Help! My Job Sucks by Richard Lowe Jr

Author:Richard Lowe Jr
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Careers
Publisher: The Writing King

You Are Being Harassed

“Intimidation, harassment and violence have no place in a democracy.” – Mo Ibrahim

Unfortunately, even in these enlightened days, harassment takes place in the workforce. Quite often, it is much more subtle than in the past, but it exists nonetheless.

Legally, harassment is “unwelcome conduct that is based on race, color, religion, sex (including pregnancy), national origin, age (40 or older), disability, or genetic information. Harassment becomes unlawful where 1) enduring the offensive conduct becomes a condition of continued employment, or 2) the conduct is severe or pervasive enough to create a work environment that a reasonable person would consider intimidating, hostile, or abusive.” — The US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission

To be considered harassment under the law, the environment created by the harassment must be intimidating, hostile, or offensive to reasonable people. Minor offenses are isolated incidents that do not qualify legally as harassment.

Many books and courses deal with the legal aspects of harassment, and most companies have some training in one form or another. If you are being harassed, and it fits into the legal definition of harassment above, then you should work with your human resources department or get legal counsel to resolve the issue.

Of course, there are forms of harassment that do not fall under the law. A boss who is hostile would create an intimidating environment, for example. You might not be able to handle the situation using the legal system, but it is a harassing environment nonetheless.

In any case, the harassment needs to be dealt with, and you have the option of putting up with it, attempting to correct it, or moving to a new department or company.

In my experience, putting up with harassment is not a viable solution. The attacks, usually verbal, will continue unabated unless stopped. In fact, generally, if no attempt is made to put an end to the harassment, it will just get worse.

Sometimes, harassment begins when a new boss comes on board, replacing the old one, and wants to shake up the department to prove his value. He may think that he has a “honeymoon period” that has to show progress within that time limit. Often, the solution chosen is to encourage, using harassment, some employees to leave by their “own free will.”

Harassment that falls under the legal definition should always be pursued using the approved methods within your corporation or brought to the local, state, or federal bodies that govern such things. However, in other instances of hostile work environment, a conversation with the perpetrator can prove helpful.

These conversations can be difficult to confront, especially in the case of one’s manager. After all, your manager has a lot of power over you. In fact, “employment at will”, meaning an employee can be dismissed for any reason and without warning, is the law in most states in the United States. Thus, it’s possible that a conversation can escalate into a firing situation.

Every manager I’ve ever worked with has welcomed a reasonable conversation about any subject, even those that involve creating a hostile work environment.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.