In our Sexual Harassment Awareness training seminars your employees will learn and apply the important skills of handling sexual harassment issues and complaints. This hands on workshop thoroughly addresses the elements of how to prevent unacceptable behavior. The class includes a detailed overview of what sexual harassment is, explains legal definitions, discusses sexual harassment prevention, and shows how to handle sexual harassment complaints and maintain a positive work environment.

For more information about individual sexual harassment training courses please complete this form.  Once the form is received one of our consultants will provide you with a confidential proposal that will include a detailed description of the training seminar and the costs for conducting it. 

Sexual Harassment Training: Sexual Harassment Training FAQ

Doesn’t sexual harassment have to involve sexual advances or other conduct that is sexual in nature?

No. The 1980 EEOC Guidelines on Sexual Harassment do suggest that conduct constituting sexual harassment must be “conduct of a sexual nature,” but it is just as wrong and just as unlawful to harass people with gender-based conduct of a nonsexual nature. Consider, for example, a man and a woman each holding the same kind of job in an organization. If their supervisor gives demeaning and inappropriate assignments (such as serving coffee, picking up dry cleaning, emptying a waste basket) to the woman, but not to the man, because of the woman’s gender, that conduct, if sufficiently severe or pervasive, could amount to harassment on the basis of sex even thought eh assignments are not sexual in nature but whether it was based on the victim’s gender.

Isn’t sexual harassment limited to situations where supervisors make sexual demands on subordinates?

No. Sexual power plays by supervisors constitute the most widely publicized and easily understood form of sexual harassment. But harassment also occurs when supervisors, so-workers, or even non-employees create a hostile environment through unwelcome sexual advances or demeaning gender-based conduct. There have even been cases where a subordinate has sexually harassed a supervisor.

Regarding harassment by non-employees (clients, customers, vendors, consultants, independent contractors, and the like), the employer’s ability to police unwelcome conduct may be more limited than with employees. For example, it is easier to investigate and discipline an employee than a customer. The employer still must take reasonable steps to address the situation once the matter comes to its attention.

Can sexual harassment occur without physical touching or a threat to the employee’s job?

Yes. The nature of sexual harassment may be purely verbal or visual (pornographic photos or graffiti on workplace walls, for example), and it does not have to involve any job loss. Any nonsexual but gender-based conduct that creates a work environment that a reasonable person would consider hostile may amount to sexual harassment.

Don’t men have a right to free speech? Can’t they express their view that women belong in the kitchen, not in the shop?

The first Amendment protects some forms of expression, even in the workplace, but the verbal threats often involve d in sexual harassment are not protected as free speech. For example, the First Amendment would not protect, as free speech, a supervisor’s comment to a subordinate that she will lose her job if she does not sleep with her boss. Nor will the First Amendment protect conduct that offends and intimidates other employees to the point that their work is affected, creating a sexually hostile environment. Courts have not issued clear rulings as to when the First Amendment will protect an employee’s political opinion regarding the roles of men and women in the workplace.

Is sexual harassment of men, either by women or by other men, unlawful?

Yes. Although sexual harassment generally is perpetrated by men against women, any form of unwelcome sexual advance against employees if either gender may be the basis for a case of unlawful sexual harassment.

Can individuals be legally liable for harassment, or just employers?

Some courts have held that individual employees cannot be liable under Title VII. Some state laws, however, do impose personal liability on individuals for perpetrating harassment. While employers often provide a legal defense for supervisors in a lawsuit, an employer may be entitled, after a court decision against it, to recover damages and legal expenses from a supervisor whose unauthorized conduct created the problem.

I’m so mad at the person who harassed me and at my employer that I just want to sue. Should I even bother to complain under my employer’s sexual harassment policy?

Yes. You owe it to your employer and to your co-workers to report through the organization’s channels to give the employer a chance to solve the problem promptly, before others are affected. A prompt complaint is also something that you owe yourself, even if your sole concern is to sue your employer. If you fail to use internal procedures, the employer’s defense team will be sure to use that fact to argue that (1) the conduct complained of never occurred, (2) the conduct was not really unwelcome, (3) the conduct was not sever or pervasive enough to create a hostile environment, or (4) the employer cannot be held responsible for preventing or correcting harassment that it did not know about.

Furthermore, under the 1998 decisions by the Supreme Court in Ellerth and Faragher, if the employer has an effective anti-harassment policy that the employee unreasonably fails to use, the employer may win the hostile environment lawsuit on that ground alone.

Failing to complain can be particularly harmful to your legal interests if you claim that harassment forced you to quit. It is hard to blame your employer for forcing you off the job if it could have corrected the conduct but was never given the opportunity to do so.

Source: David Kadue link