abusing their privilege of power.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, many people started working online. It might seem like instances of offensive behavior would decrease since people aren’t around each other as often. But the opposite happened. Since people weren’t face-to-face, it was easier to make inappropriate remarks in private. The pandemic also made it more challenging to make and respond to reports.
Reporting an instance of these inappropriate interactions should be one of the first ways to prevent more from happening. However, many people don’t make reports.
Some don’t know how or where to do this. Others believe that nothing will get done, possibly because they’ve seen that they don’t get investigated.
And even worse, some victims who make reports end up experiencing retaliation after doing so. This is a form of unlawful discrimination against someone for engaging in a protected activity, such as filing a charge of discrimination.
It could also include discrimination against someone who participated in an investigation of workplace misconduct. Facing backlash over filing a complaint will make people unlikely to report unlawful behavior at work.
Harassment has negative impacts on employees and companies. Victims are more likely to have mental health concerns after the fact.
This could lead them to take time off work or quit their job altogether. Doing so has major financial consequences for companies.
As of 2016, 98% of organizations had policies regarding sexual harassment. Yet even after five years, companies still face issues with this inappropriate behavior at work.
Just because there are policies in place doesn’t mean staff knows how to follow them. Training is important so these people know what qualifies as offensive behavior and how to report it. Since 36% don’t have this training, many people might not know that information.
But companies need to work on changing this so they don’t face negative costs. Addressing this kind of behavior before it can even happen helps improve the environment for employees. Everyone will know what actions or words are offensive, and people will trust that their concerns will get taken seriously.
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