Harassment At Workplace Is Not Gender-Specific

by Anurag T. IT Consultant

In a recent article, I came across two female employees who were pulled up for low performance by their male Superintendent. This Senior attempted to discipline the girls by spanking them with a rod. The girls were brave enough to report the same to their complaints committee, which took legal action against the Senior. Filing a complaint is formidable; employees are scared about it because it arouses specific questions like Whether one can stay. Or will they be asked to leave the organization? Is it going to stop or slow down their growth? Because of this hesitation, employees chose to stay quiet or quit and resign from their designation.

Organizations, especially MNCs, often observed, don't have anyone to acknowledge harassment concerns. The leaders of ruthless seniors are not at all engaged with their team. Therefore, the team has no one to report the sexual or mental harassment.

In an interview with an employee at an MNC. He said when he tried discussing with his Manager about the workload and pressure his team was going through. The Manager said, 'Management told us to manage on our own.' Harassment is not gender-specific.

Since he has no senior leadership to go to, he tried discussing this with his Manager again. The Manager promised he would be promoted if one of his clients met success. Instilling greed in someone's mind is an old technique to get your work done. That's the advantage of power. He waited for four quarters but no promotion, and then finally, he was asked to shift to another department or leave. He was given false hopes of raising his expectation. He lost his hope and desire to work when he did not get what he wanted. He tried communicating with HR, but he could locate a department for Sexual Harassment and no counselor for Mental Harassment. In the end, he quit the job.

Men and Women are both harassed. There have been fewer complaints in recent years, but during counseling, people opened up about their feeling in an isolated room.

Smita Bharti, executive director of Sakshi, a non-profit organization working on gender and sexual rights, says the understanding and awareness of what falls within the ambit of sexual harassment at the workplace is amorphous, which is probably the reason for the decline in cases during the pandemic.

In a discussion with the Founder of Shashi Sales, he mentioned creating a safe and friendly environment. He promised to keep the work-life balance and provide easy access to report an issue to his employees.

Harassment can happen in the meeting, calls, WhatsApp, and chats. Using terms like baby and sweetie in the office is also harassment if reported. Being cheesy at the office, and Seniors suggesting wearing hot dresses at the office, talking about something personal irrelevant to office space is harassment. We need to be careful and know when to take a step back. Job is not more important than your respect. Report to leadership and take action asap before it's too late.