Sexual harassment at work can have very serious consequences both for the harassed individual as well as for other working women who experience it secondhand.

The consequences to the individual employee can be many and serious. In some situations, a harassed woman risks losing her job or the chance for a promotion if she refuses to give in to the sexual demands of someone in authority. In other situations, the unwelcome sexual conduct of co-workers makes the working conditions hostile and unpleasant- putting indirect pressure on her to leave the job. Sometimes, the employee is so traumatized by the harassment that she suffers serious emotional and physical consequences and very often, becomes unable to perform her job properly.

According to data complied by Equal Rights Advocates, a women’s law center in the U.S., 90 to 95% of sexually harassed women suffer from some debilitating stress reaction, including anxiety, depression, headaches, sleep disorders, weight loss or gain, nausea, lowered self-esteem and sexual dysfunction. In addition, victims of sexual harassment lose $4.4 million dollars in wages and 973,000 hours in unpaid leave each year in the United States.

The consequences to working women as a group are no less serious. Sexual harassment has a cumulative, demoralizing effect that discourages women from asserting themselves within the workplace, while among men it reinforces stereotypes of women employees as sex objects.Severe or pervasive sexual harassment in certain types of businesses creates a hostile or intimidating environment that causes women to leave their jobs and look elsewhere for work or discourages them from seeking those jobs in the first place.

The effect on the morale of all employees can also be serious. Both men and women in a workplace can find their work disrupted by sexual harassment even if they are not directly involved. Sexual harassment can have a demoralizing effect on everyone within range of it, and it often negatively impacts company productivity on the whole.

Strategies
to prevent sexual harassment

It is recommended that employers take the following steps to prevent sexual
harassment.

(a) Get
high-level management support

Obtain high level support from the chief executive officer and senior
management for implementing a comprehensive strategy to address sexual
harassment.

(b) Write
and implement a sexual harassment policy

• Develop a written policy which prohibits sexual harassment in consultation
  with staff and relevant unions.
• Regularly distribute and promote the policy at all levels of the
  organisation. Ensure the policy is easily accessible on the organisation’s
  intranet.
• Provide the policy and other relevant information on sexual harassment to
  new staff as a standard part of induction.
• Translate the policy into relevant community languages where required so it
  is accessible to employees from culturally and linguistically diverse
  backgrounds.
• Ensure that the policy is accessible to staff members with a
  disability.
• Ensure that managers and supervisors discuss and reinforce the policy at
  staff meetings. Verbal communication of the policy is particularly important in
  workplaces where the literacy of staff may be an issue.
• Periodically review the policy to ensure it is operating effectively and
  contains up-to-date information.

(c) Provide
regular training and information on sexual harassment to all staff and
management

• Conduct regular training sessions for all staff and management on sexual
  harassment and the organisational policy. This training should be behaviourally
  based which means it should increase knowledge and understanding of specific
  behaviours that may amount to sexual harassment under the Sex Discrimination
  Act. Regular refresher training is recommended.
• Train all line managers on their role in ensuring that the workplace is free
  from sexual harassment.
• Display anti-sexual harassment posters on notice boards in common work areas
  and distribute relevant brochures.

(d) Encourage
appropriate conduct by managers

• Line managers should understand the need to model appropriate standards of
  professional conduct at all times.
• Include accountability mechanisms in position descriptions for
  managers.
• Ensure that selection criteria for management positions include the
  requirement that managers have a demonstrated understanding of and ability to
  deal with discrimination and harassment issues as part of their overall
  responsibility for human resources.
• Check that managers are fulfilling their responsibilities through
  performance appraisal schemes.

(e) Create
a positive workplace environment

• Remove offensive, sexually explicit or pornographic calendars, literature,
  posters and other materials from the workplace.
• Develop a policy prohibiting inappropriate use of computer technology, such
  as e-mail, screen savers and the internet.
• It is recommended that medium and large employers undertake regular audits
  to monitor the incidence of sexual harassment in their workplaces and the use
  and effectiveness of their complaints procedures.