Your staff are one of the great assets of your business and one of the main ingredients to success, but why do many businesspeople tend to fail to protect their employees? Taking care of your employees is necessary, as workers are just as important as your customers.
Several factors that employment-related claims are harassment, injured employee, discrimination, wrongful termination, retaliation, lack of advancement, wrongful discipline. More claims of sexual harassment are filed in the restaurant industry than any other, where as many as 90% of women and 70% of men experience some form of sexual harassment based on 2018 study from Harvard Business Review.
According to a new study from One Fair Wage, overall, 71% of women restaurant workers had been sexually harassed at least once during their time in the restaurant industry. The survey shows that women restaurant workers are most frequently harassed by customers, they may be pervasively sexualized and sexually harassed by supervisors, managers, or restaurant owners. Combining tipped and non-tipped workers, 44% stated they had been victims of sexual harassment from someone in a management or ownership role.
Do you prevent the risk of sexual harassment in your workplace?
As stated by Sachi Barreiro, Attorney, here are some strategies to protect your team as well as your business.
- Adopt a clear sexual harassment policy. In your employee handbook, you should have a policy devoted to sexual harassment. That policy should:
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- define sexual harassment.
- state in no uncertain terms that you will not tolerate sexual harassment.
- state that you will discipline or fire any wrongdoers.
- set out a clear procedure for filing sexual harassment complaints.
- state that you will investigate fully any complaint that you receive, and
- state that you will not tolerate retaliation against anyone who complains about sexual harassment.
- Train employees. At least once a year, conduct training sessions for employees. These sessions should teach employees what sexual harassment is, explain that employees have a right to a workplace free of sexual harassment, review your complaint procedure, and encourage employees to use it.
- Train supervisors and managers. At least once a year, conduct training sessions for supervisors and managers that are separate from the employee sessions. The sessions should educate the managers and supervisors about sexual harassment and explain how to deal with complaints.
- Monitor your workplace. Get out among your employees periodically. Talk to them about the work environment. Ask for their input. Look around the workplace itself. Do you see any offensive posters or notes? Talk to your supervisors and managers about what is going on. Keep the lines of communication open.
- Take all complaints seriously. If someone complains about sexual harassment, act immediately to investigate the complaint. If the complaint turns out to be valid, your response should be swift and effective.
Call today and see how Klinger Insurance Group can help you to protect in insuring the welfare of your employees as well as foundation of your business. Talk to us at 301-428-4935 or email us at info@klingerinsurancegroup.com and visit us www.klingerinsurancegroup.com.
