Human Resource Management Assignment: Case Study Analysis of Sexual Harassment

Question

Task: Human Resource Management Assignment Case Scenario:
A salesperson wonders how to respond to a colleague's joke
JACKSON
If Jackson Pierce was honest with himself, he hadn't been a shoo-in for the leadership program. He was definitely a high performer, but since salespeople were often evaluated on numbers, it was obvious to everyone that he wasn't in the top tier. Still, he was excited when his boss told him that he'd be part of the 2019 cohort of high potentials who were expected to go far at Coltra, a global beverage company.

When he got to the conference room where the group was to participate in a kickoff conference call with the CEO, Jackson was happy to see Rainer Wolfson. Rainer was good at everything he did -- whether it was selling the company's least popular beverage line or just making people feel welcome. He'd transferred to the Houston office from Coltra's Munich outpost three years earlier.

"I was hoping you'd be here," Rainer said.
Jackson hit "Mute" on the speakerphone and started to joke around with his colleague. "How are we going to manage this program on top of everything else we've got going on?" he said. "I can barely answer all my emails these days."

"We'll manage, don't you think?" Rainer said sincerely. "It sounds like a cool opportunity."
"Of course it is. It just seems the better you are, the more work they give you. Do you know how they chose people for this anyway?" Nearly 50 salespeople from offices around the world had been selected for the program, and although the criteria weren't explicit,1 Jackson assumed that sales numbers were a big factor. "It makes sense that you're here, but a lot of us didn't hit our targets last quarter."

"Those targets were crazy, though," Rainer said reassuringly. "I don't know how they set them, but barely anyone made them." "You did."

Rainer smiled uncomfortably
"And Ying did," Jackson said. "She's never missed -- not a single quarter." Rainer nodded. "She did this program last year."

"Who else are we waiting for?"
"Teaira," Rainer said.
"Right -- she's been crushing it recently," Jackson said, a little ruefully. His numbers hadn't been as good.

"Maybe they want to get you into leadership because you're not good at sales," Rainer said, giving him a friendly punch on the shoulder. Jackson laughed. "If that's true, why did you get picked? They'd be better off keeping you in sales forever."

"It must've been my good looks," Rainer said.
"Yeah, right." Just then Teaira came in, looking at the clock. The call was set to start any minute.
"Hey," Rainer said, leaning in to take the Polycom off mute. "I guess you're here because of your good looks, too, Teaira." Jackson had said it jokingly, but the other two didn't smile.s

RAINER
Rainer immediately felt a knot in his stomach. He could see the expression on Teaira's face, and she wasn't happy. Maybe it was more a look of confusion than anything else, but then again, maybe it wasn't. She opened her mouth as if she was about to say something and then stopped. The three of them shifted in their seats as Peter Mackenzie, their CEO,3 started his introduction.

Rainer loved Coltra. Like many others on the sales team, he'd joined the company right out of university and had been there ever since, except for a brief stint to get his MBA at ESMT Berlin. He believed in the company's fruit- and seltzer-based products and loved the culture. Sure, he had complaints about certain decisions the senior leaders made, but ultimately he knew he didn't want to work anywhere else. The company had treated him well and given him the opportunity to live overseas for a few years. Houston wouldn't have been his first choice, but it had the strongest sales team of any of the U.S. offices, so the move was a no-brainer.

In the conference room, he was having trouble listening. He kept looking back and forth between Teaira and Jackson, trying to figure out what had just happened. But words kept popping into his head: "Harassment." "Me too." "Bystander."

Was that what just happened here? he wondered. Was that harassment?
Peter's voice on the Polycom took him back to an all-hands meeting a year earlier, when the CEO had announced the company's zero-tolerance policy toward sexual misconduct and charged everyone with making Coltra a safe place to work.4 All the employees had gone through sexual harassment training. Lots of people had grumbled about it, but Rainer had taken it seriously. In fact, it had opened his eyes to what it must be like to be a woman at Coltra -- or in any work environment. And he'd carefully read several of the studies that the facilitators had handed out about what held women back from promotions in corporate environments.5 Still, gender parity was pretty decent throughout most of the company. And for several years in a row the top salesperson had been a woman: Ying. Surely Teaira must feel comfortable here, even if guys like Jackson sometimes, without realizing it, said stupid things.

Rainer glanced over at Teaira and saw that she was looking down at the table, frowning. Was she upset? Maybe Jackson's comment was exactly the kind of thing that would make a woman feel undermined and as if she didn't belong. His confusion turned to anger. Why had Jackson put him in this position?

The call was scheduled to end at 10:00, but it didn't wrap up until after 10:15. Jackson scurried out of the room, saying he was late to another meeting. Rainer followed Teaira out and asked if she was OK. He assumed she'd know what he was alluding to, but she just said, "I'm swamped. This program sounds great, but it's a lot of extra work."

Rainer tried to reassure her: "I guess it will pay off in the long term for our careers."

Teaira smiled weakly.
He believed what he'd just said. But was it true for Teaira, too?

SUZANNE
Suzanne Bibb was surprised to see Rainer Wolfson's name in her in-box. He was one of those employees who rarely asked for anything special and never caused trouble -- just got promotions and raises and commendations. She told him to come by whenever he wanted, and he did, later that afternoon. Right away it was clear that Rainer was upset.

"I wasn't going to say anything, but I called a friend of mine back in Berlin, and she encouraged me to make a report to HR," he said. "A report?" Suzanne asked.

Rainer relayed what had happened between Jackson and Teaira. He said that although he knew Jackson had been joking around, continuing some lighthearted ribbing Rainer himself had started, he didn't want to stand by if Teaira had somehow been offended.

Suzanne couldn't say that she was surprised. She'd heard comments before about Jackson's shooting off his mouth and rubbing people the wrong way. But this was different. Insinuating that a woman was selected for a leadership program because of her looks rather than her achievements fell under what the company had labeled "highly offensive" on the spectrum of sexual misconduct. And although it wasn't "evident misconduct," or even "egregious," she knew she had to take it seriously.

She asked Rainer a few follow-up questions and thanked him for coming. "So what happens now?" he asked.

Suzanne explained the company process for handling such accusations. HR had seen an uptick in these kinds of complaints since #MeToo exploded,6 so she was well versed in the protocol. She and her team had spent a lot of time explaining and re-explaining it, and many of the things brought to their attention weren't actionable offenses. Still, she always told herself, it was better than having people stay silent. She told Rainer that she would talk with Teaira and then with Jackson, and their managers would need to be notified.

"Will you tell everyone?
I reported it?" he asked.<

"Normally we let the employee filing the complaint decide whether to disclose that he or she was involved, but since you were the only other person there, it will be obvious to Teaira that it was you."

"Right," he said. "At first I told myself that it was a small comment and Jackson probably meant no harm. But when I explained it to my friend, it sounded worse. I just don't want things to get blown out of proportion."7 "None of us want that," Suzanne said. But she worried that was exactly what might happen.

TEAIRA
When she listened to the voice-mail, Teaira's first thought was: It's never good when HR calls you. Raises, promotions, new assignments -- all those come through your manager. Bad news comes from HR, especially on the phone.

She'd seen Suzanne Bibb's name on group emails, but she'd never spoken to her in person before. Suzanne cut right to the chase: "There's been a complaint." She explained that she had heard about Jackson's comment the day before.

Rainer, Teaira thought. She was annoyed. Why hadn't he let her fight her own battles? Why hadn't he said anything to her first? Then she remembered the concerned look on his face as they'd walked out of the conference room.

"It really wasn't a big deal," Teaira said instinctively, although as soon as she'd spoken, she questioned whether that was true. Jackson had been competing with her since his first day on the job. It wasn't anything she hadn't experienced before, at college or in her MBA program or in the office, but he cut her off in meetings and occasionally took credit for her ideas. She'd chalked it up to typical overly competitive male behavior, but she couldn't say that she trusted Jackson.

Still, it had been an easy thing to brush off. She'd seen Jackson later in the day, and he'd awkwardly tried to explain the comment, telling her it had been a meaningless joke, that she had come into the middle of a conversation, and that it would've made more sense if she'd heard what he and Rainer had been talking about before. It was a defense more than an apology, but she'd been on her way to another meeting, so she'd let it go.

"Maybe I should start by talking to Jackson and seeing if we can clear this up?" Teaira said.

"That's up to you," Suzanne replied. "But we take complaints like this seriously.8 And I urge you to do the same. Any comment about an employee's appearance that makes another person uncomfortable is problematic." "What if I do move forward with the complaint?" Teaira asked Suzanne. "Will Jackson get fired?"

"Until we've gathered more information, I can't say what the consequences might be. As you know, we have a zero-tolerance policy.9 I suspect some people will advocate firing him -- especially if you add your name to the complaint. But there are other, less harsh consequences for unprofessional behavior."

When Peter had announced the policy, Teaira had been proud that her company was taking a stand. Now, though, she wondered whether such a hard line was really a good thing. People were going to make mistakes, and certainly Jackson's comment, while maybe mean-spirited, wasn't a fireable offense. Or was it?

As she walked back to her desk, Teaira's frustration mounted. She thought about how few senior women Coltra had. The entire C-suite was men except for the chief HR officer. And only one board member was a woman. Were comments like Jackson's part of the problem? She felt she could handle this kind of joking -- but maybe some of her peers couldn't. And maybe Jackson's intention whether subconscious or not was to demean her. Then she remembered Rainer's finger on the mute button. Was it possible that others had heard what Jackson said? If so, why hadn't anyone else spoken up? And did she have a duty to call out that sort of behavior -- especially if others knew about it?

For this assignment you will be asked to read a case study and write an individual report. You will be required to source relevant academic sources as the contents of the report must be based on evidence from research findings.

Your assignment is to be compiled in ‘business report’ format and should address the following items (you can use keyword headings/sub-headings to address each item):

Define sexual harassment and outline what factors would be considered by an HR manager in determining whether the behaviour in this case study is sexual harassment.

Discuss the effects of sexual harassment on individuals and organisations in general.

Outline the actions that HR managers should take in the circumstances of the case study.
Describe the ways in which HR managers in organisations can prevent sexual harassment in general.

The assignment should reflect the principles of scholarly work and you must demonstrate that adequate research has been undertaken. The report must include reference to a minimum of six academic journal articles, in addition to other possible materials. Thus, the contents of the report must be based on evidence from research findings.

Answer

Introduction
The overall human resource management assignment will focus on the provided case study,where a salesperson wonders how to respond to a colleague’s jokes. In this case, there are three main characters Jackson, Rainer, and Teaira. Initially, the three individuals were to meet at a conference room in the office as Peter, CEO of the company, had arranged for a virtual meeting with them. Jackson entered the room where Rainer was already present there. As, they were having conversation with each other,Teairaenters the room. Based on the jokes they were making with each other, Jackson made a comment that was offensive to Teaira because he commented that she must have been chosen for leadership program just because of her good looks.

Therefore, in this assignment, there will be a discussion on sexual harassment and the factors that the HR manager would consider determining the case to be sexual harassment. Further, the paper will also discuss the effects of sexual harassment on individuals and organizations and will highlight the actions that HR managers should take in the unfavorable event in the case study. Lastly, the paper will discuss the various ways in which managers could prevent sexual harassment.

Sexual Harassments
Sexual harassment refers to a kind of aggravation that involves the employ of open as well as unspokensexual implications that includes the uncomfortable and unsuitableguarantee of recompenses in exchange for sexual favors(Bondestam and Lundqvist, 2020). Sexual harassment can also include actions that is verbal transgression to sexual mistreatment or stabbingAn individual can be sexually harassed verbally as well, which is often known as verbal sexual harassment. In a work environment, sexual harassment takes place repeatedly and continuously that include sexual nature, touching, etc. Verbal sexual harassment is harassment that involves any comments said aloud to anindividualopenly, close to them, or about them. It is also considered a serious concern as sexual harassment. The victim of sexual harassment is mostly women as it has been identified through various facts, researches, and findings. However, sexual harassment not only includes sexual nature always but can also consist ofunpleasantcommentsabout the person’s gender. Therefore, anyone harassing women or any individual regarding their appearance or body is said to be illegal and sexual harassment (Raihan, Islam, and Uddin, 2020).

However, in the case study, there has been direct verbal sexual harassment of Teaira, as Jackson said some offensive comment that directly attacked her appearance, which is not legal and is said to be sexual harassment in a way, as mentioned above. This is because it has also been identified that offensive comments said aloud as a joke can also appear as sexual harassment. Therefore, the factors that would be considered by the HR manager in the case study to determine that the circumstances are sexual harassment are as follows:

Inappropriate Jokes- The first and foremost factor that determines the case to be sexual harassment is inappropriate jokes. As said in the above section, any kind of jokes that leads to an uncomfortable situation for an individual is said to be sexual harassment. However, in this case, Jackson has made the same situation for Teaira by claiming that she was chosen for the leadership program because of her appearance or good looks. This comment indicates his intentions towards women, his disrespect towards women, his lack of manners and behaviors, and many more. Although Jackson said this aloud out of a joke, it has attacked her mind because of his comment as if she achieves her growth because of her good looks and not her hard works(Honnakatti, 2019).

Teasing-Jackson’s joke came out as offensive teasing, and as per the legal regulations, offensive teasing is also one of the major factors that could give rise to sexual harassment. Similarly, in this case, study, Jackson teased Teaira in such a way that she was directly attacked by his comment. As such, it can also be said that Jackson violated the company's policy and committed illegal means of harassment.

Assaulted her character-Thisfactor is also one of the major factors that the HR manager could consider to determine the case because Jackson also assaulted Teaira’s character by saying that she achieved the leadership position just because of her good looks or appearance. It meant that she was growing in this company not by working hard and putting her effort into her job, but just by flaunting her appearance(Shaw, Hegewisch, and Hess, 2018).

Effects of Sexual Harassments
Sexual harassment can cause lifetimedamage to the victimand can affect an individual as well as the organization adversely. Hence, the effects of Sexual Harassment are as follows:

Individuals
Fear-Sexual harassment can build a kind of fear and anxietywithin the victims because more than causing physical illness or pain, it causes mental disturbance and sickness. Sexual harassment occurring in any form can affect the mind of the victim in such a way that the overall scenario cannot easily be removed in their subconscious mind. This fear will disable the victim to grow personally as well as professionally.

Frustration- Frustration refers to the feeling of being upset or annoyed as a result of being unable to change or achieve something. It is the most common effect of sexual harassment on individuals, which can be harmful to some extent. This is because when the victim cannot take a particular scenario, comments, or offensive words,with which the victim was sexually assaulted, the victim will lose his or her temper, lose self-confidence, and losesleep, and many more.

Depression-Depression is a mood disorder that can influence an individual’s day-to-day life in an effective manner. Therefore, sexual harassment also causes depression to the victim because of the poor mental after being sexually assaulted. The comments, touch, sexual nature, behavior, etc., can affect the mind of an individual in such a way that it can lead to career instability, job dissatisfaction, and poor mental health.

Hypertension-Hypertension is the indication for high blood pressure, which results in rigorous complications of physical condition and augments the danger of heart disease, stroke, etc. It is also one of the most effective causes of sexual harassment(Funk, 2016).

Organization
Emotional and Physical Issues-There might be major issues in terms of emotional and physical in the organization. This will lead to a lack of trust and loyalty in the workplace, because of which there will be no teamwork. The organization will lose its reputation and goodwill that will also affect the profitability of the business.

Professional and Financial Problems-Sexual Harassment can also lead to chaos on theoccupational performance of the victim that will eventually decline the operational level of the firm. As such, in the organization, sexual harassment might lead to financial problems to a higher level because the victim will not be able to work properly, put their full efforts into their jobs, and they will unintentionally cause a partial loss in the company.

Decreased Company Productivity-When a place of work is contaminated with bias and aggravation, the entire company suffers. As such, the occurrence of sexual harassment can lead to decreased productivity in the organization. This is because harassment can also lead to higher employee turnover that will affect the productivity of the firm. There has been identification that declined level of productivity is more widespreadin the environment with elevatedcases of sexual harassment. As such, the employee tends to quit the job afterbeing sexually assaulted in the organization(Ali et al., 2015).

Actions to be taken by the HR managers in the case study
In the provided case study, it has been clear that sexual harassment has taken place, for which the HR manager must take some legal actions against the case as follows: Speak out against the harasser-It is one of the easiest and direct ways to deal with sexual harassment. As such, the HR manager in the case study should directly speak to Jackson and ask the intention behind making such an offensive comment to Teaira. This is important because by getting to the root cause of the case and addressing the provoker, the manager will be able to make the victim’s message loud and clear, which says the behavior in question is not acceptable. In general or in most cases, the verbal warning becomes enough to make the harasser stop. But, in this case, it has been found out that there are many complaints against Jackson as he has no control over his speech that creates a negative workplace environment.

Report the harassment to the appropriate people- Since Jackson's behavior and nature does not seem to end any time sooner, the HR manager must take the case to the next level where they can choose to take the incident to an appropriate supervisor or internal social caseworkers. The HR manager should ensure that she follows the exact policies that the company holds regarding sexual harassment to make sure that the case is handled with suitable timeliness and seriousness. As such, the company should be able to deal with the sexual harassment charge from then on, either by releasing or providing a counsel section to the harasser, segregating the harasser and the victim in the workplace, or by taking any other method.

File a charge-In order to make the workplace safe and secured, the HR manager of the case study mustfile a charge against Jackson. It is one of the major stepsto deal with sexual harassment in the place of work. In this process, the HR manager must contact the governing agency in the respective state that deals with the challenges in workplace discrimination and harassment. The legal authority where the HR manager can appeal is the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.With the help of this legal authority, the HR manager will be able to resolve the case and the claim with the employer in a proper way(McLaughlin, Uggen and Blackstone, 2012).

Take legal action-Taking legal action against sexual harassment is said to be one of the most dramatic steps to deal with such a case. As such, the HR manager of the case study must take legal action against Jackson. This type of action seems to be drastic, but in most cases, this step will be the only option to get justice. The HR manager must support the victim, Teaira, to file lawsuits against Jackson for the emotional as well as mental attack. It will help the victim to feel safe around the workplace and will make her feel that everyone is in her support that will not make her feel unwanted or lose her confidence level(Goldberg, Rawski, and Perry, 2018).

Recommendations to prevent sexual harassment
In today's era, the case ofsexual harassment has been rapidly growing in the corporate world that can be harmful to many businesses. Therefore, these cases should be prevented in order to ensure safety in the workplace. The steps that the HR manager must take to prevent sexual harassmentare as follows:

Understand the definition of Sexual Harassment- In most cases, companies do not consider the activities that include bad touch, inappropriate conduct of the harasser, unfavorable views as sexual harassment. However, every organization must know the varieties of sexual harassment. This could be one step towards the prevention of sexual harassment because when the staff and the employers know what sexual harassment is and what does it include, then the harasser will think once before committing such illegal activity. Hence, the companies should have proper knowledge about sexual harassment so that the victim can get justice(Shivakumar, 2020).

Incorporate training on harassment-Training on sexual harassment is the most effective step to prevent sexual harassment. The HR manager must make frequent and continuing training for workers and administrators mandatory. They must offer refresher training based on the requirements or annually. With proper training, the possible victims will be able to keep themselves safe to some extent. They will know where to go and what to say whenever they are in such an unfavorable situation. The training session must be conducted every year in order to keep safety in the workplace and to make the employees sure that they are safe in the workplace environment.

Implement a policy for sexual harassment in the workplace-In the organization, there must be an involvement of policy for sexual harassment in the company policy that will make sure that all the staff isrecognizable with it. The policy must incorporateunderstandablewhistle blowing and coverageof the measures. In case the company lacks a policy that includes sexual harassment, and then the staff must raise a voice and make them include the policy as soon as policy. Such policy is important to be implemented in the organization that will enable the companies to ensure safety within the workplace and will prevent sexual harassment cases to an extreme level.

Spread alertness- The most effectualtype of avoidanceis spreading alertness. People who are attentive about the harassing nature that can be understood as the chance of harassment will decrease and staffs will be more likely to become aware of any form of harassment. Such short awareness will assist the employees’ todetermine their insight of sexual harassment in the place of work. With this, the employees will learn to stay safe in the workplace environment on their own.

Clear Reporting Awareness in place-The entire workforce should feel at easewhile reporting any kind of actionsthat enables them and other staffs to feel uncomfortable. In addition to that, the HR manager also must be willing to take action against the harassment or some unfavorable events taking place in the workplace, considering such sexual harassment as a serious concern of the organization.

Conclusion
In conclusion, it can be said that there has been sexual harassment in the case study where Jackson has verbally harassed Teaira by saying some offensive comment out of a joke that directly attacked her appearance and looks in a wrong way. Therefore, the assignment has entirely evaluated the provided case study. In this evaluation, the paper has initiated the discussion of sexual harassment in which there has been an identification that sexual harassment can include anything that is commented out of jokes that could be offensive to another in an extreme way. Further, there has been an identification of the factors that could be considered by the HR manager in order to determine whether the case includes sexual harassment. In this section, it has been cleared that there is an involvement of sexual harassment in the case study. In further discussion, the assignment has discussed the effect of sexual harassment on both individuals as well as organizations. The assignment has then suggested what actions should the HR manager take, considering the unfavorable events that occurred in the case study. Lastly, the assignment has provided some valuable steps that the HR manager could use in order to prevent sexual harassment in a firm.

References
Ali, S.R.O., Zakaria, Z., MohdZahari, A.S., Mohd Said, N.S. and Salleh, S.M. (2015). The Effects of Sexual Harassment in Workplace: Experience of Employees in Hospitality Industry in Terengganu, Malaysia. Mediterranean Journal of Social Sciences. [online] Available at: http://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/a715/9afd3ea7e80de3eded6c111403aae854b90c.pdf [Accessed 1 Jun. 2021].

Bondestam, F. and Lundqvist, M. (2020).Sexual harassment in higher education – a systematic review.European Journal of Higher Education, 10(4), pp.1–23. Funk, C. (2016). Effects of Sexual Harassment in the Workplace. [online] 360training. Available at: https://www.360training.com/blog/effects-of-workplace-sexual-harassment [Accessed 1 Jun. 2021].

Goldberg, C.B., Rawski, S.L. and Perry, E.L. (2018).The direct and indirect effects of organizational tolerance for sexual harassment on the effectiveness of sexual harassment investigation training for HR managers.Human Resource Development Quarterly, 30(1), pp.81–100

Honnakatti, V. (2019). SEXUAL HARASSMENT AT WORKPLACE: AN EXPLORATORY STUDY AT BELAGAVI. GLOBAL JOURNAL FOR RESEARCH ANALYSIS, pp.1–5.

McLaughlin, H., Uggen, C. and Blackstone, A. (2012).Sexual Harassment, Workplace Authority, and the Paradox of Power.American Sociological Review, 77(4), pp.625–647.

Raihan, T., Islam, T. and Uddin, Md.A. (2020). Sexual Harassment at Workplace: A Systematic Review of Literature. Business Perspective Review, 2(2), pp.1–14.

Shaw, E., Hegewisch, A. and Hess, C. (2018).Sexual Harassment and Assault at Work:

Understanding the Costs. [online] . Available at: https://iwpr.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/IWPR-sexual-harassment-brief_FINAL.pdf [Accessed 1 Jun. 2021].

Shivakumar (2020).Prevention of “Sexual Harassment” at the Workplace-Can Training Help? [online] ResearchGate. Available at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/339507834_Prevention_of_Sexual_Harassment_at_the_Workplace-Can_Training_Help [Accessed 1 Jun. 2021].